Anthony McIntyre's Blog, page 1123
August 10, 2018
August 9, 2018
Art Of Protest
Paul Kelly thinks that people don't think enough about the papal visit.
I have no problem admitting my lack of expertise regarding art. I just don’t get it. I can gaze at a masterpiece for ages without the foggiest idea of the message being conveyed. During a trip to the Louvre in 2010 I stood with the throngs in front of the Mona Lisa and wondered what all the fuss is about. My initial reaction to the Venus de Milo was what nasty habits must she have had that necessitated the removal of her arms. The Raft of Medusa fascinated me for two reasons; the sheer enormity of it and that it was parodied in 1985 on the cover of Rum, Sodomy and the Lash, the second album by The Pogues which I’ll always hold dear as it was the first time I’d ever heard an expletive in a song. But I know when I look at something whether I like it or not.
Taking all of the above into account, I decided to attend the ‘Art of Protest’ exhibition in Kenny’s Gallery, Galway after seeing it advertised recently in the Tuam Herald. It runs until August 25th. All of the regulars were represented; Che Guevara, Bobby Sands, the Palestinian Intifada, Bloody Sunday and Repeal the 8th to name but a few. One item on display will haunt me forever. Olga Magliocco’s Tuam Babies, A Memorial is a 22ft x 6ft cotton sheet with the names and ages of the 796 children who perished at the Tuam Mother and Babies home between 1925 and 1960. The youngest victim lived for 10 minutes. The oldest survived for nine years.
The event was officially launched by local historian Catherine Corless. During her address this unassuming, indomitable and inspirational woman spoke of her frustration at the indifference shown to her and the victims by some in positions of influence and their absolute unwillingness to support the campaign. This frustration and despair was reinforced further when Mrs Corless spoke after the meeting in Tuam last Monday (23/7) at which Minister for Children, Katherine Zappone, was present: “….I do believe her (Mrs Zappone) heart is in the right place and if she can get the backing of the cabinet, that they will go ahead with the exhumation.” That Mrs Corless felt compelled to use the term ‘if’ speaks volumes.
Let us remind ourselves of what Mrs Corless’ campaign is seeking: Long overdue recognition and justice for 796 children who died of neglect while in the ostensible ‘care’ of the Bon Secours Sisters at Tuam Mother and Baby home, a veritable concentration camp. 796 children who were subsequently deemed subhuman and unworthy of a Christian burial whose remains were dumped in a sewer.
In a little over 3 weeks, the current CEO of the profit-obsessed company responsible for this holocaust, Jorge Bergoglio (aka Pope Francis) will arrive in Ireland to a trumpet fanfare. His stay will be just shy of 36 hours. He won’t be here long enough to warrant packing his toothbrush yet this glorified refueling stopover will cost the Irish taxpayer an estimated €20m.
Surely, this money could be put to better use? The hospital trolley crisis immediately springs to mind.
Arrangements are already underway to stage a peaceful protest during the visit. The “Say Nope to the Pope” campaign has been described by Taoiseach Leo Varadkar as “wrong, petty and mean-spirited….” and “…not a legitimate protest.” Leo’s lapdog, Micheal Martin went a step further by referring to those intending to exercise their democratic right as “…petty, intolerant and certainly the opposite of progressive.”
What adjectives, I wonder, would Leo and Micheal use to describe an organization that tolerates its’ employees raping and torturing children, protects the assailants, demonizes the victims, orchestrates cover-ups and obstructs subsequent criminal investigations? “Mean-spirited” doesn’t quite cover it.
Professor of Irish Studies at Concordia University and regular Irish Times contributor Dr Emer O’Toole crunched some very depressing numbers in an article for The Guardian recently. With the Irish taxpayer picking up the exorbitant tab (the Ryan report alone cost €82m), the Ferns (2005), Ryan (2009), Murphy (2009), Cloyne (2011) and Raphoe (2011) reports all revealed a plethora of cover-ups of sexual and physical abuse in state-funded, church-run institutions. Each report confirmed protecting church assets by far superseded child welfare. For example, Cloyne found that Bishop John Magee was ordered by Rome to deliberately mislead the authorities investigating his handling of sexual abuse allegations. He didn’t need much persuading.
Established in 2002, the redress scheme for victims of clerical abuse was set at €1.5b. The state had hoped to split the costs of the scheme with the church 50/50 but as of April 2017 the church had only contributed €96m, roughly 6% of the redress, prompting Minister for Education, Richard Bruton to comment; “…it is disappointing the organizations responsible for protecting children, which managed the institutions in which these horrendous acts took place, would apparently place so little value on their responsibility." (Irish Independent 4/4/17) Since then, according to Dr O’Toole, the church has only stumped up a further €100m to compensate those it tortured for decades.
I hope anyone considering waving a yellow flag in Knock on Sunday August 26th will chew on this before loading up the car.
I’m sure there are those amongst us more than willing to go to bat for the church. I hope they do. I welcome debate. And I’d be very interested to hear a positive spin put on genocide, child rape, torture, slavery and human trafficking.
➽Paul Kelly is a Tuam based writer.
I have no problem admitting my lack of expertise regarding art. I just don’t get it. I can gaze at a masterpiece for ages without the foggiest idea of the message being conveyed. During a trip to the Louvre in 2010 I stood with the throngs in front of the Mona Lisa and wondered what all the fuss is about. My initial reaction to the Venus de Milo was what nasty habits must she have had that necessitated the removal of her arms. The Raft of Medusa fascinated me for two reasons; the sheer enormity of it and that it was parodied in 1985 on the cover of Rum, Sodomy and the Lash, the second album by The Pogues which I’ll always hold dear as it was the first time I’d ever heard an expletive in a song. But I know when I look at something whether I like it or not.
Taking all of the above into account, I decided to attend the ‘Art of Protest’ exhibition in Kenny’s Gallery, Galway after seeing it advertised recently in the Tuam Herald. It runs until August 25th. All of the regulars were represented; Che Guevara, Bobby Sands, the Palestinian Intifada, Bloody Sunday and Repeal the 8th to name but a few. One item on display will haunt me forever. Olga Magliocco’s Tuam Babies, A Memorial is a 22ft x 6ft cotton sheet with the names and ages of the 796 children who perished at the Tuam Mother and Babies home between 1925 and 1960. The youngest victim lived for 10 minutes. The oldest survived for nine years.
The event was officially launched by local historian Catherine Corless. During her address this unassuming, indomitable and inspirational woman spoke of her frustration at the indifference shown to her and the victims by some in positions of influence and their absolute unwillingness to support the campaign. This frustration and despair was reinforced further when Mrs Corless spoke after the meeting in Tuam last Monday (23/7) at which Minister for Children, Katherine Zappone, was present: “….I do believe her (Mrs Zappone) heart is in the right place and if she can get the backing of the cabinet, that they will go ahead with the exhumation.” That Mrs Corless felt compelled to use the term ‘if’ speaks volumes.
Let us remind ourselves of what Mrs Corless’ campaign is seeking: Long overdue recognition and justice for 796 children who died of neglect while in the ostensible ‘care’ of the Bon Secours Sisters at Tuam Mother and Baby home, a veritable concentration camp. 796 children who were subsequently deemed subhuman and unworthy of a Christian burial whose remains were dumped in a sewer.
In a little over 3 weeks, the current CEO of the profit-obsessed company responsible for this holocaust, Jorge Bergoglio (aka Pope Francis) will arrive in Ireland to a trumpet fanfare. His stay will be just shy of 36 hours. He won’t be here long enough to warrant packing his toothbrush yet this glorified refueling stopover will cost the Irish taxpayer an estimated €20m.
Surely, this money could be put to better use? The hospital trolley crisis immediately springs to mind.
Arrangements are already underway to stage a peaceful protest during the visit. The “Say Nope to the Pope” campaign has been described by Taoiseach Leo Varadkar as “wrong, petty and mean-spirited….” and “…not a legitimate protest.” Leo’s lapdog, Micheal Martin went a step further by referring to those intending to exercise their democratic right as “…petty, intolerant and certainly the opposite of progressive.”
What adjectives, I wonder, would Leo and Micheal use to describe an organization that tolerates its’ employees raping and torturing children, protects the assailants, demonizes the victims, orchestrates cover-ups and obstructs subsequent criminal investigations? “Mean-spirited” doesn’t quite cover it.
Professor of Irish Studies at Concordia University and regular Irish Times contributor Dr Emer O’Toole crunched some very depressing numbers in an article for The Guardian recently. With the Irish taxpayer picking up the exorbitant tab (the Ryan report alone cost €82m), the Ferns (2005), Ryan (2009), Murphy (2009), Cloyne (2011) and Raphoe (2011) reports all revealed a plethora of cover-ups of sexual and physical abuse in state-funded, church-run institutions. Each report confirmed protecting church assets by far superseded child welfare. For example, Cloyne found that Bishop John Magee was ordered by Rome to deliberately mislead the authorities investigating his handling of sexual abuse allegations. He didn’t need much persuading.
