Anthony McIntyre's Blog, page 1198

Jobstown Protest – Water Activists On Trial

Joe Dalton reflects on the Jobstown protest.  Joe Dalton writes @ Joe's Water Blog.
In my first post in a while, I offer my thoughts on the trial and acquittal of the six anti-water charges campaigners in Jobstown, Dublin.



On 15th November 2014, the Irish Tánaiste (Deputy Prime Minister) and Minister for Social Protection, the Labour Party’s Joan Burton Teachta Dála (TD), was attending a student graduation ceremony at An Cosán education centre in Jobstown, a working-class area in Dublin. On attempting to leave the ceremony she found herself trapped in a Garda (Police) car, along with her assistant Karen O’Connell, for over two hours surrounded by anti-water charges protestors. Six of the protestors, including local TD Paul Murphy, who was elected in a by-election just the month before the protest on a strong anti-water charges platform, were acquitted of false imprisonment of the two women in June 2017.

Context of the Protest

Water charges had been introduced across the State earlier in 2014 and had led to a determined campaign of grassroots resistance with multiple small scale protests around the country and the first of several large scale anti-water charges demonstrations taking place in the Capital city just the month before, October 2014, with a second earlier the same month.

Previously water services were provided free at the point of use for domestic users across Ireland. At the 2011 general election, and following the then Fianna Fáil – Green Party Coalition Government commitment to introduce water charges, the Labour Party had campaigned on a manifesto of opposition to such charges, but immediately u-turned following the election when they entered a Coalition Government with Fine Gael. In this respect Labour engaged in something that all Irish political parties have been guilty of with regard to water services over many years, namely of adopting opportunist and irresponsible polices when in opposition, then struggling with the reality of water services provision when in power.

The protest has to be seen in the context of the severe austerity imposed on the Irish taxpayer ever since the economic crisis of 2008. At this time, the bubble burst on the Irish property market leaving the private banking sector exposed to huge losses. Due to the interconnectivity of the banking system, this exposure would have been felt by banks, and their investors, across Europe.

As it happened, in one of the most infamous events in recent Irish history, the Irish Government was persuaded by the banking sector that this was just a short-term liquidity problem that justified placing the liability for this exposure onto the Irish taxpayer, as clear a case of socialising the losses while privatising the profits as has ever existed. When this turned out to be far more than just a liquidity problem the Irish taxpayer was unjustly faced with honouring this debt in full.

After accepting one austerity tax after another, something I always found hard to understand, and watching those responsible for the crisis come out of it largely unscathed, the introduction of water charges proved to be the straw that broke the camel’s back and saw extraordinary passions unleashed from the Irish people.

Anger at Jobstown

News of Tánaiste Burton’s presence in Jobstown led to a spontaneous protest outside An Cosán of 100 or so anti-water charges protestors. From the video footage, there seems to have been a complete mix of young and old, male and female. Some of the chanting was aggressive and unpleasant. When eventually Joan Burton emerged, behind a line of students and protected by a few Gardaí, the crowds descended around her shouting abuse in what must have been a very unhappy experience for her. She was hit with a water balloon on her way to her car.


As Minister for Social Protection, Joan Burton was tasked with implementing much of the Government austerity programme. As such among some working class communities, who felt much of the brunt of this austerity, she was regarded as a traitor as can be seen from the repeated aggressive use of the word towards her. I think this reflects a common unfortunate trait of some on the left to assume that anyone who doesn’t subscribe to their world view must be inherently evil, corrupt, selfish, treacherous or all of the above.

As someone who has worked in water services in many countries where paying for water is an accepted part of life, I happen to believe that domestic water charges are an essential part of a viable utility funding model, putting me completely at odds with the Jobstown protestors. I was struck by the vitriolic anger of the protestors when watching the video footage. Trying to persuade them of the merits of water charges would have been quite a challenge. Perhaps I would have been subjected to the same abuse if ever I tried to make such a case to them.

As word spread, the crowd increased to a few hundred who surrounded her car and refused to allow Burton to leave. Eventually Paul Murphy arrived on the scene and sought to get a semblance of control over the protest. While I probably disagree with Paul Murphy on most things, I found his description of his involvement in the Jobstown protest convincing from the start. This was an unplanned spontaneous protest. By the time Paul Murphy arrived, it already had an ugly character. Had he simply ordered the protestors to disperse, I don’t think he would have gotten very far.



As the most recognisable politician present, the Gardaí naturally sought him out as a controlling influence. While he clearly allied himself with the protestors, nevertheless he tried to facilitate a gradual de-escalation in the form of a slow march towards the Tallaght dual carriageway that would allow Burton and O’Connell to leave. In the event it never got that far as the Gardaí managed to transfer the two women to another car which managed to get away.

Dawn Raids, Trial and Acquittal

In February 2015, there was a series of Garda dawn raids on several of the protestors, including Paul Murphy, after which they were charged with false imprisonment. Not content with charging them in the District Court, where the maximum sentence would have been 12 months, the decision was made to bring them before the Circuit Court on indictment, where the maximum sentence is life imprisonment.

While I happen to completely disagree with the protestors on water charges, and from the video footage can see that many of them were engaged in very aggressive and unpleasant behaviour, I always thought that it was ludicrous for the Public Prosecution Service (PPS) to bring these charges. As argued by criminal lawyer Frank Buttimer, false imprisonment is a serious crime usually associated with a much larger criminal intent.

Much of the mainstream media concern about the trial has been focused on the use of social media by supporters of the defendants with #JobstownNotGuilty trending on Twitter during the trial. For me the most concerning aspect of the case, apart from the fact that it was ever brought to trial, was the unreliability of the Garda witnesses. Evidence supplied from three Gardaí claiming that Paul Murphy asked the crowd whether they wanted to keep the two trapped there “all night” was flatly contradicted by the video evidence.

