By one of the few Irish politicians that makes any sense of the vote chasing antics going on!

Referendums ‘a marketing ploy by the Government ahead of elections,’ Aontú leader claims, as Green minister says ‘there were many reasons why people voted no’ independent.ie/irish-news/ref… Maybe not far from the truth when the parties pushing a ‘yes’ vote clearly didn’t examine the difference between a government influenced abortion vote and one that had no chance of ever succeeding.

Derry and Gaza - a unique bond of solidarity and shared history of oppression!

There is possibly no other city or few countries in the world that shares the bond of suffering at the hands of an army of occupation quite like the populations of Derry City and the people of Gaza.

It's really disturbing to still listen to people defending the Israeli Government despite the rising death toll in the last 24 hours in Gaza. There are no two sides to this Genocide. The IDF is an illegal occupying force. They are the terrorists in Gaza. Hamas are the democratically elected governing authority in Gaza. Under international law they have the absolute right to resist occupation with military force. There is no alternative narrative.

So long as the British Government continue to try to wrangle their way out of their share of guilt for the violence of the years leading up to the GFA by setting up mock tribunals and commissions of enquiry, many Irish people will conclude that British justice is a total farce! For young NI loyalists it may even be an epiphany or wake up moment that spells out the fact that we cannot trust anything British and for some frustrated Nationalists that justice only speaks out the barrel of a gun!

Ireland should now refer the state of Israel’s Genocide in Gaza to the ICJ. By doing so, there will be no need for the ICC to prove any intention on the part of Israel to commit Genocide before the court can accept they have the jurisdiction to prosecute the case. Any one of the 153 member states that are all party to the Geneva Convention can under Article IX do so but it only takes one to take up the torch of justice to force the ICC to prosecute the many Israeli officials responsible but also those who aided and abetted their actions.

It is wrong to refer to all Israelis or Palestinians as nazis, terrorists or claim that they hate each other. Anti-Semitism and Islamaphobia are both forms of hate crimes. Anti-Zionism is however a separate thing to Judaism or being Israeli. Zionism is colonialism. Zionists are not necessarily Jewish in the religious sense of the word but often secular minded Israelis who are out to ethically cleanse or subjugate millions of Palestinians in the most brutal manner that they will become a minority within a greater Israel without any rights!

This is why more and more Irish people north and south are thinking more about a UI since that disastrous decision led by English Nationalists in 2016 who didn’t give a damn about anyone else threw Northern Ireland over a cliff - It’s not just about who broke Britain! A United Ireland is no longer a dream. It is both economically feasible and desirable, even a necessity if Northern Ireland is to find its natural homeland and place in the world.

Time and time again we hear that the International Community has ignored the plight of the Palestinian people. Israel and the US as well as twelve other countries do not get the final say when 130 countries voted to call for a ceasefire. Neither does the Press/Media or any politicians get to have the final say and that includes those sponsored by wealthy Zionists and we know who they are! Pressure is mounting on #JoeBiden and other world leaders who have been complicit in an Act of Genocide.

Is Ireland facing an existential threat from far right groups from both inside and outside its borders seeking to dismantle democracy and install highly authoritarian regimes in its place? The recent events in Dublin along with certain individuals rule in criticising the country’s leaders and forces of law and order would certainly suggest that far right thinking is driving the language being posted on social media.

Why do the media keep ignoring the fact Hamas has no presence or authority on the West Bank yet many reporters fail to condemn Israel, the IDF and the local Jewish Settlers for the systematic ethnic cleansing there as if West Bank Palestinians are viewed as terrorists by default? Why does it take an entire column of tanks and trained snipers to surround a hospital on all sides and shoot everyone who hasn't already died from Israeli bombing, lack of water, fuel and food? This is massive overkill and obviously nothing to do with a proportionate response.