Established in 2002, the redress scheme for victims of clerical abuse was set at €1.5b. The state had hoped to split the costs of the scheme with the church 50/50 but as of April 2017 the church had only contributed €96m, roughly 6% of the redress, prompting Minister for Education, Richard Bruton to comment; “…it is disappointing the organizations responsible for protecting children, which managed the institutions in which these horrendous acts took place, would apparently place so little value on their responsibility." (Irish Independent 4/4/17) Since then, according to Dr O’Toole, the church has only stumped up a further €100m to compensate those it tortured for decades.
I hope anyone considering waving a yellow flag in Knock on Sunday August 26th will chew on this before loading up the car.
I’m sure there are those amongst us more than willing to go to bat for the church. I hope they do. I welcome debate. And I’d be very interested to hear a positive spin put on genocide, child rape, torture, slavery and human trafficking.
➽Paul Kelly is a Tuam based writer.
August 8, 2018
A German View On James Connolly
Dieter Reinisch reviews a German work on James Connolly.
In the past three or so years, hundreds of books on almost all aspects of the 1916 rising have been published. It is hard to keep track of the wide range of topics and qualities. I doubt that anyone can read all those books. Certainly, one approach to handle the literature is to look at the more idiosyncratic titles published to commemorate the 1916 centenary.
One of these books is a small German language book by Priscilla and Thomas Metscher on James Connolly’s political thinking. What makes this book particularly interesting is that it provides a view of James Connolly and early 20th century Socialist Republicanism from outside Ireland.
Moreover, the understanding of James Connolly is starkly underdeveloped – one could say, almost non-existing – in Germany and Austria. While a wide-range of Socialist and Marxist thinkers and activists got translated to German in the GDR, James Connolly never received this honour. Not even any of the numerous Maoist, Trotskyist, Anti-Revisionist, Titoist, or Hoxhaist splinters that saw the light of day in the 1970s ever embraced Connolly. It took the GDR state-publisher Dietz as long as 1975 to publish a small volume on Marx and Engels writings on Ireland entitled “Island in Revolt”.
In 1989, the conference proceedings “Ireland: Society and Culture” were edited by Doretha Siegmund-Schultze. The conference was held in September 1988, about two years before the end of the GDR. Thus, there is a reason to argue that this volume reflects that state of research on Ireland in the final days of the Eastern Germany academy. Notably, not even one of the 29 contributions deals with James Connolly! The authors of the new book on Connolly, Priscilla and Thomas Metscher themselves devote chapters on Mary Ann McCracken and the United Irishmen revolution, respectively. In short, Helga Woggon’s academic tome “Integrative Socialism and National Liberation”, published in 1990, remains the only German-language publication on James Connolly.
Although Irish history and the conflict have occasionally attracted interest among German readers, Connolly remains a largely unknown figure. While anti-imperialist solidarity has a long tradition in Germany, Connolly is not among the read authors of national liberation and anti-imperialism in Germany, while the writings of Roger Casement, Bobby Sands, and even Gerry Adams are all available in German.
Under those circumstances, the book by Priscilla and Thomas Metscher is a welcome addition to the German literature on Ireland. The book is a translation from English based on Thomas Metschers’ papers delivered on the topic to conferences in Dublin and Havana in 2001 and 2002. This makes the bulk of 80 pages. It is accompanied by a short introduction on the volume and James Connolly by the translators and a 25 pages chapter on the political life of Connolly by Priscilla Metscher. In addition, five of Connolly writings, “Socialism and Nationalism”, “The Boer War”, “Labor, Nationality and Religion”, “A Continental Revolution”, and “On Women” are – some of them for the first time – translated into German and included as an appendix.
The whole book has 150 pages. Unfortunately, rather than providing an in-depth introduction and analyses to Connolly’s writings, Thomas Metscher devotes over 30 pages to an introduction to his own interpretation of the principles of Marxism and Historical Materialism. This is followed by his interpretation of the concept of “integrative Marxism”. The terminology resembles Woggon’s “integrative Socialism” but Woggon is not referenced in the book.
The final part of Thomas’ contribution finally deals with Connolly himself. Here, he analyses central aspects of Connolly’s writings and political evolution. He attempts to interpret Connolly’s approach as “integrative Marxism” and portrays him, in accordance with Antonio Gramsci, as an “organic intellectual”. This part heavily relies on the writings of Lenin and Connolly. The quotes from Connolly’s writings are well-organised under several sub-headlines but more introduction and contextualisation would be helpful to guide the reader unfamiliar with Connolly through these texts.
There are certain originality and strength in explaining Connolly as an “organic intellectual”; by portraying Connolly as a Marxist thinker, however, oftentimes the author goes way over the top when presenting him as the greatest and most advanced Marxist writer of his time – second only to Lenin himself.
Following Thomas’ introduction to Connolly’s writings, Priscilla introduces the political life of Connolly. In this final part of the book, she stresses Connolly’s rationale for uniting the Socialist and the Nationalist struggle in an Irish context. In this account lies the great strength of the small volume and this notion will be most interesting to German readers. This part should have, indeed, been printed as the primer to the book, for it introduces the readers not familiar with Irish Republicanism and Socialism in the early 20th century to Connolly and his political life. Thomas is not always able to do this, and readers of his part will feel thrown into excerpts of Connolly’s writings without being given sufficient context.
I read this book in parallel with Priscilla’s contribution to “A Festschrift for Anthony Coughlan” (Iontas Press, 2018). In this chapter, she compares the Desmond Greaves biographies of Connolly and Liam Mellows. As the book on Connolly under review, her chapter on “Desmond Greaves, Marxist Historian” deserves a wide readership.
In sum, taken both parts by Thomas and Priscilla Metscher together, this book is a welcome addition to the German debate on anti-colonialism and on Ireland. It will introduce German readers, students and activists alike, to the life and thinking of one of the most influential European revolutionaries of the 20th century. The easily accessible language and the price of 12.80, - should guarantee a wide readership of this book.
Priscilla Metscher & Thomas Metscher, Am Vorabend der Oktoberrevolution: James Connolly – sein Marxismus und der irische Osteraufstand 1916 [On the Eve of the October Revolution: James Connolly – his Marxism and the 1916 Easter Rising], Essen: Neue Impulse 2016; Am Vorabend der Oktoberrevolution - James Connolly – sein Marxismus und der irische Osteraufstand 1916
Dieter Reinisch is a Historian at the European University Institute in Florence and Editorial Board member of the journal “Studi irlandesi: A Journal of Irish Studies” (Florence University Press). He teaches History and Gender Studies at the Universities of Vienna and Salzburg. He tweets on @ReinischDieter and blogs on me.eui.eu/dieter-reinisch.
In the past three or so years, hundreds of books on almost all aspects of the 1916 rising have been published. It is hard to keep track of the wide range of topics and qualities. I doubt that anyone can read all those books. Certainly, one approach to handle the literature is to look at the more idiosyncratic titles published to commemorate the 1916 centenary.
One of these books is a small German language book by Priscilla and Thomas Metscher on James Connolly’s political thinking. What makes this book particularly interesting is that it provides a view of James Connolly and early 20th century Socialist Republicanism from outside Ireland.
Moreover, the understanding of James Connolly is starkly underdeveloped – one could say, almost non-existing – in Germany and Austria. While a wide-range of Socialist and Marxist thinkers and activists got translated to German in the GDR, James Connolly never received this honour. Not even any of the numerous Maoist, Trotskyist, Anti-Revisionist, Titoist, or Hoxhaist splinters that saw the light of day in the 1970s ever embraced Connolly. It took the GDR state-publisher Dietz as long as 1975 to publish a small volume on Marx and Engels writings on Ireland entitled “Island in Revolt”.
In 1989, the conference proceedings “Ireland: Society and Culture” were edited by Doretha Siegmund-Schultze. The conference was held in September 1988, about two years before the end of the GDR. Thus, there is a reason to argue that this volume reflects that state of research on Ireland in the final days of the Eastern Germany academy. Notably, not even one of the 29 contributions deals with James Connolly! The authors of the new book on Connolly, Priscilla and Thomas Metscher themselves devote chapters on Mary Ann McCracken and the United Irishmen revolution, respectively. In short, Helga Woggon’s academic tome “Integrative Socialism and National Liberation”, published in 1990, remains the only German-language publication on James Connolly.
Although Irish history and the conflict have occasionally attracted interest among German readers, Connolly remains a largely unknown figure. While anti-imperialist solidarity has a long tradition in Germany, Connolly is not among the read authors of national liberation and anti-imperialism in Germany, while the writings of Roger Casement, Bobby Sands, and even Gerry Adams are all available in German.
Under those circumstances, the book by Priscilla and Thomas Metscher is a welcome addition to the German literature on Ireland. The book is a translation from English based on Thomas Metschers’ papers delivered on the topic to conferences in Dublin and Havana in 2001 and 2002. This makes the bulk of 80 pages. It is accompanied by a short introduction on the volume and James Connolly by the translators and a 25 pages chapter on the political life of Connolly by Priscilla Metscher. In addition, five of Connolly writings, “Socialism and Nationalism”, “The Boer War”, “Labor, Nationality and Religion”, “A Continental Revolution”, and “On Women” are – some of them for the first time – translated into German and included as an appendix.