Paul Murphy claims that such inconsistencies point towards coordinated perjury on behalf of the Gardaí. I do not agree, as I believe it highly unlikely that Gardaí would conspire to commit a serious criminal offense like this. Rather, as argued by Fintan O’Toole in the Irish Times, I think it betrays a cultural bias within the Gardaí against working class communities, whereby they convince themselves, until they really believe it, that these people are obviously troublemakers who need to be taught a lesson. It shows a recklessness with giving evidence, making definite statements without qualification, which were flawed by their own prejudice and faulty recollections. Bearing in mind that in certain non-jury courts in Ireland the word of a Garda is often deemed sufficient evidence to convict, this is indeed concerning, not least for the teenage Jobstown protestor who was earlier convicted of false imprisonment in the Junior Court sitting without a jury. This conviction should surely be considered unsafe.

Yet when the Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Leo Varadker quite reasonably expressed concern at this aspect, the knee jerk reaction of the Fianna Fáil leader Micháel Martin was to defend the Gardaí and the PPS, in essence the very system that allowed this flawed trial to proceed. Martin claimed that Varadker’s comments were “unfair to the Gardaí”, “very serious”, “ill-judged”, gave the “impression that maybe the Gardaí didn’t give the full truth in accordance with the facts” and set a “dangerous precedent”.

This is unfortunately a typical establishment reaction, to close ranks and defend the system at all costs, even when it is clearly found wanting. From where I’m sitting it seems quite obvious that the Gardaí gave false evidence. The blame for this lies with the Gardaí themselves, not with others who point out inconvenient truths.

I can also understand why the Jobstown protestors were angry at the media coverage of the case. Those who doubted the ability of the jury to do their duty due to the existence of a Twitter hashtag expressed no concern when Paul Murphy was declared guilty of false imprisonment on national television on the day of his arrest.

Indeed, the most positive aspect of the trial is that it keeps the faith with, and highlights the importance of, trial by jury. Faith in the institutions of the state, namely the Gardaí and the PPS, is severely damaged however. The PPS are under no official obligation to explain why they bring any case to court. I think clear answers on why this flawed trial was allowed to happen and how the Gardaí came to give such flawed evidence are required.

Like Lost Water ... Sadly Going To Disappear

Buncrana Together on:
Why the 9.4 water exemption clause on water charges is a game-changer, missing from Oireachtas Report and sadly going to disappear.
This is another interview from OceanFM, NWT, June 23 2017 on the issue of the 9.4 Exemption clause of the EU's Water Framework Directive that gives Ireland an exemption on water charges.
Michael Mooney, a former election candidate in Donegal with the Right2Change campaign speaks clearly and passionately on the history and importance of the 9.4 Exemption clause.
He voices the disillusionment and shock that many in Ireland feel over how we were led, how the campaign against water charges has gone and about our fear that water charges are coming down the line.

Michael Mooney's Facebook page where he is trying valiantly trying to highlight water charges issues

Ibrahim Halawa Good - Tony Taylor Bad

Dublin activist, Rowan Clarke, makes the case that much of the Left in Ireland is regressive due to its facilitation of theocrat ideologies and cultures.
Very much inspired by the ‘Social Justice Warrior’ phenomenon in the United States, they emulate the same sort of outlook: casually promoting what would seem to be socially progressive viewpoints, usually connected with feminism, civil rights, multiculturalism and the new-found concept of Identity politics.

Usually there is no real sincerity behind these sentiments. They are populist notions and most of the time espoused for personal validation.

Yet still this mindset has established itself as a driving force in modern Irish society, particularly among the younger demographics, and have considerable influence on media, even having direct influence and involvement to some degree in establishment media.

Those critics and commentators perplexed by this rapidly expanding culture, tend to deem it a Left phenomenon and those purposing it Lefties, but on closer inspection one can see that many core Left principles are contradicted by this social liberalism, such as collective ownership of equity, and an abhorrence of decadent individualism.

Still the mainstream Left in Ireland have embraced this Social Liberal import, its mass populism is too big an electoral market to snub.

And it’s not hard to miss the Trendy Trot parties out on the streets waving placards and banners related to some empty rhetoric related to some intersectional cause. 
From an Irish standpoint, this all manifests in a form of dogged criticism and opposition to the Catholic Church, and all issues in which it has a connection or influence.

For me personally, I share this desire to see a complete and permanent end to the Churches traditional dominance of important institutions of society such as education and health.

The separation of church and state is vital for any Republic to thrive, and secularism is a vital component of the Irish Republic proclaimed during Easter week 1916.

The Catholic Church and the theocracy it established in the 26 counties after partition, could truly be deemed an evil and malign entity, the reverberations of the pain and misery caused, still felt today by a generation who lived through it.
The Liberals and Trendy Left are more then entitled to cast scorn on the church and do whatever they wish to see it crumble as a participating influence on Irish officialdom.

But oddly and unfortunately the Liberals and the Trendy Lefties are selective in their scorn, and for reasons I can’t comprehend.

When it comes to the topic of Islam, the Liberal and Trendy Lefties do a complete 360 and seem to be very enabling of Islam and in a way supportive of Muslim theocrats and theocracies!

The case Ibrahim Halawa is an excellent example of this.

Ibrahim Halawa was born in Ireland into an established Egyptian family, a dynasty that could be argued is the leading proponent of fundamentalist Sunni Islam in Ireland.

Ibrahim’s father Hussein, is the most senior cleric, the leading Imam in Irelands largest mosque Clonskeagh mosque. Which in the past has been directly linked to the Muslim Brotherhood and a source of activities of the Muslim Brotherhood in Ireland.

The Halawa’s, from what I have seen first-hand and from reports I’ve been given are nice people, but there is no denying they are deeply conservative, dedicated Muslims who are committed to Islam’s spread and certainly some of the Muslim theocracies in the Middle East, which are synonymous with grave human rights abuses and oppression.

Before I go on, let me state the following,

Ibrahim Halawa’s detention and denial of due process in Egypt on all appearances is draconian and cruel.

I am not making a case that Ibrahim Halawa deserves the obvious injustices he is enduring, he deserves an immediate fair trial and his human rights respected, but still the facts need to be clarified.

