How it is. (Courtesy of Jim Kable.)
28 OCTOBER—Catherine Connolly has such a sweet Irish face—broad and open, bright eyes with a touch of sadness about them, always either smiling or about to give the world one. She has Irish politics, too, this daughter of Galway: Ireland’s tenth president, elected last Friday, draws directly from the collective memory of Britain’s long, cruel colonization of her people when she condemns apartheid Israel’s long, cruel colonization of Palestinians. So do her voters: She had the support of 63 percent of them.
History does this sometimes, providing power does not bury it: Its bleak, violent chapters can induce among the living a heightened consciousness of and commitment to justice. This is among the many things that distinguish the Irish. Connolly calls the Zionist regime’s genocide just what it is and recognizes Hamas as “part of the fabric of the Palestinian people”—a liberation movement by any other name. Could she have expressed such an understanding so forthrightly had the Irish Republican Army not been part of the fabric of the Irish people all those years?
I read Connolly’s rise from the Dáil (where she was deputy speaker) to the Irish presidency as marking a progression in global politics we ought not miss. How to put this? The world has been turning against the Israeli terror regime since it began its spree of murder and starvation two Octobers ago. Now it is doing so decisively, so finding its collective voice at last. What you have heard ever more loudly on many streets these past two years you now hear at the highest levels of government. There is momentum, I mean to say, and it is in the right direction. Only in America is this not so—a point to which I will return.
Connolly’s election has reportedly prompted many Israelis to pledge never to set foot on the Emerald Isle. Brilliant: Israeli Zionists are joining in the urgent work of isolating Israeli Zionists. However many stay away, Ireland will be better off for each one.
There is a fleck of history here, too. As you may recall, the Irish were very quick to denounce the Israelis’ campaign of terror two autumns ago. By the end of 2023 there were left-wing calls in the Dáil to expel Dana Erlich, Tel Aviv’s predictably repellent ambassador. A few months later, in May 2024, Ireland formally recognized Palestinian sovereignty. At the end of that year the Netanyahu regime finally gave up. Its Foreign Ministry cited “the extreme anti–Israel policies of the Irish government” as it recalled Erlich and closed its embassy in Dublin.
Ireland’s anticolonial, anti-imperialist tradition and its reflexive sympathy for the oppressed are impossible to miss and, notably, never seem to bend in the wind. This makes me think Connolly’s voice is likely to prove especially strong—is “acute” my word?—on the Palestine question. But she jumps onto a moving train, let us not forget. The momentum just noted has been gathering for some time and now appears to be reaching critical mass.
History does this sometimes, providing power does not bury it: Its bleak, violent chapters can induce among the living a heightened consciousness of and commitment to justice. This is among the many things that distinguish the Irish. Connolly calls the Zionist regime’s genocide just what it is and recognizes Hamas as “part of the fabric of the Palestinian people”—a liberation movement by any other name. Could she have expressed such an understanding so forthrightly had the Irish Republican Army not been part of the fabric of the Irish people all those years?
I read Connolly’s rise from the Dáil (where she was deputy speaker) to the Irish presidency as marking a progression in global politics we ought not miss. How to put this? The world has been turning against the Israeli terror regime since it began its spree of murder and starvation two Octobers ago. Now it is doing so decisively, so finding its collective voice at last. What you have heard ever more loudly on many streets these past two years you now hear at the highest levels of government. There is momentum, I mean to say, and it is in the right direction. Only in America is this not so—a point to which I will return.
Connolly’s election has reportedly prompted many Israelis to pledge never to set foot on the Emerald Isle. Brilliant: Israeli Zionists are joining in the urgent work of isolating Israeli Zionists. However many stay away, Ireland will be better off for each one.
There is a fleck of history here, too. As you may recall, the Irish were very quick to denounce the Israelis’ campaign of terror two autumns ago. By the end of 2023 there were left-wing calls in the Dáil to expel Dana Erlich, Tel Aviv’s predictably repellent ambassador. A few months later, in May 2024, Ireland formally recognized Palestinian sovereignty. At the end of that year the Netanyahu regime finally gave up. Its Foreign Ministry cited “the extreme anti–Israel policies of the Irish government” as it recalled Erlich and closed its embassy in Dublin.
Ireland’s anticolonial, anti-imperialist tradition and its reflexive sympathy for the oppressed are impossible to miss and, notably, never seem to bend in the wind. This makes me think Connolly’s voice is likely to prove especially strong—is “acute” my word?—on the Palestine question. But she jumps onto a moving train, let us not forget. The momentum just noted has been gathering for some time and now appears to be reaching critical mass.
Keep reading Patrick Lawrence in The Floutist on Substack.