The whole book has 150 pages. Unfortunately, rather than providing an in-depth introduction and analyses to Connolly’s writings, Thomas Metscher devotes over 30 pages to an introduction to his own interpretation of the principles of Marxism and Historical Materialism. This is followed by his interpretation of the concept of “integrative Marxism”. The terminology resembles Woggon’s “integrative Socialism” but Woggon is not referenced in the book.
The final part of Thomas’ contribution finally deals with Connolly himself. Here, he analyses central aspects of Connolly’s writings and political evolution. He attempts to interpret Connolly’s approach as “integrative Marxism” and portrays him, in accordance with Antonio Gramsci, as an “organic intellectual”. This part heavily relies on the writings of Lenin and Connolly. The quotes from Connolly’s writings are well-organised under several sub-headlines but more introduction and contextualisation would be helpful to guide the reader unfamiliar with Connolly through these texts.
There are certain originality and strength in explaining Connolly as an “organic intellectual”; by portraying Connolly as a Marxist thinker, however, oftentimes the author goes way over the top when presenting him as the greatest and most advanced Marxist writer of his time – second only to Lenin himself.
Following Thomas’ introduction to Connolly’s writings, Priscilla introduces the political life of Connolly. In this final part of the book, she stresses Connolly’s rationale for uniting the Socialist and the Nationalist struggle in an Irish context. In this account lies the great strength of the small volume and this notion will be most interesting to German readers. This part should have, indeed, been printed as the primer to the book, for it introduces the readers not familiar with Irish Republicanism and Socialism in the early 20th century to Connolly and his political life. Thomas is not always able to do this, and readers of his part will feel thrown into excerpts of Connolly’s writings without being given sufficient context.
I read this book in parallel with Priscilla’s contribution to “A Festschrift for Anthony Coughlan” (Iontas Press, 2018). In this chapter, she compares the Desmond Greaves biographies of Connolly and Liam Mellows. As the book on Connolly under review, her chapter on “Desmond Greaves, Marxist Historian” deserves a wide readership.
In sum, taken both parts by Thomas and Priscilla Metscher together, this book is a welcome addition to the German debate on anti-colonialism and on Ireland. It will introduce German readers, students and activists alike, to the life and thinking of one of the most influential European revolutionaries of the 20th century. The easily accessible language and the price of 12.80, - should guarantee a wide readership of this book.
Priscilla Metscher & Thomas Metscher, Am Vorabend der Oktoberrevolution: James Connolly – sein Marxismus und der irische Osteraufstand 1916 [On the Eve of the October Revolution: James Connolly – his Marxism and the 1916 Easter Rising], Essen: Neue Impulse 2016; Am Vorabend der Oktoberrevolution - James Connolly – sein Marxismus und der irische Osteraufstand 1916
Dieter Reinisch is a Historian at the European University Institute in Florence and Editorial Board member of the journal “Studi irlandesi: A Journal of Irish Studies” (Florence University Press). He teaches History and Gender Studies at the Universities of Vienna and Salzburg. He tweets on @ReinischDieter and blogs on me.eui.eu/dieter-reinisch.
August 7, 2018
August 6, 2018
Israeli Supreme Court Paving The War To A War Crime
From Tikkun back in May, an illuminating piece on Israeli war crimes by Adam Keller.
Israel’s Supreme Court green lights state to commit war crime; if implemented, the justices will also be liable.
On Thursday, 24 May 2018, three Israeli Supreme Court justices – Noam Sohlberg, Anat Baron and Yael Willner – ruled that the state may demolish the homes of the community of Khan al-Ahmar, transfer the residents from their homes and relocate them. This ruling removes the last stumbling block in Israel’s way in the matter, lifting the impediment which had thus far served to defer the transfer of the community, a war crime under international law. While it is a policy shaped by the government, the justices – here as well as in other cases – pitched in and paved the road to the commission of a war crime. Personal liability for the commission of this crime will fall not only on policy-makers. Those who paved the juridical route enabling the crime are equally liable.
For years Israel has been endeavoring to displace this community for a variety of reasons, including the expansion of nearby settlements, de facto annexation of the area – without its Palestinian residents, and bisecting the West Bank, cutting it in two. To that end, Israeli authorities made the lives of the residents intolerable, hoping to make them leave their homes, ostensibly of their own volition. Khan al-Ahmar residents filed several petitions to Israel’s High Court of Justice against their being transferred. At the same time, residents from settlements in the area also filed petitions, seeking that the state implement the demolition orders. All the petitions were denied, after the state assured the court that it is seeking alternate solutions for the residents.
In the latest petition, the state wrote that such a solution had been found and that it plans to transfer the residents of Khan al-Ahmar to West Jahalin, near Abu Dis. Although the residents objected to this plan, last week (on Thursday 24 May 2018) the justices rejected their arguments and ruled that the state is allowed to transfer them.
Justice Sohlberg, who wrote the ruling, stated that the “undisputed” premise of the examination is that “construction in the Khan al-Ahmar compound, both the school and the dwellings, is unlawful,” and therefore it is clear that the state has the authority to issue demolition warrants for these structures. Based on his line of reasoning, the only question the justices are called to rule upon is whether or not the court is allowed to intervene in the way the state elects to “enforce the law.” The justices answered in the negative, finding the state’s decisions reasonable.
The justices ruled this way so as to confine their role as Supreme Court justices to handling mere bureaucratic issues. They thereby ignored the context of Israeli policy vis-à-vis the people living in Palestinian communities in the West Bank, set aside the directives of international humanitarian law (IHL), and disregarded the very heart of the matter: the fact that Israel intends to commit a war crime.
Following are some facts that the justices chose to ignore in their ruling:
1. The determination that the “construction is illegal” is meaningless
The structures in the community were in fact built without the residents having been issued building permits from the Israeli authorities. However, the residents did not choose to do so because they are deliberate lawbreakers, but because Israel’s policy keeps them from even being able to apply for building permits. The state has always evaded its responsibilities in terms of planning for the residents of these communities. The plans it has suggested always involve radical changes in the residents’ way of life and were drawn up without consulting them. Plans that the residents themselves prepared and submitted to the Civil Administration were denied on a variety of grounds. It was only when Israel had a clear interest of its own – as for example in the present case of planning West Jahalin – that the authorities rallied to arrange for speedy approval of the plan.
2. The transfer will impose a radical change in residents’ way of life
Justice Sohlberg wrote that:
Yet these statements fly in the face of reality and even contradict the statement made to the court by the state: the plan to transfer the residents to West Jahalin was made over the heads of the residents, without consulting them at all. The plan not only forces the residents to leave their homes but compels a drastic change in their way of life. Contrary to what Justice Sohlberg wrote, the plan does not enable the residents to continue working as shepherds, and the state said so plainly in its response to the petition: “The neighborhood is indeed planned in an urban environment. It therefore includes no large pasturelands or areas for farming, however it does allow for building limited storerooms and livestock pens, as supplementary farming for the families’ livelihood.”
3. IHL provisions state that forcible transfer of residents of an occupied territory is a war crime
The ruling is based exclusively on the argument of “unlawful construction” and that the court does not interfere in the state’s decisions in prioritizing “law enforcement” actions. However, the land from which the justices ruled that the residents be transferred is an occupied territory, and the provisions of IHL apply there. Neither the state nor the court troubled themselves to offer explanations for the breach of these provisions. They addressed the matter as though it were merely a minor technical issue of illegal construction.
But this is not a trivial or insignificant violation of IHL. It is a breach which is a commission of a war crime. The provisions of international law prohibit the forcible transfer of protected civilians, unless the security of the population or imperative military reasons so demand. Obviously these exceptions are irrelevant when the state seeks to take over the land for the purpose of future expansion of settlements in the area or for any such similar purpose.
➽Adam Keller is an Israeli peace activist
Israel’s Supreme Court green lights state to commit war crime; if implemented, the justices will also be liable.
On Thursday, 24 May 2018, three Israeli Supreme Court justices – Noam Sohlberg, Anat Baron and Yael Willner – ruled that the state may demolish the homes of the community of Khan al-Ahmar, transfer the residents from their homes and relocate them. This ruling removes the last stumbling block in Israel’s way in the matter, lifting the impediment which had thus far served to defer the transfer of the community, a war crime under international law. While it is a policy shaped by the government, the justices – here as well as in other cases – pitched in and paved the road to the commission of a war crime. Personal liability for the commission of this crime will fall not only on policy-makers. Those who paved the juridical route enabling the crime are equally liable.
For years Israel has been endeavoring to displace this community for a variety of reasons, including the expansion of nearby settlements, de facto annexation of the area – without its Palestinian residents, and bisecting the West Bank, cutting it in two. To that end, Israeli authorities made the lives of the residents intolerable, hoping to make them leave their homes, ostensibly of their own volition. Khan al-Ahmar residents filed several petitions to Israel’s High Court of Justice against their being transferred. At the same time, residents from settlements in the area also filed petitions, seeking that the state implement the demolition orders. All the petitions were denied, after the state assured the court that it is seeking alternate solutions for the residents.