Ibrahim, an Irish citizen, at 17 years old travelled with the full blessing and support of his family to Cairo, Egypt. He went to fight in a war/participate in a mass protest (it's something of a grey area, hard to ascertain what label it deserves: the answer is different depending on who you ask).

In Egypt during this period, civil war was in full effect, with chaos reigning throughout the region as mass demonstrations broke out.

The allegedly democratically elected Mohamed Morsi, leader of the Sunni Islamist collective, the Muslim Brotherhood, had been ousted due to coup led by Abdel Fattah el-Sisi,(democracy as we know from current events here is a very subjective term - in the Middle East it’s even less black and white. Morsi and his Muslim Brotherhood had earlier ousted another previous leader Honsi Mubarrack in 2011).

Ibrahim Halawa, made the conscious decision to join the Muslim Brother and oppose the ousting of its leader Morsi.

For this decision, Ibrahim found himself captured and to this day remains interned.

I am fully aware that Ibrahim Halawa is no doubt an impressionable gullible young man (I’ve been there myself in the past) who no doubt was spurred on and encouraged by his powerful father, and probably manipulated by talented Islamist recruiters both here and in when he arrived in Egypt. It still is evident that Halawa’s worldview is entirely diametrically different than the Ultra-Liberals and Trendy Lefties here in Ireland who are his most staunch supporters.

The more conspiracy theory inclined are convinced that when Ibrahim boarded the plane to Egypt, he renounced his Irish citizenship by tearing up his Irish passport.
I’m not so convinced of this.
But what I am convinced of is that he has little love of Ireland and does not regard it as his home. He shares nothing in common with its culture nor its core values.

Let’s be honest: strict Muslims would have little love or appreciation for the positive aspects of Irish culture and identity.
Ibrahim in videos filmed at rally’s during the uproar of the Muslim Brotherhood uprising, is heard to make speeches referring to Ireland as ‘the place he lives’ and Egypt as his ‘home’ and Islam as the philosophy he lives by.
The Muslim Brotherhood, like many other dominant Islamist entities in the Middle East, proposes a theocracy that would see widespread human rights abuses and oppression of any who don’t subscribe to its medieval dogmatic perspective. That includes women, gays, those they deem apostates which is all non-Muslims or those who have dared leave the faith.

All across the Middle East we have ample examples of how Muslim theocracies enforce their tyranny: public lashings, hangings, internment, stoning and those labelled gay or effeminate thrown from buildings.

While all established religions have their extremists and liberal strand, within Islam it can be very cut and dry: you abide by the Koran in all its teaching and you follow it to a tee.

So, I find extremely odd that those here in Ireland we would deem themselves bastions of human rights, and defenders of those they deem oppressed in society such as women, gays and minority races: who lambast the Catholic Church from a height for its outdated positions and conservative religious grasp that they want rid of. Yet they are comfortable bedfellows with the Halawas and staunch crusaders for the release of their son.
All faith systems and religions are fair game to be attacked but bizarrely Islam is off limits. In fact despite it being one of the most draconian, backwards and oppressive religions out there, its practice is encouraged.

The influence the Trendy Left and Liberals have on all forms of media on this issue is very noticeable. Nearly weekly we are given an update on the current state of Ibrahim: on what condition his health is in; what developments there are in his legal situation; what prominent Irish politician or famous advocate has visited him.

You see Ibrahim Halawa, despite obviously devoting himself to a foreign country for which he holds no citizenship, subscribing to an organisation who promote ideals that contradict everything Irish.

He and his family feel he still is entitled to every avenue of support and help the Irish State can provide them with and demand the Irish people call for the release of this self-avowed Muslim Brotherhood fundamentalist Islamist - a gullible young man but a religious crusader none the less.

You could be forgiven for finding this a hugely cynical move on the Halawas' part.

Yet still the Liberals and Trendy Left are busy fighting Ibrahim’s corner.

One could make the argument that defending all forms of free speech is a virtue and perhaps they are right.

But really, what is the difference between the politics of the Halawas and let’s say that of Far Right figures such Britain’s Nick Griffin or Frances Marie Le Pen?

Both, despite differences in geography and skin colour, endorse similar authoritarian, fascist, absolutist outlooks. Islamofascism is no different to any other forms of fascism.

Would the Liberals and Trendy Left be out protesting if Nick Griffin or Marie Le Pen were imprisoned due to their beliefs?

I sincerely doubt it, and in the case of Ibrahim Halawa, I certainly won’t be waving any flags for him.

While I respect the right of the Halawas to practise any religion they choose, I cannot hide the fact I find their Islamist credenda to be a detestable barbaric philosophy and I would oppose them ever trying to influence theocracies anywhere else on this earth.

You would think my fellow Left travellers would join me in those sentiments.

What brings home this glaring hypocrisy, is the total deliberate avoidance by the mainstream Left and Liberal class of the gross injustices here in Ireland when it comes to republican prisoners.

Particularly in the cases of the Special Criminal Court in the 26 counties and the low level use of internment in the 6 counties. 
In the Special Criminal Court, defendants endure a scenario in which they are simply accused of membership of an illegal organisation, evidence is not required and there is no Jury in place only a Judge, and all it takes to be found guilty is the finger point of a high-ranking guard.

The Special Criminal Court is condemned under protocol set out by the European Convention on Human Rights.

And in the North, the British government have been literally kidnapping individuals off the streets, throwing them in jail cells with no trial or due process in sight.

This is currently the case for Derry man Tony Taylor who is 500 days interned without trial.

These political prisoners are revolutionary and progressive in outlook which is the cruel irony in the Trendy Left ignoring them.

Where is the media outcry over what Tony Taylor and his family are enduring?

Where are Solidarity, People Before Profit, Amnesty International and the prominent celebrity activists to denounce this gross injustice in our country?
Are we now at a juncture where it is more beneficial and attractive to fight the corner of Islamic protesters in Egypt over that of Irishmen subjected to EU and internally condemned Diplock courts and internment by remand on their own soil?

It boggles the mind!