To those including @SuellaBraverman @RishiSunak and the tarbrushing #ConservativeParty who would oppose a protest march in support of those #Palestinians being bombed by #Isreal, you are conveniently ignoring the connection between #RemembranceSunday and what’s happening in #Gaza The above named hypocrites are completing ignoring the fact that thousands of graves of British soldiers who are buried in Gaza and number more than the total number who died in Afghanistan are buried in Commonwealth War Graves tended beautifully by the Palestinian people! Fact

It’s almost incredulous that any Israeli Government would ever conceive conducting indiscriminate bombing and forcing Palestinians from their homeland given their history of both the Holocaust and the period of exile to Babylon which lasted 60 years from 597-538 BCE. However both events would appear to have hardened the resolve of the Jewish people, and left an indelible imprint on their psyche. Attacks by Hamas result in a form of seige mentality amongst the more religious zealots in Israel that sees all Palestinians as the enemy.

We must stop allowing the liberal elites who back Israel to impose their own narrative on the real history of Palestine. There is no Arab-Israeli conflict. It is an ‘Occupation’. Stop labelling Palestinians as terrorists. The true terrorists are the Israeli government. We should refrain from equating Hamas with Palestinians as Netanyahu created and funded Hamas to thwart Palestinians unity between the people of Gaza and their West Bank brothers and sisters. Hamas does not represent all the Palestinian people!

Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Natanyahu has announced that Israeli will assume responsibility for all security in Gaza once their current military response is completed. This will likely mean moving Jewish settlers into Gaza once they have destroyed all infrastructure and Hamas presence and subjugate the last few Palestinians should any survive under the same harsh military law and courts that Palestinians on the West Bank have been subjected to.

We must always understand the historical context that led up to this brutal massacre of young people in cold revenge by probably some of the third generation descendants of those who were expelled from the land they once owned here! History and violence often repeats itself! 😢

https://twitter.com/pgavigan77/status/1720904805814591528

Unless we learn the lessons of the past we will never be able to provide a solution that ensures such incidents never happen again. Both sides must be prepared to acknowledge their part in these crimes against humanity to free them from their past and begin a new shared future.

What is going on here??

How can Sinn Fein meet with Palestinian and Arab ambassadors on the one hand and then abstain from supporting a call for the Israeli Ambassador to be expelled. Abstention is failure not only to act but also to refrain from doing the right thing.🇵🇸🇮🇪

The fallout in terms of voters switching to SDLP or not voting in the next NI election at all is already a probability given the level of anger expressed online by even life time supporters of Sinn Fein! Could the abstention prove to be a huge mistake and political disaster?

There is absolutely no plan from the Israeli Government as to what they will put in its place even if they manage to destroy Hamas and that is far from as simple an objective as what they assume. Why? Hamas is a huge organisation that is interwoven into the very fabric of Palestinian life and its people. It has both a political and military wing, a women’s branch and various ministries as well as strong connections to other armed militant groups throughout the Arab world.

In my uni days I had to decide what area of Middle or Far Eastern History I would focus on for my final dissertation. It was a question that attracted me as a young man to dive headlong into the history of another turbulent part of the world that was as volatile as my own! Never one for avoiding a challenge and looking for something to really seize my youthful energies, believe it or not I chose to do it on the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) and suggested rather naively that I would visit an Israeli Kibbutz for the duration of my research

You will never tell Irish people what to sing. No British or West Brit media will ever be allowed to control the narrative around our history whatever revisionists think! instagram.com/reel/CxyGx7mo8… The sad reality is that there is no allowance for the fact that there are two sides to this tale of bitter conflict between those who rose from oppression and discrimination to fight the system and those who to did everything to maintain the status quo by sectarian killings

Whether you like it or not the Cranberries song ‘Zombie’ is to many nationalists in the north of Ireland as much a peace song as a loyalist band playing the Billy Boys as they march down a Catholic Housing Estate. This may seem to many as an overstatement or exaggeration!

https://twitter.com/irish_news/status/1706365445748474038

Why it is not a peace song is because the very lyrics of the song don’t even try to present a balanced picture of the crimes committed by both sides to the NI conflict that includes not only those of the IRA but also states forces in collusion with armed loyalist paramilitaries.

The current points system for being allocated a house in the Derry/Londonderry area is clearly not fit for purpose when disabled applicants with serious complex needs are being rejected on the grounds that their total points are insufficient due to being maxed out. The points system is being unfairly exploited by those in the know who even boast on social media platforms such as Facebook that they know exactly when the latest housing schemes are being released, how many units, and who is getting them.