In the latest petition, the state wrote that such a solution had been found and that it plans to transfer the residents of Khan al-Ahmar to West Jahalin, near Abu Dis. Although the residents objected to this plan, last week (on Thursday 24 May 2018) the justices rejected their arguments and ruled that the state is allowed to transfer them.
Justice Sohlberg, who wrote the ruling, stated that the “undisputed” premise of the examination is that “construction in the Khan al-Ahmar compound, both the school and the dwellings, is unlawful,” and therefore it is clear that the state has the authority to issue demolition warrants for these structures. Based on his line of reasoning, the only question the justices are called to rule upon is whether or not the court is allowed to intervene in the way the state elects to “enforce the law.” The justices answered in the negative, finding the state’s decisions reasonable.
The justices ruled this way so as to confine their role as Supreme Court justices to handling mere bureaucratic issues. They thereby ignored the context of Israeli policy vis-à-vis the people living in Palestinian communities in the West Bank, set aside the directives of international humanitarian law (IHL), and disregarded the very heart of the matter: the fact that Israel intends to commit a war crime.
Following are some facts that the justices chose to ignore in their ruling:
1. The determination that the “construction is illegal” is meaningless
The structures in the community were in fact built without the residents having been issued building permits from the Israeli authorities. However, the residents did not choose to do so because they are deliberate lawbreakers, but because Israel’s policy keeps them from even being able to apply for building permits. The state has always evaded its responsibilities in terms of planning for the residents of these communities. The plans it has suggested always involve radical changes in the residents’ way of life and were drawn up without consulting them. Plans that the residents themselves prepared and submitted to the Civil Administration were denied on a variety of grounds. It was only when Israel had a clear interest of its own – as for example in the present case of planning West Jahalin – that the authorities rallied to arrange for speedy approval of the plan.
2. The transfer will impose a radical change in residents’ way of life
Justice Sohlberg wrote that:
the particulars of the solution, the area proposed for the families to live on, and the arrangements made for the members of the tribe to carry on shepherding, all indicate that the proposal is not one that makes the state’s decision to implement the demolition orders an unreasonable one which justifies judicial intervention.
Yet these statements fly in the face of reality and even contradict the statement made to the court by the state: the plan to transfer the residents to West Jahalin was made over the heads of the residents, without consulting them at all. The plan not only forces the residents to leave their homes but compels a drastic change in their way of life. Contrary to what Justice Sohlberg wrote, the plan does not enable the residents to continue working as shepherds, and the state said so plainly in its response to the petition: “The neighborhood is indeed planned in an urban environment. It therefore includes no large pasturelands or areas for farming, however it does allow for building limited storerooms and livestock pens, as supplementary farming for the families’ livelihood.”
3. IHL provisions state that forcible transfer of residents of an occupied territory is a war crime
The ruling is based exclusively on the argument of “unlawful construction” and that the court does not interfere in the state’s decisions in prioritizing “law enforcement” actions. However, the land from which the justices ruled that the residents be transferred is an occupied territory, and the provisions of IHL apply there. Neither the state nor the court troubled themselves to offer explanations for the breach of these provisions. They addressed the matter as though it were merely a minor technical issue of illegal construction.
But this is not a trivial or insignificant violation of IHL. It is a breach which is a commission of a war crime. The provisions of international law prohibit the forcible transfer of protected civilians, unless the security of the population or imperative military reasons so demand. Obviously these exceptions are irrelevant when the state seeks to take over the land for the purpose of future expansion of settlements in the area or for any such similar purpose.
➽Adam Keller is an Israeli peace activist
We Told Everybody’s Story Exactly As It Happened
Via The Transcripts John McDonagh has Dublin historian Joe Mooney in studio today as Joe is in New York City and will be at Rocky Sullivan’s this Tuesday evening to deliver a talk entitled A Rare Time for Death In Ireland: Seán O’Casey and the 1916 Rising.
Radio Free Éireann
WBAI 99.5FM Pacifica Radio
New York City
Joe Mooney RFÉ 7 July 2018
John: Joe Mooney – you are, as you said, you’re an historian. You’re with a group in Dublin. Explain the group that you’re with and how did that come about?
Historian Joe Mooney with Eilish Lynch’s 1916 painting ‘They did us proud our heroes gone’ Source: Irish Independent
Joe: Good Afternoon. I’m involved with the East Wall History Group and a number of other local history groups in Dublin and particularly around the Dublin Docklands area. We cover all aspects of local history, particularly around the docks – there’s some incredible stories – people look at their school days, the industries, the factories that were there and, of course, the working life of the dock which was always hard-working and hilarious like docks everywhere. But what is of particular interest to the listeners, I would imagine, is the revolutionary history of the Dublin docks. It was the area where Jim Larkin’s Irish Transport and General Workers Union really took off. It was the area where the 1913 Lockout really hit when we saw the Irish workers go up against the Irish-boss class in open class warfare. Out of that the Irish Citizen Army was developed and the Irish Citizen Army would have really have grown in that area and also we had the St. Laurence O’Toole’s Club and Pipe Band which fed men into the IRB (Irish Republican Brotherhood) and into the Irish Volunteers so come 1916 and the subsequent revolutionary period a lot of people, a lot of very well-known people and a lot of very not so well-known people, came from that area and that’s something we’ve been really looking at – an almost forgotten part of Irish history, Dublin history and revolutionary history is the role of the people in the Dublin Docklands. And of course, a big figure from the area would be Seán O’Casey, the playwright, who was part of many of those organizations in his day.
John: Well a lot of the history now is getting the attention because, for whatever reason, ‘the hundred anniversary’ of anything brings it up and it was The Uprising – like when you walk through Dublin you’re literally walking through history whether it’s James Joyce’s Ulysees or the 1916 Uprising. How do you think the government, the Twenty-Six County government, covered the 1916 Uprising? Because now were getting into a more difficult part of Irish history going into the Civil War. But what was your observations and did they include any historical groups to participate in what was going on?
Joe: Well an eye-opening thing for me was I wrote a small piece, and I don’t want anybody to berate me for this, for the Irish Independent newspaper, once owned…
John: …Well, don’t worry.
Joe: …Once owned by William Martin Murphy…
John: …There’s no Irish press so – Come on!….
Joe: …anti-Republican newspaper and I wrote it so carefully that they couldn’t edit it or take it out of context. It was about the Citizen Army and the lead-up to The Rising. They changed one word in the article, my final one, they took the word ‘British’ out. I said: ‘the people who went up against the bosses of Dublin then went up against the British Empire‘ and they took the word ‘British’ out but left the word ’empire’. It could have been Star Wars for all the reader would have been getting from that.
John: …the Ottoman Empire or the Roman Empire or…
Joe: Yeah. So I think that, in a way, kind of says well, ‘official Ireland’, through the government and the media, would have liked to do – it was part of our history that couldn’t be avoided – but they would have liked to take all blame or all revolutionary thought out of it. Now I think it backfired. The government initially, as people will probably remember, brought out a promo video about the 1916 Commemorations which avoided any mention of, pretty much any mention, of the Revolution, The Uprising, and gave us Bono etc and some business men which was meant to symbolise the Hundredth Anniversary? But the backlash from that really created something – and I think that was the most positive thing. I think a lot of people, when they realised the government just weren’t going to do this justice started thinking: Well what can we do to make it work? And I think the most powerful thing that came out of the centenary celebrations is what would have happened in local areas – local groups and unofficial groups looking at the history and saying: We’re really going to get this out there. And for us a lot of our hidden history in the docks came out of it. In parts of the city, parts of the country, everywhere, you had locals looking back to what was going on in their areas a hundred years ago . The more the momentum grew of new stories coming out people started thinking: Oh, I remember this story from my family! and those stories came out. And particularly a lot of people who, I know a couple of people whose mothers and fathers had fought in The Rising and really, for the first time, they really felt like they were being celebrated and getting their place in history. So that would be my take on it – it was the people of Ireland who made it an important celebration – not the government.
John: But now we’re coming into a difficult period towards 1921 and the Civil War. How is your group going to cover that – your historical group?
Joe: Well first of all just before I move on I should say Dublin City Council was very supportive of local groups. There’s some really good councillors and the current Lord Mayor of Dublin had five members of his family in The Rising and he was at the forefront at the time as a city councillor of pushing the commemorations and now, as Lord Mayor, I’ll be interested to see what he does as we come into the War of Independence. How we will cover it is how we cover every story: We will do a really good job and we’ll do it honestly. We’ll tell the story as it happened. We won’t hide anything. For example, we discovered that in some of the families in our area you had brothers who were involved with Na Fianna, you had brothers who were involved with the Volunteer Movement, you had women involved with the Citizen Army while at the same time other brothers were off fighting with the British Army – for economic reasons or whatever they had joined the British Army. So we tell the story as it happened. We don’t, when we look at people who were in the British Army, we don’t put a slant on it to try and say: Isn’t this great? We were part of Britain – which I think is the mistake I think a lot of people make when they talk about the British war dead – they’re trying to make a political point. I see everybody who died in the First World War as a tragic waste of life be they English, Irish, British, French or German and that’s how we will cover it. That’s how we covered that difficult period – we told everybody’s story exactly as it happened.