The Punishment Of Dissent

Through the prism of Nikolai Bukharin, writer Matt Treacy views the treatment of dissent by tyranny. Matt Treacy blogs @ Brocaire Books.



Nikolai Bukharin was an interesting chap. He was a “foundational Bolshevik” as some might refer to latter day republican “dissenters” as “foundational Provos,” as if that was a bad thing. If that is not bad enough then they will drop the penny as informers.

Like many revolutionaries Bukharin made moral compromises that do not always reflect well upon him. He sided with Stalin initially but became appalled by the burgeoning terror and the huge loss of life in the artificial famines.

He professed allegiance to Stalin to the very end, but many historians believe that he was being duplicitous for whatever reason. Many of us have been. Stalin toyed with him, and at one stage apparently stood laughing at him with Beria and the other scum while poor Nikolai attempted to attract their attention by waving at them in the podium during the May Day march.

The lesson of that is, do not attempt to kowtow to tyrants. They only have contempt for people who fawn on them, and that includes those who think they are in the “core group.”

So one day, after years of dodging and dealing they came to take Bukharin away. Historians are conflicted about whether he was tortured but evidence from the archives show that the interrogators were instructed that “beatings permitted.” Well, anyone who has ever been beaten up would not consider that anything to be happy about.

So, eventually he confessed to all sorts of nonsensical allegations and they had a trial. Then he retracted, and then made a ludicrous confession to being a fascist. The best interpretation of it is that he did it to save his family. It didn’t succeed. They sent them to the gulag. Another reason not to compromise with tyrants.

The lesson of all of this is that internal dissenters are always looked upon as worse than any external enemy. The reason being that they remind the tyrant of how far they have distanced themselves from the original objectives they professed to believe in. Above all they cannot tolerate that.

Most of all they cannot tolerate anyone who points out that the Emperor does not have clothes. The lesson of Bukharin is, never compromise.

Without A Single Thought Of The Genocide

At the end of June Mick Hall wrote in Organized Rage that:
Across Canada today many people will be celebrating the 150th anniversary of the signing of Canada's confederation without a thought of the genocide inflicted on first nation people
“That is what Canadians will be celebrating today, the theft of 99.8% of our land, leaving us on reserves that make up only 0.2% of the territories given us by the Creator.” --Art Manuel 
The Kent Monkman painting The Scream, in which Royal Canadian Mounted Police join nuns and priests in prying First Nations children away from their panicked parentsJay Soule aka Chippiwar is a Native multimedia artist from the Chippewas of the Thames First Nation (Deshkaan Ziibing Anishinaabeg) located twenty minutes south west of London, Ontario on the north bank of the Thames River.

Jay creates art under the name Chippewar which represents the hostile relationship that Canada's native people's have with the government of the land they have resided in since their creation.

Below is some of his work, they're a reminder while Canada is celebrating the 150th anniversary of the signing of Canada’s confederation. Native people have often been treated appallingly by the Federal government.

More on this here.
Here is a more upbeat article.
O Canada, never stop being weird

Sadly That Was A Lie

An email which Daniel Bradley sent to the Legacy Investigation Branch on 20 July 2017 in which he accused the body of covering up the 1972 British Army slaying of his brother, IRA volunteer Seamus Bradley.


Maybe you should send this email to the coroner as pictures don't tell lies. In a statement from yourselves, you claim that the clothes and his shoes had too much blood on them that being the reason they were never returned to the Bradley home, sadly that was a lie as can be seen here in this picture. His shoes were not given back either as there were no bullet holes in his shoes. Instead you deliberately covered up a brutal murder, as he was violently attacked by unknown army military. On today's date yourself and chief Constable George Hamilton office are running away and hiding instead of accepting and acknowledging what was done. Come the 15th of September I will be expressing my serious concerns to the coroner with the evidence in front of me through my barrister. As the RUC. At the time covered up, now yourselves are doing the same. You all should be ashamed of yourselves as you took an oath to uphold the last and TRUTH, if it hadn't been for myself this crime would have remained covered up.

In Toronto LGBT Iranians Were Branded As ‘Islamophobes’

Maryam Namazie with her latest piece in  The Freethinker.


Police intervention ensured that they weren’t able to stop the Iranians from joining Pride as the video below shows.




If you cannot condemn the persecution meted out by Islamic states and Islamists, well, that’s a pretty good deal for those in power and a pretty raw one for those who want to defend human rights.

That Iranian LGBTQ participants needed police intervention in a place where they must feel safest says much about the world we live in today.


Add caption
Which makes it all the more important to emphasise that the only states which punish homosexuality with the death penalty are Islamic ones, including Afghanistan, Iran, Mauritania, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, UAE, and Yemen. And that Islam is used as a justification for murdering LGBTQ people (as are all religions – though we don’t have, for now at least – – a Republic of Gilead).

Of course that does not mean that all Muslims are homophobic –gay Muslims at Toronto Pride is a good case in point. After all, people are more than the religions they were born into out of very little choice of their own.

It also doesn’t mean that bigotry doesn’t exist – of course it does. But what on earth does defending LGBTQ people (including gays Muslims ) in countries under Islamic rule have to do with bigotry?
The Iranians at Toronto Pride were told their defence of LGBTQ rights “emboldens” “anti-Muslim racists”,  but those making this convoluted linkage assume that Muslims are automatically anti-LGBTQ and that they are one and the same as the Islamists – which seems to me to be promoting the very bigotry they feign to resist. (Unless of course they believe former President Ahmadinejad when he said “In Iran, we don’t have homosexuals like in your country”.)



On July 8, members from the Council of Ex-Muslims of Britain and I will be marching with others, including Muslims, at Pride in London to highlight the persecution faced by LGBTQ people  in countries under Islamic rule. We will be focused in particular on the harrowing roundup, detention and torture of homosexuals in Chechnya where its president, Ramzan Kadyrov, has expressed the desire to “eliminate” gay people by the start of Ramadan.

Those who will gasp in horror to see us criticise Islam and Islamism at Pride in London whilst they regularly protest the Pope and poke fun at Christianity and the religious-right would do well to remember that rights are universal and applicable to everyone irrespective of where we live.

