Archive for the ‘History of Ireland’ Category
Two Irish Green Party “Rebels” Plan to Vote for Landlords in Dáil Éireann – Thousands of Tenants Will be Evicted
It seems certain that Green Party “Rebels” Neasa Hourigan TD (Dublin Central) and Patrick Costello TD (Dublin South-Central) will vote with FFFGGG coalition colleagues allowing landlords to evict tenants who will become homeless. A bad housing crisis will become worse.
Here is a quote from Deputy Costello’s website : “Ireland needs quality public housing – we need to build more homes, for all ages and incomes. Yet there is very little building happening, either public or private. This needs to change”.
The Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Threshold paints a grim picture :
Read the rest of this entry »“War and an Irish Town” – Joan McKiernan reviews a classic Eamonn McCann study of Derry and Partitioned Ireland
Joan McKiernan is an Irish-American socialist-feminist activist living in New York.
Joan McKiernan
War and an Irish Town
Source : https://againstthecurrent.org/atc223/war-and-an-irish-town/
By Eamonn McCann
First publication Pluto Press, 1974. Chicago: Haymarket Books edition, 2018, $20 paperback.
“‘WE’RE GONNA WALK on this nation, we’re gonna walk on this racist power structure, and we’re gonna say to the whole damned government — “STICK ‘EM UP MOTHERFUCKERS.’”
WITH THIS QUOTE from a film of the Black Panthers, Eamonn McCann, launches the Haymarket edition of his classic study of Derry and the North of Ireland Troubles, War and an Irish Town, taking us back to those heady days when so much change not only seemed possible, but likely to happen.
This is an especially timely reissue when the question of a united Ireland is again on the table.
Those in Derry that 1968 night cheering the Black Panthers’ words shared a common goal: the fight against inequality and repression, whether on the streets of Derry or Chicago where Black activists were “then under murderous assault by the feds and local police forces across the US.”
In those years, from Vietnam to Yugoslavia, Chicago to Mexico and many other places, the world was filled with students, workers, communities fighting back. McCann argues that “Each upsurge of struggle sent out a flurry of sparks which helped ignite struggle elsewhere.”
He situates The Troubles in the North of Ireland in this time of international struggles. Those who were there for those struggles should read this latest edition, with a new introduction by the author, to reconsider what happened and why we did not win. Those who were too young at the time can read about those exciting times and what lessons can be learned for the future.
Read the rest of this entry »Cedar Lounge Blog Response to People Before Profit Pamphlet : “The case for a left government / Getting rid of Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael.”
The Cedar Lounge Blog publishes a very good assessment of a recent People Before Profit Pamphlet. Source : https://cedarlounge.wordpress.com/2023/03/08/left-wing-unity/
Everyone on the Irish Left needs to keep the focus on supporting left wing election candidates who rule out coalition with the right in all circumstances. On this key point, People Before Profit is correct.
Predicting a general election result almost two years from now is unwise. The current Fianna Fáil/Fine Gael/ Green Party FFFGGG coalition can remain in office until February 2025. These three parties will not voluntarily cut and run unless at least one of them is sure they will benefit from a fresh general election. Could the government fall due to external pressures? That’s possible. At the moment one serious crisis follows another. The latest arises from a government decision making it easier for landlords to evict tenants.
Read the rest of this entry »International Women’s Day 2023 in Ireland – Show Solidarity With the Women of Ukraine – Wednesday March 8, The Spire, O’Connell Street, Dublin
On 8 March, Wednesday, #IWD an International Women’s Day march assembles 17.30 at The Spire, Dublin.
The Irish Left with Ukraine, part of the European Network with Ukraine will attend will attend to show our solidarity with the Ukrainian resistance and the Ukrainian feminist resistance.
Links : https://www.facebook.com/groups/irishleftwithukraine @EuropeanWith https://ukraine-solidarity.eu/
Read the rest of this entry »Have British Tories Thrown Jeffrey Donaldson’s Democratic Unionist party to the Wolves? Is the”Windsor Framework” the “NI Protocol” in Different Clothes?
Readers may wonder :
Has British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak thrown the Democratic Unionist party of British-occupied Ireland to the wolves? Early indications suggest the answer is Yes.
The cause? Brexit.
Sunak’s former boss Boris Johnson’s negotiated a 2019 “Oven Ready Brexit” which featured the “Northern Ireland Protocol” (NIP) in 2019. This facilitated a landslide Tory General Election victory in December of that year. Things were different in the six-county bit of Ireland (Northern Ireland) and Scotland. In both of these locations, the Brexiteer forces were soundly rejected by the voters. Sunak now claims the NIP has been replaced by the “Windsor Framework”.