John: Well one of the unbelievable things that came out – there’s wall up in Glasnevin Cemetery and the Twenty-Six County government put up the names of the British soldiers that died that week on O’Connell Street in front of the GPO and giving it the equivalency of the Volunteers who died. I mean, stuff like that and the re-writing of history – that’s a full time job!
Joe: Oh yeah! Absolutely appalling! And as I said, we will tell the stories truthfully but how you cover the story or how you commemorate it is a different matter. You put the facts out there – and they’re the facts. But how you commemorate it – and it’s absolutely appalling that British soldiers that were rampaging through Dublin were given the same credibility on a memorial wall…
John: ….You were telling us – what’s that one woman that you said was up on the wall?
Joe: Yeah and interestingly, this appears in one of the O’Casey plays based on this woman: A man I know, his granny was shot dead during the Easter Rising by a British soldier. She was in the house and the soldier shot into the house, bullet hit her, she hit the ground and her blood dripped through the floor. You read that in O’Casey. When he went to the Memorial Wall to see his granny’s name the next name on the wall was the soldier from the regiment that had shot his granny dead – and that is no way to commemorate a revolution in a country and it’s no way to remember the enemy dead.
John: Well you know, talking about re-writing – a little bit off-topic – there’s one guy I just cannot stand – is Bob Geldof. Now he just recently was in Dublin, he handed in his key to the city or his citizenship but he had a book out or something just slamming the 1916 Uprising saying they were fools, they were religious fanatics and they should have waited – John Redmond would have brought us to the promised land. I mean, how is he treated now? Because he came back and made this very ceremonial thing going up to Dublin City Hall and turning back – what was the title he had? The…
Joe: …Free Man of the City…
John: …Free Man of the City because of Aung San Suu Kyi in Burma or Myanmar, I mean – but he got plenty of air time to slam everybody that was executed by the British!
Joe: Yeah well I mean, Bob Geldolf, I think it’s fair to say, most Irish people would see him as an idiot and obviously you’re familiar with the expression ‘West Brit’ – he’s the worst example of a West Brit you could come across. And again, it’s absolutely insane when you think – and again I don’t like doing the sliding-scale of suffering or death – but when you think how many Irishmen believed John Redmond (that if they went to war for the British they’d be rewarded with Home Rule afterwards) when you think of the thousands and thousands of Irishmen that died because of John Redmond’s words and you think of the relatively small number, four hundred or so, that died during the 1916 Rising, and you have idiots like Bob Geldof, Kevin Myers, etc in the newspapers trying taking up World War I as if it was something glorious and then talking down the rebels who tried to free their own country in their own city I mean it’s just incredible, like hypocrisy apart from anything else.
Máirín Ní Ghadhra’s book about her father, Nollaig Cover Art: Brian Mór
John: One of our former producers who’s now long since dead, Nollaig Ó Gadhra, an historian out in Galway, he always brought up that no one goes into the amount of lives that were saved by The Uprising – that people didn’t join the British Army and go fight in Flanders and just be slaughtered. I mean, the accounting of it! And that has a particular big effect in the Six Counties among the Loyalist population – they were devastated but they are still so proud of that – about dying in the trenches of France and Belgium and nothing will shake them of that vision whereas at least down in Dublin you say – you know there’s a famous song by Finbar Furey, whatever – you were all that we had, you went and fought there when the greatest war was at home right here here in Dublin. So we’re speaking with Joe Mooney and Joe Mooney is going to be at Rocky Sullivan’s Tuesday night at eight o’clock, you heard John Kearns say that. So what brings you over here? What will you be speaking about at Rocky Sullivan’s?
Joe: Well I have had the pleasure of working with John in the past. John’s play, Sons of Molly Maguire, which was of course about some famous Irish labour martyrs was premiered in, it had its Irish premiere last year, great location – Liberty Hall – what better place to have a play about Irish radicals? So I’ve worked with John on a number of occasions and John has set up this talk in Rocky Sullivan’s and what I’ll be looking at will be the life and politics of Seán O’Casey as reflected in his plays. Seán O’Casey is probably most famous for The Plough and the Stars and the riots that happened in Dublin when it was performed in 1926 because of its depiction of the 1916 Rising. But the story’s not….
John: …Why was there riots? What was it that people were upset about?
Character sketch for The Plough and the Stars by Seán O’Casey Source: seanocasey.co.uk Joe: It was the depiction of the rebels in 1916. People would have felt that ten years after they died that it was an insult to their memory – the way he described them. But O’Casey’s a little bit more complicated than that. O’Casey came from a Protestant family. He came from the Orange Tradition. He got very involved with the Irish Cultural and National movements, got involved with the trade union movement and was the first secretary of the Irish Citizens Army. And then he turned his back on a lot of that, he fell out with the likes of James Connolly and Countess Markievicz, he did get caught up in The Rising as a civilian and I’ll be covering that in great detail, what actually happened to him.
After The Rising he still, he returned somewhat to Nationalist politics. He has been a friend to Thomas Ashe who died on hunger strike. He wrote two pamphlets about Thomas Ashe. He spoke passionately about the labour movement being getting more involved with the national struggle and then he moved into play writing. His big thing was to look at the day-to-day lives of Dubliners, so-called ‘ordinary people’ during The Rising, and he wrote three really good plays set during the War of Independence, the Civil War and then he done The Plough and the Stars, set during The Rising. He got such a backlash from that that he essentially sent himself into exile in England afterwards. So I’ll be covering all that but he’s a very complex man. There was a lot more to him than just that simple story. For example, one of the people who organised the riot at the Abbey Theatre was Frank Ryan, an IRA leader who then went on to be a leader of the International Brigades in Spain and Seán O’Casey was a staunch supporter of the Spanish Republic against Franco and he actually met Frank Ryan during that time and they discussed the Plough and Star riots and also the support for the Spanish Republic shown by the IRA and other Irish revolutionaries. So there’s a lot more to the story than just simply that he was a man that turned his back on the revolutionary movement.
John: There’s an old saying, it’s said if anyone claims that they understand Irish history they don’t know what they’re talking about because, like you said, everything is complicated no matter what you’re looking at. So that is Joe Mooney who will be giving a talk about – it’s called The Rare Time for Death In Ireland: Seán… now, what does that mean – the rare death for time in Ireland?
Joe: Seán O’Casey lived in the North Docks, as I said, where we have the history group in our area, during The Rising an almost lost part of the story of The Rising is what happened in the Dublin docks. The British Army sealed off the area, took control of it and were subjected to sniper fire throughout the week. However, on the Thursday they decided to clear the snipers out and they rampaged through the area and they killed a lot of civilians – shot them in their houses if they saw anybody moving at the window, shot a child on the street, etc, and in his autobiography O’Casey writes a very passionate piece that was then turned into a poem and the first line is: ‘It was a rare time for death in Ireland’ and that’s where the title came from – it’s just about the civilians that ended up being shot down.
John: So before we head off anything else you would like to see? I mean, you’re only in New York a couple of days and I was looking at your Facebook – you bumped into the naked cowboy, naked people running down Queens Boulevard, crazy stuff on the subway – this is all in a day or two!
East Wall For All website Click here
Joe: Yeah well, it’s a crazy city! It’s a crazy city but it’s a great city and I have to say I’m very happy for Chris Byrne, Rocky Sullivan’s, John to give me the opportunity to bring our talk over here and I would say if anybody is interested in some of the hidden history, the revolutionary stories, we have uncovered, you’ll find them on our website called east wall for all dot ie or you’ll find us on Facebook as the East Wall History Group and you’ll find some amasing stories there. Everybody knows the big names and the big stories of the 1916 Rising but the smaller stories and the more obscure people are just as fascinating – and sometimes more so.
John: As so that is Joe Mooney. He’s going to be at Rocky Sullivan’s now on Tuesday night, eight o’clock – Rocky’s is now a little bit closer to Ikea – it used to be just one street away. It is a beautiful place – they have a stage, they’ve got a great sound system so I’d recommend anybody in the Red Hook area or downtown Brooklyn to get over there and hear Joe Mooney talking about Seán O’Casey and I guess you could do a Q&A and people will be asking you questions and stuff like that.
Joe: Oh yeah, if people want to find out more from the talk – I think the talk’s about an hour long – but beyond that if anybody wants to discuss Dublin and The Rising – I would know for there we would have done a little research into some of the lesser known garrisons such as City Hall, St. Stephen’s Green so we can tell people a lot of the stories that they may not have heard from 1916.
The Transcripts, Of Interest to the Irish Republican Community.You can follow The Transcripts on Twitter @RFETranscripts
Radio Free Éireann
WBAI 99.5FM Pacifica Radio
New York City
Joe Mooney RFÉ 7 July 2018
John: Joe Mooney – you are, as you said, you’re an historian. You’re with a group in Dublin. Explain the group that you’re with and how did that come about?