The argument that Islam and Islamism cannot be criticised because Muslims are a minority in Canada or the UK is akin to telling an Iranian woman that she cannot criticise Trump’s or May’s misogynist policies because Christians are a minority in Iran! It’s absurd when you use this line of argument for any other situation but it has become the new normal, particularly when it comes to Islam and Islamism.

This perspective denies desperately needed internationalism and real anti-fascism (which must include being anti-Islamist to be worthy of its name).

It defends silence rather than condemnation and solidarity.

What was the saying during the height of the AIDS crisis? Silence = Death.

Well, yes exactly.


See CEMB’s Pride in London page. For more information, please contact Daniel Fitzgerald  at exmuslimcouncil@gmail.com, telephone 07952 593 227 or visit our website.

The upcoming International Conference on Freedom of Conscience and Expression being held in London during 22-24 July 2017 will also discuss the links between LGBTQ communities and ex-Muslim movements among other timely issues. For more information of the conference, visit its website.

Editor’s notes/Updates:

Antifa denies targeting the Pride participants:




Also please note that some have said the reason the group were targeted by ‘anti-fascists’ was because of the far-Right JDL which were invited to join by the group organisers. This has been denied by ICHR:

Snake Of Racism

Investigative Journalist and Political Commentator, Dr John Coulter, has been probing the activities of the Far Right in Ireland for almost 40 years. In this latest investigation, he poses the crucial question – where will the snake of racism rear its head next?

Reporting on racism and racist organisations and people for almost four decades gives me ethical nightmares under the journal’s Code of Practice – in trying to expose this social cancer of racism, do my reports actually fuel the very evil I am trying to expose?

As a born-again Christian, I fondly remember the chorus we were taught in Junior Sunday School – “Red and yellow, black and white, all are equal in His sight; Jesus loves all the children of the world.”
While the Christian Churches need to do much, much more to combat the evils of racism other than simply uttering pious sermons, I also get concerned that racist organisations adopt the ethos – ‘any news, even bad news, is good news.’

Will Brexit increase hate crimes? Would a future potential Irexit whereby the Republic follows the UK out of the European Union increase racism on this island? Would radical Islamic terror attacks in Ireland spark a form of racism which would eclipse the curse of sectarianism which has gripped this island for generations?
The bottom line is that Ireland must be ready to cope with any new wave of racism. To prepare for this scenarios, I’m taking readers back seven years to August 2010 and an interview I did with Nick Griffin, then a member of the European Parliament for an English constituency.

The fascist British National Party was then planning to launch an extreme Right-wing Irish National Party in the Republic, according to British National Party boss and English MEP Griffin.

Griffin, who was a former chairman of the fascist National Front party before moving to the BNP, confirmed in 2010 that plans had been set in place to establish the INP.

He said in his interview:
In the South, we have been approached by individual Irish people. We know there is no place for a British National Party in Eire, but these people want to form an Irish National Party and we want to help them establish that. There are many in Great Britain connected with the BNP who are from Irish extraction and we in the BNP are actively looking for ways that we can help those in Eire.
Under Griffin’s leadership, the BNP had become the most successful fascist party in Britain since the late Oswald Mosley’s notorious British Union of Fascists, known as the Blackshirts.
In 2009, the BNP won two seats in the European Parliament. A year later, with only weeks to go to the expected Westminster General Election and local government elections in England, there was the real fear the BNP could make further gains, including Commons seats and full control of at least one English council.
For example, Winning control Barking and Dagenham Council would give the BNP control of an annual £200 million budget.
In the 1930s, the BUF attracted considerable support from the Irish community in Britain, especially in Yorkshire.
Anti-fascists even feared Griffin was a strong contender to win one of England’s supposedly safest Labour Party Westminster seats - Barking.
Had Griffin become an MP, the launch of an INP would have been inevitable. In a past English council elections, the BNP clinched over 50 seats.
In 2010, Griffin confirmed the BNP wanted to develop its operations in the Northern Ireland where it already has a Belfast branch.
Even modest victories for the BNP in the English council polls would have seen the party attempt to make a huge political leap across the Irish Sea.
He added:

Certainty we want to develop in Northern Ireland. The core issues that the BNP stands for are becoming more relevant to Northern Ireland. We have got a local team coming together and we will see steady work taking place in Northern Ireland. But we will be guided by our local members in Northern Ireland. Sectarianism is institutionalised in Northern Ireland, but we will not be making moves until I talk with our people in Northern Ireland and hold a strategy conference.

Racism has become the new sectarian curse in the North of Ireland. Figures on racially motivated crime produced by the Police Service of Northern Ireland have emphasised this trend in racism.
Racist graffiti was daubed in loyalist areas of south Belfast against the North’s steadily growing Polish community.

