I've said below that this blog will be concerned with culture and politics. The political issue that will be most prominent will be the question of Palestine. In the autumn of 2001, shortly after 9/11, I, along with Tom Hyland and Raymond Deane - see Raymond's new blog at http://raymondmdeane.blogspot.com/
- and several other activists and academics set up the Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign (see www.ipsc.ie). Our purpose was to raise the profile of the Palestine question in Irish public discussion and political discourse. In this we succeeded admirably, to the extent that it is now well known that Israeli diplomats regard a posting in Dublin as one of the most strenuous in Europe, and Israel's self-appointed defenders have felt the need to create rival organisations of their own.
In spite of this, it remains difficult to put out information on the situation in Palestine unclouded by either pro-Zionist bias or liberal waffle about 'the two-state solution' or the equality of suffering 'on both sides'. The real and terrible history of European anti-Semitism and the attempted and nearly successful genocide of the Jewish people also are taken to lay a burden of ethical complexity over attempts to understand what is going on in Israel/Palestine. But, as Norman Finkelstein has often pointed out, the situation is not actually so complex. A formidable state, aided by the material and political support of the last of the old superpowers, and the connivance of other newer 'powers' such as the European Union, is slowly choking another people and society, vastly weaker in resources monetary, military and diplomatic, in the full view of the world. This should properly be seen as an outrage and a crime.
Accordingly, I will regularly post links to important and useful websites touching on this issue, and occasional writings or reflections of my own.
Conor
- and several other activists and academics set up the Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign (see www.ipsc.ie). Our purpose was to raise the profile of the Palestine question in Irish public discussion and political discourse. In this we succeeded admirably, to the extent that it is now well known that Israeli diplomats regard a posting in Dublin as one of the most strenuous in Europe, and Israel's self-appointed defenders have felt the need to create rival organisations of their own.
In spite of this, it remains difficult to put out information on the situation in Palestine unclouded by either pro-Zionist bias or liberal waffle about 'the two-state solution' or the equality of suffering 'on both sides'. The real and terrible history of European anti-Semitism and the attempted and nearly successful genocide of the Jewish people also are taken to lay a burden of ethical complexity over attempts to understand what is going on in Israel/Palestine. But, as Norman Finkelstein has often pointed out, the situation is not actually so complex. A formidable state, aided by the material and political support of the last of the old superpowers, and the connivance of other newer 'powers' such as the European Union, is slowly choking another people and society, vastly weaker in resources monetary, military and diplomatic, in the full view of the world. This should properly be seen as an outrage and a crime.
Accordingly, I will regularly post links to important and useful websites touching on this issue, and occasional writings or reflections of my own.
Conor
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