Historian Joe Mooney with Eilish Lynch’s 1916 painting ‘They did us proud our heroes gone’ Source: Irish Independent Joe: Good Afternoon. I’m involved with the East Wall History Group and a number of other local history groups in Dublin and particularly around the Dublin Docklands area. We cover all aspects of local history, particularly around the docks – there’s some incredible stories – people look at their school days, the industries, the factories that were there and, of course, the working life of the dock which was always hard-working and hilarious like docks everywhere. But what is of particular interest to the listeners, I would imagine, is the revolutionary history of the Dublin docks. It was the area where Jim Larkin’s Irish Transport and General Workers Union really took off. It was the area where the 1913 Lockout really hit when we saw the Irish workers go up against the Irish-boss class in open class warfare. Out of that the Irish Citizen Army was developed and the Irish Citizen Army would have really have grown in that area and also we had the St. Laurence O’Toole’s Club and Pipe Band which fed men into the IRB (Irish Republican Brotherhood) and into the Irish Volunteers so come 1916 and the subsequent revolutionary period a lot of people, a lot of very well-known people and a lot of very not so well-known people, came from that area and that’s something we’ve been really looking at – an almost forgotten part of Irish history, Dublin history and revolutionary history is the role of the people in the Dublin Docklands. And of course, a big figure from the area would be Seán O’Casey, the playwright, who was part of many of those organizations in his day.
John: Well a lot of the history now is getting the attention because, for whatever reason, ‘the hundred anniversary’ of anything brings it up and it was The Uprising – like when you walk through Dublin you’re literally walking through history whether it’s James Joyce’s Ulysees or the 1916 Uprising. How do you think the government, the Twenty-Six County government, covered the 1916 Uprising? Because now were getting into a more difficult part of Irish history going into the Civil War. But what was your observations and did they include any historical groups to participate in what was going on?
Joe: Well an eye-opening thing for me was I wrote a small piece, and I don’t want anybody to berate me for this, for the Irish Independent newspaper, once owned…
John: …Well, don’t worry.
Joe: …Once owned by William Martin Murphy…
John: …There’s no Irish press so – Come on!….
Joe: …anti-Republican newspaper and I wrote it so carefully that they couldn’t edit it or take it out of context. It was about the Citizen Army and the lead-up to The Rising. They changed one word in the article, my final one, they took the word ‘British’ out. I said: ‘the people who went up against the bosses of Dublin then went up against the British Empire‘ and they took the word ‘British’ out but left the word ’empire’. It could have been Star Wars for all the reader would have been getting from that.
John: …the Ottoman Empire or the Roman Empire or…
Joe: Yeah. So I think that, in a way, kind of says well, ‘official Ireland’, through the government and the media, would have liked to do – it was part of our history that couldn’t be avoided – but they would have liked to take all blame or all revolutionary thought out of it. Now I think it backfired. The government initially, as people will probably remember, brought out a promo video about the 1916 Commemorations which avoided any mention of, pretty much any mention, of the Revolution, The Uprising, and gave us Bono etc and some business men which was meant to symbolise the Hundredth Anniversary? But the backlash from that really created something – and I think that was the most positive thing. I think a lot of people, when they realised the government just weren’t going to do this justice started thinking: Well what can we do to make it work? And I think the most powerful thing that came out of the centenary celebrations is what would have happened in local areas – local groups and unofficial groups looking at the history and saying: We’re really going to get this out there. And for us a lot of our hidden history in the docks came out of it. In parts of the city, parts of the country, everywhere, you had locals looking back to what was going on in their areas a hundred years ago . The more the momentum grew of new stories coming out people started thinking: Oh, I remember this story from my family! and those stories came out. And particularly a lot of people who, I know a couple of people whose mothers and fathers had fought in The Rising and really, for the first time, they really felt like they were being celebrated and getting their place in history. So that would be my take on it – it was the people of Ireland who made it an important celebration – not the government.
John: But now we’re coming into a difficult period towards 1921 and the Civil War. How is your group going to cover that – your historical group?
Joe: Well first of all just before I move on I should say Dublin City Council was very supportive of local groups. There’s some really good councillors and the current Lord Mayor of Dublin had five members of his family in The Rising and he was at the forefront at the time as a city councillor of pushing the commemorations and now, as Lord Mayor, I’ll be interested to see what he does as we come into the War of Independence. How we will cover it is how we cover every story: We will do a really good job and we’ll do it honestly. We’ll tell the story as it happened. We won’t hide anything. For example, we discovered that in some of the families in our area you had brothers who were involved with Na Fianna, you had brothers who were involved with the Volunteer Movement, you had women involved with the Citizen Army while at the same time other brothers were off fighting with the British Army – for economic reasons or whatever they had joined the British Army. So we tell the story as it happened. We don’t, when we look at people who were in the British Army, we don’t put a slant on it to try and say: Isn’t this great? We were part of Britain – which I think is the mistake I think a lot of people make when they talk about the British war dead – they’re trying to make a political point. I see everybody who died in the First World War as a tragic waste of life be they English, Irish, British, French or German and that’s how we will cover it. That’s how we covered that difficult period – we told everybody’s story exactly as it happened.
John: Well one of the unbelievable things that came out – there’s wall up in Glasnevin Cemetery and the Twenty-Six County government put up the names of the British soldiers that died that week on O’Connell Street in front of the GPO and giving it the equivalency of the Volunteers who died. I mean, stuff like that and the re-writing of history – that’s a full time job!
Joe: Oh yeah! Absolutely appalling! And as I said, we will tell the stories truthfully but how you cover the story or how you commemorate it is a different matter. You put the facts out there – and they’re the facts. But how you commemorate it – and it’s absolutely appalling that British soldiers that were rampaging through Dublin were given the same credibility on a memorial wall…
John: ….You were telling us – what’s that one woman that you said was up on the wall?
Joe: Yeah and interestingly, this appears in one of the O’Casey plays based on this woman: A man I know, his granny was shot dead during the Easter Rising by a British soldier. She was in the house and the soldier shot into the house, bullet hit her, she hit the ground and her blood dripped through the floor. You read that in O’Casey. When he went to the Memorial Wall to see his granny’s name the next name on the wall was the soldier from the regiment that had shot his granny dead – and that is no way to commemorate a revolution in a country and it’s no way to remember the enemy dead.
John: Well you know, talking about re-writing – a little bit off-topic – there’s one guy I just cannot stand – is Bob Geldof. Now he just recently was in Dublin, he handed in his key to the city or his citizenship but he had a book out or something just slamming the 1916 Uprising saying they were fools, they were religious fanatics and they should have waited – John Redmond would have brought us to the promised land. I mean, how is he treated now? Because he came back and made this very ceremonial thing going up to Dublin City Hall and turning back – what was the title he had? The…
Joe: …Free Man of the City…
John: …Free Man of the City because of Aung San Suu Kyi in Burma or Myanmar, I mean – but he got plenty of air time to slam everybody that was executed by the British!
Joe: Yeah well I mean, Bob Geldolf, I think it’s fair to say, most Irish people would see him as an idiot and obviously you’re familiar with the expression ‘West Brit’ – he’s the worst example of a West Brit you could come across. And again, it’s absolutely insane when you think – and again I don’t like doing the sliding-scale of suffering or death – but when you think how many Irishmen believed John Redmond (that if they went to war for the British they’d be rewarded with Home Rule afterwards) when you think of the thousands and thousands of Irishmen that died because of John Redmond’s words and you think of the relatively small number, four hundred or so, that died during the 1916 Rising, and you have idiots like Bob Geldof, Kevin Myers, etc in the newspapers trying taking up World War I as if it was something glorious and then talking down the rebels who tried to free their own country in their own city I mean it’s just incredible, like hypocrisy apart from anything else.
Máirín Ní Ghadhra’s book about her father, Nollaig Cover Art: Brian Mór
John: One of our former producers who’s now long since dead, Nollaig Ó Gadhra, an historian out in Galway, he always brought up that no one goes into the amount of lives that were saved by The Uprising – that people didn’t join the British Army and go fight in Flanders and just be slaughtered. I mean, the accounting of it! And that has a particular big effect in the Six Counties among the Loyalist population – they were devastated but they are still so proud of that – about dying in the trenches of France and Belgium and nothing will shake them of that vision whereas at least down in Dublin you say – you know there’s a famous song by Finbar Furey, whatever – you were all that we had, you went and fought there when the greatest war was at home right here here in Dublin. So we’re speaking with Joe Mooney and Joe Mooney is going to be at Rocky Sullivan’s Tuesday night at eight o’clock, you heard John Kearns say that. So what brings you over here? What will you be speaking about at Rocky Sullivan’s?