Using white paint, the racists daubed swastikas, along with the slogans ‘C18’ – representing the racist terror Combat 18 – and ‘Poles out’.
Police have also warned about racist crime in the Co Armagh town of Portadown – more globally associated with the annual Drumcree Orange Order standoff each July which has been continuing since 1995.
In spite of tensions in, and lack of, the Stormont power-sharing Executive, the North’s peace process is holding firm.
The Executive and legislative Assembly, which came into existence on Devolution Day in May 2007, has lasted longer than any solution since the original Northern Parliament was axed in 1972.
But after finally getting the chance for lasting peace following more than eight centuries of religious conflict, the communities now face the prospect of a generation of racist crimes. One of the core reasons for this is that there is a blatant impasse in the Stormont peace process and the Executive needs to be urgently kick-started.
While a single group has not yet been identified as being behind the racist campaign, a number of fringe fascist organisations have been active in an attempt to gain a foothold, not just in the North, but also in the Republic of Ireland.
Former UUP Assemblyman Danny Kennedy, the Ulster Unionist Party ex-deputy leader, has warned in the past about the dangers of recruitment from the British National Party.
The fringe neo-Nazi British People’s Party produced specific posters, leaflets and stickers aimed at recruiting in Northern Ireland. It has also unveiled plans to establish an Irish Patriots Party.
In the past couple of years, the old White Nationalist Party, the National Front and the British Movement have indulged in leafleting and sticker campaigns in the North.
A branch of the Ku Klux Klan - the Knights of the Invisible Empire - has been active in the North since 1999.
In 2009, the Klan unsuccessfully tried to launch two initiatives - bringing all the Far Right groups together under the banner of the White Aryan Resistance.
The Klan also tried to launch another racist terror group, known as Lodge 14 - the number representing the 14 words of the American racist movement about creating a better world for white children. Both plans flopped. But the racist Right just keeps coming back and coming back.
The island’s community – both in Northern Ireland and in the Republic - faces a dilemma - ethically, morally, and socially it should ignore these racists by not giving them a platform, but the racial crime continues to climb and the police continue to warn about incidents - so somebody must be doing it.
When the BNP also won a London Assembly seat, there were also fears it would cross the Irish Sea and try and recruit in the North as well as launch the INP in the South. Every time the racist Right wins in mainland Britain, the spotlight falls on Ireland.
Southern Ireland does have a history of flirting with fascism. In the 1920s and ‘30s, General Eoin O’Duffy had a thriving Blueshirt movement. Just as many Irish folk went to fight for Franco’s fascists in Spain as those who fought for the Republican International Brigade.
During World War 2, the IRA wanted to assist with any Nazi invasion of Britain, and Oswald Mosley, the British Union of Fascist boss, was committed to the Irish republican cause.
Even in Northern Ireland, the extreme Right-wing Ulster Protestant League enjoyed some success in the pre-War 1930s.
One of the major problems is that the modern racist leadership in the North has moved away from the working class skinhead movement and into the educated middle class.
Such faceless leaders – under the guise of anti-social behaviour - can always find gullible, working class kids to put up their graffiti or smash windows in the homes of migrant workers.
But this leadership will remain in respectable middle class, well educated white collar jobs. For example, the Klan orders its members to infiltrate existing democratic political parties, churches and community groups.
The racist plan is that the BNP, NF and others who replace them will take the main ‘heat’, leaving the middle class-run Klan to oversee the whole operation. It is clear the racist problem will get worse with the increase in the population of ethnic workers, asylum seekers, and the Irish Travelling community.
The US State Department has claimed at least six radical Islamic groups are operating in Ireland, while Shannon airport in the Republic has been used as a base for rendition, or alleged torture flights.
Only a few years ago in one predominantly Protestant growing commuter village, about 20 minutes’ drive from Belfast, a fundamentalist Christian church was holding a series of meetings aimed at combating the anti-social behaviour in the locality.
A meeting to organise the events noted the biggest threat to the Christian outreach came from the recruiting activities of the BNP.
Traditionally, the Far Right was always recruited from the loyalist working class community, but has found it impossible to gain an English-style electoral foothold because of working class support for the parties linked to loyalist terror groups, such as the Progressive Unionists (linked to the UVF and Red Hand Commandoes) and the Ulster Political Research Group (linked to the UDA and UFF).
While much of the racially motivated crime has been occurring in loyalist areas of the North, the real danger could come if racism spreads into traditionally Catholic districts, or across the border into the Republic.

Who's Who In Northern Ireland Racism Over The Years
British People’s Party: formerly known as the White Nationalist Party. Has around 50 members, but had support of 200 when known as WNP. Openly neo-Nazi and wants to recruit both Catholics and Protestants. Most active racist group with links to Nazi terror gang, Combat 18. Target areas – Larne, Lisburn, Coleraine, Belfast, Portadown.
British National Party: largest of Britain fascist movements winning over 50 council seats in England in 2010. Pursuing “a low-key leafleting campaign in a number of parts”, according to a spokesman. 
National Front: has only a handful of activists, mostly based in Coleraine and Bangor; indulged in limited leafleting, but is a shadow of the late 1980s organisation.

British Movement: although largely defunct on mainland, still has a few supporters in the North; was responsible for low-level leafleting around north Antrim.

Ku Klux Klan: focuses on recruiting middle class, university educated Protestants by invitation only; branch known as Knights of the Invisible Empire – one of the leading Klan units in the US in 1930s. Supposedly believes in “quality, not quantity”, according to Northern spokesman. Wants to infiltrate the various Unionist parties and “influence from within”. Has unsuccessfully tried to form its own terror network in Ireland.

Ulster Monday Club: while not racist or fascist, UMC has been defunct since 1980s. Extreme Right-wing Unionists want to use the new Conservative and Unionist electoral link to re-vamp the Club because of its once high standing in UUP. Before disbanding, was one of the most influential pressure groups in UUP, boasting a number of MPs and several councillors. Disbanded because of racist allegation scandal which engulfed the English-based National Monday Club.

Combat 18: Neo-Nazi terror group thought responsible for some of the racist attacks in the North. Takes its name from the first and eighth letters of the alphabet – A and H – which stand for Adolf Hitler, the Nazi dictator responsible for the Holocaust. While the Hebrew community in the North is very small, Combat 18’s main targets have been families from the growing Eastern European communities, especially the Roma community from Romania. 

The Historic Links Between Racists And The North
The rise of racism in the North did not come with the start of the new millennium. Links between Loyalism and the Far Right can be traced back to the 1970s.
In the early ‘70s, the NF, then Britain’s largest racist organisation, tried to establish itself in the aftermath of the paramilitary-backed Ulster Workers’ Council strike which brought down the power-sharing Sunningdale Executive in 1974.
However, in spite of the NF’s very public support of the Union, working class loyalists opted instead to develop their own political parties attached to the UDA and UVF.
But in the late Seventies, when the NF collapsed in Britain with the rise of hardline Tory boss Maggie Thatcher, the UVF formed terror links with the European Nazi movement.
It established an unholy alliance with the Belgian neo-Nazi terror group, the Vlaamse Militante Orde (VMO or Flemish Militant Order).
The North Antrim hills were used for a limited amount of joint UVF/VMO training, but the relationship turned sour when the UVF refused to attack the North’s small Jewish community.