Establishment media outlets are ecstatic, claiming the Third British Brexit Prime Minister of 2021 has “Done the Impossible”
https://www.irishtimes.com/politics/2023/02/28/windsor-framework-brexit-deal-what-the-papers-say/
There is one significant dissenting note, which is almost certainly closer to the truth. It comes from the outstanding British Guardian cartoonist Steve Bell :
Read the rest of this entry »Ukraine: Voices of Resistance and Solidarity – Dublin Book Launch Report and Video
We wish to thank Independent Left, Conor Kostick, Donnacha Ó Bríain, Halyna Herasym and Nóirín Greene for this report and visual record. Source : https://independentleft.ie/voices-of-resistance/
Ukraine: Voices of Resistance and Solidarity
27/02/2023
Ukraine: Voices of Resistance and Solidarity is a book edited by Fred Leplat and Chris Ford, published by Resistance Books and Ukraine Solidarity campaign. It contains essays by Mick Antoniw, Welsh Labour MP; John-Paul Himka, history professor; Taras Bilous, activist for Sotsialnyi Rukh / Social Movement; Yuliya Yurchenko activist for Ukraine Solidarity Campaign and Sotsialnyi Rukh / Social Movement; Oksana Dutchak, co-editor of Spilne/ Commons; Viktoriia Pihul, Ukrainian feminist; Nataliya Levytska, Deputy Chair of the Confederation of Free Trade Unions of Ukraine; Vitalii Dudin president of Sotsialnyi Rukh / Social Movement; Bogdan Ferens, founder of the Social Democratic Platform; Eric Toussaint, spokesperson of the CADTM International; Ilya Budraitskis, activist in the Russian Socialist Movement; Niko Vorobyov, Russian-British freelance journalist; Gilbert Achcar, Lebanese socialist; Simon Pirani professor of modern languages and cultures; Stephen R. Shalom, editor of New Politics; and Dan La Botz, editor of New Politics.
Read the rest of this entry »The first anniversary of the imperialist military invasion of Ukraine by the Russian Federation on 24 February 2022 – Statement by Irish Left With Ukraine (ILWU)
The Ukrainian people are foremost on our minds as they suffer under and resist the Russian invasion. Anyone who considers themselves an opponent of imperialism should be in support of their resistance.
We in the ILWU — socialists, anarchists, feminists, trade unionists, anti-imperialists — have watched with dismay, however, as many on the Western left who have campaigned vigorously against US imperialism have failed to recognise the need to do the same with respect to Russian imperialism. If Ukraine has the right to self-determination and to resist the dismemberment and partition of their state then Irish socialists should expend their energy on seeking out practical means of supporting the Ukrainian people’s struggle. This struggle echoes the same fight Ireland undertook over a century ago.
Some left-wing organisations oppose deliveries of weapons to Ukraine. They are fast becoming isolated in the international labour movement. Trade unions, social movements, and organised left-wing parties across the European continent are mobilising in support of the Ukrainian right to self determination.
Indeed some left-wing organisations oppose deliveries of weapons to Ukraine. They are fast becoming isolated in the international labour movement. Trade unions, social movements, and organised left-wing parties across the European continent are mobilising in support of the Ukrainian right to self determination.
Support Irish State Mine Clearance in Ukraine
The ILWU makes this statement to publicly register our support for Irish assistance, by the Irish Defence Forces, with mine clearance in Ukraine. Mine clearance is humanitarian work that will save lives, will clear land to enable farming, and will make towns and villages habitable once again. Defence Forces personnel will use their specialist demining skills to train Ukrainians in this activity.
Read the rest of this entry »RUSSIAN PRESIDENT VLADIMIR PUTIN THROWS LEFT SUPPORTERS UNDER THE BUS – by Brendan Ogle
The Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke for several hours to a captive audience in a Moscow palace on February 21, describing LGBT Rights as “Pure Satanism”. Brendan Ogle, a UNITE Trade Union official in Ireland, responds. Source : https://www.facebook.com/camilo.ogle
It had to come to this.
In fact for those watching, those not completely blinded by their understandable hatred of US and NATO imperialism, it came to this a long time ago. But yesterday it happened in horrific awful technicolour. Putin threw left supporters – and there are still far too many of them – under the bus.
A year from his invasion of Ukraine Putin’s war with what he calls ‘the west’ has now openly gone full #FarRight. The language of the toxic fascist inspired racist protests that took place here and elsewhere recently is 100% Putin’s language. He helped to create it. Yesterday in a lengthy monologue in front of a room of nodding donkeys applauding rapturously in case they got a nerve agent in their lunch, he described LGBT rights as ‘pure satanism’, engaged in transphobic hate speech and described paedophilia as the ‘new norm’ in the west.
A year from his invasion of Ukraine Putin’s war with what he calls ‘the west’ has now openly gone full #FarRight. The language of the toxic fascist inspired racist protests that took place here and elsewhere recently is 100% Putin’s language. He helped to create it.
Yesterday in a lengthy monologue in front of a room of nodding donkeys applauding rapturously in case they got a nerve agent in their lunch, he described LGBT rights as ‘pure satanism’, engaged in transphobic hate speech and described paedophilia as the ‘new norm’ in the west.
Sound familiar?
Read the rest of this entry »February 18 2023 – Tens of Thousands Demonstrate Against Racism and the Far-Right in Dublin
Brendan Ogle (UNITE Trade Union) introduces film highlights of the February 18 2023 Ireland for All Solidarity March in Dublin :
A diverse band for sure, an eclectic mix of the great, the good and …well. The point is Ireland 
is about 
not hate.
Get the hate off our streets.
NEVER LET THE FASCISTS HAVE THE STREETS
(Put together by the brilliant @martinblake) :
https://www.facebook.com/100006503678746/videos/756058655802297/
Photos of the demonstration – special thanks to Mike Finn and Maeve Foreman :
Read the rest of this entry »
Tomás Ó Flatharta 