Joe: Well I have had the pleasure of working with John in the past. John’s play, Sons of Molly Maguire, which was of course about some famous Irish labour martyrs was premiered in, it had its Irish premiere last year, great location – Liberty Hall – what better place to have a play about Irish radicals? So I’ve worked with John on a number of occasions and John has set up this talk in Rocky Sullivan’s and what I’ll be looking at will be the life and politics of Seán O’Casey as reflected in his plays. Seán O’Casey is probably most famous for The Plough and the Stars and the riots that happened in Dublin when it was performed in 1926 because of its depiction of the 1916 Rising. But the story’s not….
John: …Why was there riots? What was it that people were upset about?
Character sketch for The Plough and the Stars by Seán O’Casey Source: seanocasey.co.uk Joe: It was the depiction of the rebels in 1916. People would have felt that ten years after they died that it was an insult to their memory – the way he described them. But O’Casey’s a little bit more complicated than that. O’Casey came from a Protestant family. He came from the Orange Tradition. He got very involved with the Irish Cultural and National movements, got involved with the trade union movement and was the first secretary of the Irish Citizens Army. And then he turned his back on a lot of that, he fell out with the likes of James Connolly and Countess Markievicz, he did get caught up in The Rising as a civilian and I’ll be covering that in great detail, what actually happened to him.After The Rising he still, he returned somewhat to Nationalist politics. He has been a friend to Thomas Ashe who died on hunger strike. He wrote two pamphlets about Thomas Ashe. He spoke passionately about the labour movement being getting more involved with the national struggle and then he moved into play writing. His big thing was to look at the day-to-day lives of Dubliners, so-called ‘ordinary people’ during The Rising, and he wrote three really good plays set during the War of Independence, the Civil War and then he done The Plough and the Stars, set during The Rising. He got such a backlash from that that he essentially sent himself into exile in England afterwards. So I’ll be covering all that but he’s a very complex man. There was a lot more to him than just that simple story. For example, one of the people who organised the riot at the Abbey Theatre was Frank Ryan, an IRA leader who then went on to be a leader of the International Brigades in Spain and Seán O’Casey was a staunch supporter of the Spanish Republic against Franco and he actually met Frank Ryan during that time and they discussed the Plough and Star riots and also the support for the Spanish Republic shown by the IRA and other Irish revolutionaries. So there’s a lot more to the story than just simply that he was a man that turned his back on the revolutionary movement.
John: There’s an old saying, it’s said if anyone claims that they understand Irish history they don’t know what they’re talking about because, like you said, everything is complicated no matter what you’re looking at. So that is Joe Mooney who will be giving a talk about – it’s called The Rare Time for Death In Ireland: Seán… now, what does that mean – the rare death for time in Ireland?
Joe: Seán O’Casey lived in the North Docks, as I said, where we have the history group in our area, during The Rising an almost lost part of the story of The Rising is what happened in the Dublin docks. The British Army sealed off the area, took control of it and were subjected to sniper fire throughout the week. However, on the Thursday they decided to clear the snipers out and they rampaged through the area and they killed a lot of civilians – shot them in their houses if they saw anybody moving at the window, shot a child on the street, etc, and in his autobiography O’Casey writes a very passionate piece that was then turned into a poem and the first line is: ‘It was a rare time for death in Ireland’ and that’s where the title came from – it’s just about the civilians that ended up being shot down.
John: So before we head off anything else you would like to see? I mean, you’re only in New York a couple of days and I was looking at your Facebook – you bumped into the naked cowboy, naked people running down Queens Boulevard, crazy stuff on the subway – this is all in a day or two!
East Wall For All website Click here Joe: Yeah well, it’s a crazy city! It’s a crazy city but it’s a great city and I have to say I’m very happy for Chris Byrne, Rocky Sullivan’s, John to give me the opportunity to bring our talk over here and I would say if anybody is interested in some of the hidden history, the revolutionary stories, we have uncovered, you’ll find them on our website called east wall for all dot ie or you’ll find us on Facebook as the East Wall History Group and you’ll find some amasing stories there. Everybody knows the big names and the big stories of the 1916 Rising but the smaller stories and the more obscure people are just as fascinating – and sometimes more so.
John: As so that is Joe Mooney. He’s going to be at Rocky Sullivan’s now on Tuesday night, eight o’clock – Rocky’s is now a little bit closer to Ikea – it used to be just one street away. It is a beautiful place – they have a stage, they’ve got a great sound system so I’d recommend anybody in the Red Hook area or downtown Brooklyn to get over there and hear Joe Mooney talking about Seán O’Casey and I guess you could do a Q&A and people will be asking you questions and stuff like that.
Joe: Oh yeah, if people want to find out more from the talk – I think the talk’s about an hour long – but beyond that if anybody wants to discuss Dublin and The Rising – I would know for there we would have done a little research into some of the lesser known garrisons such as City Hall, St. Stephen’s Green so we can tell people a lot of the stories that they may not have heard from 1916.
The Transcripts, Of Interest to the Irish Republican Community.You can follow The Transcripts on Twitter @RFETranscripts
Onward Christian Soldiers
Christians awake and organise! That’s the chant from contentious commentator, Dr John Coulter, in his latest Fearless Flying Column today.
Christians need to launch a 21st century Crusade to save their faith before the loonies of the ‘Politically Correct Brigade’ have our churches closed and clerics jailed!
We can start by ensuring that every school, place of work and public place provides either a Christian morning assembly for prayers, or a prayer chapel.
It’s time for the Christian Churches in Ireland to take head on the assorted rag bag of atheists, humanists, pagans, occultists and cults.
For too long, Christians have stood by with their noses in their Bibles and hands in pockets while television drama has mocked our faith and clergy.
The rot started with the portrayal of the camp vicar in the legendary comedy Dad’s Army about the World War 2 Home Guard.
Father Ted seems hilarious on the surface, but surely every priest in Ireland cannot be branded as the drunken, psychotic and lustful Father Jack, or wanting to ‘Kick Bishop Brennan’ up the arse?
Another drama series, Rev, about an inner city Anglican vicar has him as a hard-cursing, chain-smoking, boozing rebel with no talk about the Salvation of Jesus Christ.
Even in society, people seem to be able to break at will the Third Commandment about not cursing using the name of God or Jesus.
Yet if you cursed using the name of Mohammed, Jehovah or one of the gods from the Chinese community, you would be before the courts for racism, or some other crazy charge.
So I am issuing the following warning – Christians awake! The Northern and Southern election ballot boxes await you.
In the South, a Dail General Election looms and the Churches have already lost the same-sex marriage and abortion referenda. In the North, at the last Assembly poll, Unionism became a minority bloc for the first time in the state’s history.
Many fundamentalist and evangelical Christians are convinced man is living in the ‘last days’ and the end of the world is nigh, to quote the old sandwich boards.
So why don’t they get off their ‘holier than thou’ arses and vote in some changes?
Christians should stop tub thumping about the pluralist society when they know fine well they can make a difference by voting in candidates who will defend the Christian way of life which made both Stormont and the Dail so great.
To our shame, what have we Christians done about this? Nothing!
How soon will the situation emerge when the Politically Correct Brigade succeed in appointing so-called ‘Pulpit Police.’
These politically correct fanatics will tour our Christian churches across Ireland, recording services and clerics who preach provocative sermons, or congregations who sing ‘offensive’ hymns.
A time is coming when Bible-believing Christians will be jailed for expressing their faith in Ireland; a proud island which has a tremendous record of sending thousands of Christian missionaries across the globe to spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Christian clerics must lead the way. They must face down the PC Brigade by embarking on a pro-active campaign of staunchly evangelical street preaching and summer beach missions.
Christians in every place of work should demand time either for morning prayers, or that a prayer room is set aside for Christian devotion.
Born-again clerics should go into airport prayer rooms and preach the Gospel. Christian parents and teachers should demand that Morning Assembly be a fixed part of the school day.
As a primary school kid, I recall local clerics coming into our classroom for religious education quizzes and lessons.
This crisis could hit the Catholic Church hard especially if the CCMS is disbanded or swallowed up by any proposed new single education authority for the North.
If the LGBTQ+ community can have Pride, and republicans have hunger strike commemorations, when are our churches going to host a series of Christian Pride marches? Or will the PC fascists ban those, too?
And speaking of marching forward, thank goodness the new soccer season has kicked off because as a devoted footie fan, I was suffering withdrawal symptoms from the end of the World Cup!
This will be a soccer season like no other. For me as a lifelong Arsenal fan, it will be my first for over two decades without Big Arsene in charge.
But north of the English border, I’ve a special message for Brendan Rodgers - invade England!
That’s my firm advice to Glasgow Celtic as Rodgers’ Legions take full advantage of the footballing challenges at my beloved Rangers.
The Carnlough’s Bhoys manager has manoeuvred the Pride of Parkhead into prime position to clinch yet another historic Treble, and possibly take a step closer towards a 10-in-a-row Premiership title run.
But if Celtic are to remain the dominant football force in Scotland, they need arch rivals Rangers to survive.
While Rangers can boost home crowds of 40,000-plus at their Ibrox home on a regular basis and a new super star manager in Stevie Gerrard, that loyalty is not enough to guarantee the financial future of one of the globe’s greatest clubs.