It was to be 1986 and unionist opposition to the previous year’s Anglo-Irish Agreement which sparked the next major foray by the Far Right into the North.

The NF tried to re-establish its presence by sending John Field, then a 26-year-old Londoner and member of the party’s ruling National Directorate, to the North. The NF opened a bookshop and headquarters in east Belfast.
However, this time the NF was espousing the cause of independence for the North, and urged its members to joining the growing grassroots Protestant movement, the Ulster Clubs.

In an interview with me in the late 1980s, Field said when asked if the NF enjoyed close relations with the UDA:

We’re not prepared to comment on what organisations, paramilitary or otherwise, that we are associated with. We believe any people have a duty and a right to take up arms against those who are prepared to wage an armed struggle against the British people and nation. We are not a religious organisation and we don't support sectarian murder. But if a person who is in the IRA or supports the armed republican struggle in one form or another is taken out by the loyalist paramilitaries, we would be the first to applaud it.

The NF contested council elections in Newtownabbey, but only scored a handful of votes. The movement eventually split and at one time in the late 1980s, there were two separate groups – both calling themselves the NF, one based around a paper called NF News, the other around another paper called The Flag.
While the NF based itself in the loyalist working class, in 1986 another sinister hardline Right-wing group supporting an independent North established itself in the unionist middle class. Called the Ulster Movement for Self-Determination (MSD), it wanted the three counties of Ulster now in the Republic to join with the six Northern counties to form a new political state.
MSD was thought to want the expulsion of nationalists from the new nine-county state to ensure a loyalist majority. MSD was defunct by 1991.
Fascism and racism were not exclusive to the Northern Protestant tradition. Nationalism, too, has had a murky link with the Far Right. Britain’s most notorious pre-War Nazi leader, Sir Oswald Mosley, who founded the street thugs known as the Blackshirts, was an avid Irish republican.
In 1930s Britain, quite a number of Yorkshire-based Irish migrant families supported Mosley’s British Union of Fascists organisation.
And British Government documents made public since the start of the new millennium suggested a small group of IRA supporters were prepared to help the Nazis invade the North during World War Two.
Also in the early 1930s, Protestant nationalist Ernest Blythe from Lisburn became a leading figure in General Eoin O’Duffy’s equally notorious fascist Blueshirts – a movement which was later to become one of the inspirations of the modern day Southern party, Fine Gael.
Republicanism’s flirtation with racism reached its peak in the early 1984 when one of the smaller Ku Klux Klan organisations based in the United States pledged its support for the nationalist cause.
The links were confirmed in the June 1984 literature of the pro-Klan organisation, The Mountain Church, based in Cohoctah, Michigan.

This particular pro-Klan movement noted in its Ireland File:

At the risk of sounding like some sort of babbling liberal, the problem in Northern Ireland is to bring peace and reconciliation to the two warring tribes, and then to unite all of Ireland’s 32 counties under a populist, racial nationalist society.

In the same edition of the Mountain Church, writing under the banner of the Irish Republican Association, an author who signs himself “IRA Glen Cove, New York” brands the Jews as “the synagogue of satan”.

While the BNP represents the biggest threat in Northern Ireland, a recent court ruling ordering the party to change its constitution allowing ethnic minorities to join could lead to increased support for the ‘whites only’ NF instead. 
Follow Dr John Coulter on Twitter @JohnAHCoulter

Great Arch

Via The Transcripts John McDonagh, RFÉ 1 July 2017, alerts listeners to a problem in Donegal over access to the Great Arch on the Fanad Peninsula.Radio Free Éireann
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John: Yes, and then one other topic I wanted to bring up: Anyone that listens to Radio Free Éireann – we know you’re going over this summer and we always push the west of Ireland and to get out of Dublin. And there’s that old saying: What’s the best thing that ever came out of Dublin? And it’s the road out of it!
The Great Pollet Sea Arch Source: Donegal Democrat Date: 2 July 2017
So if you land in Dublin head to the west of Ireland. I’ve done shows with David McGowan who has a glamping site in South Sligo where he brought in a plane just to bring some publicity to that part of that – Sligo. And then just recently I just got back, I was in Donegal Town, the Reel Bar, r-e-e-l, is voted the most, the best Irish pub in Ireland, in Donegal Town. And one of the reasons I love it is they have a poster of Brian Mór, the founder of Radio Free Éireann, hanging up in the bar. And I would recommend anybody heading to Donegal Town to go to that. 
But I’ve been going for the past couple of years to the Fanad Peninsula, to the lighthouse which has just opened there, and one of the other tourists sites there is called the Great Arch. And it’s a bit difficult to get to ’cause you have to go through fields to get down to the beach. But it’s a natural thing that happened – that’s in that part of Donegal. Well an American bought a plot of land there and he has now closed it off because he will not give right-of-way to tourists to go down there and he’s hurting tourism there.
Fanad Arch Turnstyle Source: Donegal Daily Date: 22 June 2017
And there’s a little turnstile that goes into the field. He has now blocked it up with cement and there’s been protests going on and it’s actually been raised in the Dáil and I want to give people alert: Please still go to the area. They hope to resolve it very shortly. And go to that Fanad Peninsula and Inishowen and the Bloody Foreland up there and go and support the west of Ireland and the Wild Atlantic Way.
(ends time stamp ~13:36)
The Bloody Foreland, County Donegal
Photo: wildatlanticway.com

The Bizarre Case Of Bashar

The Uri Avnery Column considers it absurd for the US government and media to have laid the blame for a gas attack at the door of the Syrian dictator, Bashar al-Assad.
Conan Doyle, the creator of the legendary Sherlock Holmes, would have titled his story about this incident "The Bizarre Case of Bashar al-Assad".

And bizarre it is.

It concerns the evil deeds of Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian dictator, who bombed his own people with Sarin, a nerve gas, causing gruesome deaths of the victims.