What’s the point in watching the Bhoys win Treble after Treble if there’s no significant Rangers to rub it into?
I’ve been a lifelong Rangers follower, but the tears flowed last season when in spite of loyal fans packing Ibrox and Parkhead, the Gers were humiliated time after time.
Even if Rangers survive as a financial business, in footballing terms, with the loss of many good players – especially those from the North – the club will be lucky to remain in the Scottish Premier League (SPL).
If Rangers become no better than clubs like Ross County or Stranraer (my apologies to both clubs for using them as examples), Rodgers should persuade the Celtic board to abandon the SPL and apply for the English Premiership.
Bhoys legend, the late Jock Stein, proved Celtic could hold their own not just with any English club, but with the best in Europe.
Celtic fans should not rejoice at the fate of Rangers. An SPL without Rangers – even a totally weakened Rangers squad – is frankly a boring waste of time for Celtic.
And if Rodgers can add an impressive Champions League run this incoming season to a domestic Treble next year, then he is well poised not just to invade England, but perhaps to even compete successfully in a planned European Super League.
Which would Celtic fans prefer – duffing Hearts and Hibs (again apologies to both these clubs for using them as examples) every week, or going head to head with the big Manchester duo, Liverpool, Spurs, Arsenal and Chelsea?
Even playing in a European Super League against Barcelona, Real Madrid, Benfica and Porto on a regular basis would be a real challenge and provide exciting football for the Parkhead faithful.
If Rangers can only afford less than average footballers in the future, it might be beneficial to have Celtic out of Scotland and rampaging across England or Continental Europe for the next decade.
Given Rangers bad luck on and off the pitch, it would not surprise me if my beloved Blues are relegated from the SPL in the coming years.
It was sickening enough watching the Celts take nine league titles in a row. But if Rangers have to sell their top stars to stay financially afloat, it would be virtually unbearable medicine to see Rodgers notch up a decade of SPL titles in a row!
The Scottish economy needs Rangers to remain in business. Look at the amount of cash thousands of Northern Irish-based Rangers fans spend travelling to matches at Ibrox and other grounds across Scotland – including Parkhead.
I’m not a gambling man, but I’d bet my house more Rangers and Celtic fans from the North travel to Scotland than attend Irish League games on an average weekend.
If Rangers are to avoid the devastation of a trophyless cabinet for the next 10 years, then it might be a good move for them if Rodgers took Celtic south of the Scottish border. That way, my current Rangers shares might be worth more than bog roll!
Follow Dr John Coulter on Twitter. @JohnAHCoulter
Christians need to launch a 21st century Crusade to save their faith before the loonies of the ‘Politically Correct Brigade’ have our churches closed and clerics jailed!
We can start by ensuring that every school, place of work and public place provides either a Christian morning assembly for prayers, or a prayer chapel.
It’s time for the Christian Churches in Ireland to take head on the assorted rag bag of atheists, humanists, pagans, occultists and cults.
For too long, Christians have stood by with their noses in their Bibles and hands in pockets while television drama has mocked our faith and clergy.
The rot started with the portrayal of the camp vicar in the legendary comedy Dad’s Army about the World War 2 Home Guard.
Father Ted seems hilarious on the surface, but surely every priest in Ireland cannot be branded as the drunken, psychotic and lustful Father Jack, or wanting to ‘Kick Bishop Brennan’ up the arse?
Another drama series, Rev, about an inner city Anglican vicar has him as a hard-cursing, chain-smoking, boozing rebel with no talk about the Salvation of Jesus Christ.
Even in society, people seem to be able to break at will the Third Commandment about not cursing using the name of God or Jesus.
Yet if you cursed using the name of Mohammed, Jehovah or one of the gods from the Chinese community, you would be before the courts for racism, or some other crazy charge.
So I am issuing the following warning – Christians awake! The Northern and Southern election ballot boxes await you.
In the South, a Dail General Election looms and the Churches have already lost the same-sex marriage and abortion referenda. In the North, at the last Assembly poll, Unionism became a minority bloc for the first time in the state’s history.
Many fundamentalist and evangelical Christians are convinced man is living in the ‘last days’ and the end of the world is nigh, to quote the old sandwich boards.
So why don’t they get off their ‘holier than thou’ arses and vote in some changes?
Christians should stop tub thumping about the pluralist society when they know fine well they can make a difference by voting in candidates who will defend the Christian way of life which made both Stormont and the Dail so great.
To our shame, what have we Christians done about this? Nothing!
How soon will the situation emerge when the Politically Correct Brigade succeed in appointing so-called ‘Pulpit Police.’
These politically correct fanatics will tour our Christian churches across Ireland, recording services and clerics who preach provocative sermons, or congregations who sing ‘offensive’ hymns.
A time is coming when Bible-believing Christians will be jailed for expressing their faith in Ireland; a proud island which has a tremendous record of sending thousands of Christian missionaries across the globe to spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
Christian clerics must lead the way. They must face down the PC Brigade by embarking on a pro-active campaign of staunchly evangelical street preaching and summer beach missions.
Christians in every place of work should demand time either for morning prayers, or that a prayer room is set aside for Christian devotion.
Born-again clerics should go into airport prayer rooms and preach the Gospel. Christian parents and teachers should demand that Morning Assembly be a fixed part of the school day.
As a primary school kid, I recall local clerics coming into our classroom for religious education quizzes and lessons.
This crisis could hit the Catholic Church hard especially if the CCMS is disbanded or swallowed up by any proposed new single education authority for the North.
If the LGBTQ+ community can have Pride, and republicans have hunger strike commemorations, when are our churches going to host a series of Christian Pride marches? Or will the PC fascists ban those, too?
And speaking of marching forward, thank goodness the new soccer season has kicked off because as a devoted footie fan, I was suffering withdrawal symptoms from the end of the World Cup!
This will be a soccer season like no other. For me as a lifelong Arsenal fan, it will be my first for over two decades without Big Arsene in charge.
But north of the English border, I’ve a special message for Brendan Rodgers - invade England!
That’s my firm advice to Glasgow Celtic as Rodgers’ Legions take full advantage of the footballing challenges at my beloved Rangers.
The Carnlough’s Bhoys manager has manoeuvred the Pride of Parkhead into prime position to clinch yet another historic Treble, and possibly take a step closer towards a 10-in-a-row Premiership title run.
But if Celtic are to remain the dominant football force in Scotland, they need arch rivals Rangers to survive.
While Rangers can boost home crowds of 40,000-plus at their Ibrox home on a regular basis and a new super star manager in Stevie Gerrard, that loyalty is not enough to guarantee the financial future of one of the globe’s greatest clubs.
What’s the point in watching the Bhoys win Treble after Treble if there’s no significant Rangers to rub it into?
I’ve been a lifelong Rangers follower, but the tears flowed last season when in spite of loyal fans packing Ibrox and Parkhead, the Gers were humiliated time after time.
Even if Rangers survive as a financial business, in footballing terms, with the loss of many good players – especially those from the North – the club will be lucky to remain in the Scottish Premier League (SPL).
If Rangers become no better than clubs like Ross County or Stranraer (my apologies to both clubs for using them as examples), Rodgers should persuade the Celtic board to abandon the SPL and apply for the English Premiership.
Bhoys legend, the late Jock Stein, proved Celtic could hold their own not just with any English club, but with the best in Europe.
Celtic fans should not rejoice at the fate of Rangers. An SPL without Rangers – even a totally weakened Rangers squad – is frankly a boring waste of time for Celtic.
And if Rodgers can add an impressive Champions League run this incoming season to a domestic Treble next year, then he is well poised not just to invade England, but perhaps to even compete successfully in a planned European Super League.
Which would Celtic fans prefer – duffing Hearts and Hibs (again apologies to both these clubs for using them as examples) every week, or going head to head with the big Manchester duo, Liverpool, Spurs, Arsenal and Chelsea?
Even playing in a European Super League against Barcelona, Real Madrid, Benfica and Porto on a regular basis would be a real challenge and provide exciting football for the Parkhead faithful.
If Rangers can only afford less than average footballers in the future, it might be beneficial to have Celtic out of Scotland and rampaging across England or Continental Europe for the next decade.
Given Rangers bad luck on and off the pitch, it would not surprise me if my beloved Blues are relegated from the SPL in the coming years.
It was sickening enough watching the Celts take nine league titles in a row. But if Rangers have to sell their top stars to stay financially afloat, it would be virtually unbearable medicine to see Rodgers notch up a decade of SPL titles in a row!
The Scottish economy needs Rangers to remain in business. Look at the amount of cash thousands of Northern Irish-based Rangers fans spend travelling to matches at Ibrox and other grounds across Scotland – including Parkhead.
I’m not a gambling man, but I’d bet my house more Rangers and Celtic fans from the North travel to Scotland than attend Irish League games on an average weekend.
If Rangers are to avoid the devastation of a trophyless cabinet for the next 10 years, then it might be a good move for them if Rodgers took Celtic south of the Scottish border. That way, my current Rangers shares might be worth more than bog roll!
Follow Dr John Coulter on Twitter. @JohnAHCoulter
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