Like everybody else around the world, I heard about the foul deed a few hours after it happened. Like everybody else, I was shocked. And yet…

And Yet, I am a professional investigative journalist. For 40 years of my life I was the editor-in-chief of an investigative weekly magazine, which exposed nearly all of Israel's major scandals during those years. I have never lost a major libel suit, indeed I have rarely been sued at all. I am mentioning this not to boast, but to lend some authority to what I am going to say.

In my time I have decided to publish thousands of investigative articles, including some which concerned the most important people in Israel. Less well known is that I have also decided not to publish many hundreds of others, which I found lacked the necessary credibility.

How did I decide? Well, first of all I asked for proof. Where is the evidence? Who are the witnesses? Is there written documentation?

But there was always something which cannot be defined. Beyond witnesses and documents there is something inside the mind of an editor which tells him or her: wait, something wrong here. Something missing. Something that doesn't rhyme.

It is a feeling. Call it an inner voice. A kind of intuition. A warning that tells you, the minute you hear about the case for the first time: Beware. Check it again and again.

This is what happened to me when I first heard that, on April 4, Bashar al-Assad had bombed Khan Sheikhoun with nerve gas.

My inner voice whispered: wait. Something wrong. Something smells fishy.
First Of All, it was too quick. Just a few hours after the event, everybody knew it was Bashar who did it.

Of course, it was Bashar! No need for proof. No need to waste time checking. Who else but Bashar?

Well, there are plenty of other candidates. The war in Syria is not two-sided. Not even three- or four-sided. It is almost impossible to count the sides.

There is Bashar, the dictator, and his close allies: the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Party of God (Hizb-Allah) in Lebanon, both Shiite. There is Russia, closely supporting. There is the US, the far-away enemy, which supports half a dozen (who is counting?) local militias. There are the Kurdish militias, And there is, of course, Daesh (or ISIS, or ISIL or IS), the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (Al-Sham is the Arabic name for Greater Syria.)

This is not a neat war of one coalition against another. Everybody is fighting with everybody else against everybody else. Americans and Russians with Bashar against Daesh. Americans and Kurds against Bashar and the Russians. The "rebel" militias against each other and against Bashar and Iran. And so on. (Somewhere there is Israel, too, but hush.)

So in this bizarre battlefield, how could anyone tell within minutes of the gas attack that it was Bashar who did it?

Political logic did not point that way. Lately, Bashar has been winning. He had no reason at all to do something that would embarrass his allies, especially the Russians.

The First question Sherlock Holmes would ask is: What is the motive? Who has something to gain?

Bashar had no motive at all. He could only lose by gas-bombing his citizens.

Unless, of course, he is crazy. And nothing indicates that he is. On the contrary, he seems to be in full control of his senses. Even more normal than Donald Trump.

I don't like dictators. I don't like Bashar al-Assad, a dictator and the son of a dictator. (Assad, by the way, means lion.) But I understand why he is there.

Until long after World War I, Lebanon was a part of the Syrian state. Both countries are a hotchpotch of sects and peoples. In Lebanon there are Christian Maronites, Melkite Greeks, Greek Catholics, Roman Catholics, Druze, Sunni Muslims, Shiite Muslims and diverse others. The Jews have mostly left.

All these exist in Syria, too, with the addition of the Kurds and the Alawites, the followers of Ali, who may be Muslims or not (depends who is talking). Syria is also divided by the towns which hate each other: Damascus, the political and religious capital and Aleppo, the economic capital, with several cities – Homs, Hama, Latakia - in between. Most of the country is desert.

After many civil wars, the two countries found two different solutions. In Lebanon, they agreed a national covenant, according to which the president is always a Maronite, the prime minister always a Sunni Muslim, the commander of the army always a Druze and the speaker of the Parliament, a powerless job, always a Shiite. (Until Hizballah, the Shiites were on the lowest rung of the ladder.)

In Syria, a much more violent place, they found a different solution: a kind of agreed-on dictatorship. The dictator was chosen from among one of the least powerful sects: the Alawis. (Bible-lovers will be reminded that when the Israelites chose their first King, they took Saul, a member of the smallest tribe.)

That's why Bashar continues to rule. The different sects and localities are afraid of each other. They need the dictator.

What Does Donald Trump know about these intricacies? Well, nothing.

He was deeply shocked by the pictures of the victims of the gas attack. Women! Children! Beautiful Babies! So he decided on the spot to punish Bashar by bombing one of his airfields.

After making the decision, he called in his generals. They feebly objected. They knew that Bashar was not involved. In spite of being enemies, the American and Russian air forces work in Syria in close cooperation (another bizarre detail) in order to avoid incidents and start World War III. So they know about every mission. The Syrian air-force is part of this arrangement.

The generals seem to be the only half-way normal people around Trump, but Trump refused to listen. So they launched their missiles to destroy a Syrian airfield.

America was enthusiastic. All the important anti-Trump newspapers, led by the New York Times and the Washington Post, hastened to express their admiration for his genius.

In comes Seymour Hersh, a world-renowned investigative reporter, the man who exposed the American massacres in Vietnam and the American torture chambers in Iraq. He investigated the incident in depth and found that there is absolutely no evidence and almost no possibility that Bashar used nerve gas in Khan Sheikhoun.

What happened next? Something incredible: all the renowned US newspapers, including the New York Times and The New Yorker, refused to publish. So did the prestigious London Review of Books. In the end, he found a refuge in the German Welt am Sonntag.

For me, that is the real story. One would like to believe that the world – and especially the "Western World" - is full of honest newspapers, which investigate thoroughly and publish the truth. That is not so. Sure, they probably do not consciously lie. But they are unconscious prisoners of lies.

Some weeks after the incident an Israeli radio station interviewed me on the phone. The interviewer, a right-wing journalist, asked me about Bashar's dastardly use of gas against his own citizens. I answered that I had seen no evidence of his responsibility.

The interviewer was audibly shocked. He speedily changed the subject. But his tone of voice betrayed his thoughts: "I always knew that Avnery was a bit crazy, but now he is completely off his rocker."

Unlike the good old Sherlock, I don't know who did it. Perhaps Bashar, after all. I only know that there is absolutely no evidence for that.