Notes from the Old Sod: after Prime Minister Leo Varadkar suddenly resigned as the leader of Ireland, he was replaced by Simon Harris, who won the parliamentary vote to succeed him on April 9. Harris, alas, turns out to be a carrier of the same anti-Israel animus.
More on Harris and his views on Israel, as it is now fighting the fourth war for its survival as a Jewish state — the others were fought in 1948, 1967, and 1973 — can be found here: “New Irish PM on Gaza: ‘Reason has been replaced by revenge,'” by Leon Kraiem, Jerusalem Post, April 9, 2024:
Simon Harris, who became the youngest-ever Prime Minister of Ireland on Tuesday after the sudden resignation of his predecessor, Leo Varadkar, affirmed on Saturday his willingness to recognize a Palestinian state, condemned Hamas, and called for the release of hostages. Harris also, however, condemned Israel’s conduct in its war against the jihadist group.’
Harris addressed the war between Israel and Hamas and its allies during a speech on Saturday at the annual conference of his party, Fine Gael.
“We absolutely, fully condemn the massacre carried out by Hamas in October,” Harris said, “and again, we call for the unconditional release of all of the hostages. But—” Harris said, pausing for applause, “we will not stay silent on the actions of the Israeli government either,” a line that drew a second round of applause.
Harris said that in Gaza, “reason has been replaced by revenge, by bombing, by maiming, and by the death of children.” He also invoked “famine, a specter no Irish person can bear,” adding that “anyone who can countenance deliberate starvation has lost their sense of humanity.”
Harris paints a picture of Israel as a country maddened by the need for “revenge” to do all sorts of terrible things to innocent civilians “by bombing, by maiming and by the death of children.”
But Isrel is not hellbent on “revenge.” It is soberly, and methodically, trying to accomplish only one thing: to dismantle Hamas, which has threatened to repeat the atrocities it carried out on October 7 “again and again and again.” Israel wants to make sure that Hamas will never again be able to threaten the Jews of Israel. The IDF from the very beginning of the Gaza campaign has done everything it can to minimize civilian casualties, just as Hamas tries to maximize them, so that it can use those casualties as a weapon in its propaganda war against Israel.
The picture Harris paints of an unhinged Israel wreaking its revenge simply does not accord with the actual behavior of the IDF. It first told the people of northern Gaza to head south, because soon that part of Gaza would become a battlefield. To that end it dropped fourteen million leaflets, sent six million messages, and made four million robocalls. And those warning worked: 900,000 people left northern Gaza to head south of the Wadi Gaza, as the IDF had instructed, and they remained safe as battles broke out in the north. The warnings were repeated later in central Gaza, once the IDF had turned its attention to that area, and again civilians headed even further south, to Rafah, where they been living ever since.
The IDF also warns civilians to leave buildings, including schools, mosques, apartment buildings, and hospitals, where Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad have hidden both fighters and weapons, as part of their strategy to embed themselves and their weapons in civilian areas. The IDF uses leafletting, messaging, and telephoning to warn civilians of buildings about to be targeted. These are the rational, systematic efforts of a military determined to minimize civilian casualties, and those efforts have achieved amazing success. According to the UN, in all the wars since World War II, the average ratio of civilian-to-combatant deaths has been 9:1. In Afghanistan, the Americans managed to achieve a 4:1 ratio, and in Iraq, a 3:1 ratio. But in Gaza so far, the IDF has achieved a 1:1 ratio, that is one civilian death for every combatant killed. This ratio has not been achieved by any other army in the history of warfare, as both British Colonel Richard Kemp and West Point Professor John Spencer have noted. Harris’ description of a maddened IDF blindly flailing out in an unhinged spirit of “revenge” is simply false.
Then there is Harris’ charge that Israel has been deliberately engaged in creating a “famine” in Gaza. He says that “anyone who can countenance deliberate starvation has lost their sense of humanity.” He is referring to the IDF, and to all the Israelis, whom he thinks are causing “deliberate starvation.” It’s nonsense. There has not been any “deliberate starvation” of Gazans by the IDF. There are thousands of trucks full of food and other humanitarian aid inside Israel ready to enter Gaza as soon as each truck has been searched for weapons. That has slowed down aid, but one can hardly qualify that as a policy of “deliberate starvation.” Another problem has been the distribution of aid, because once inside Gaza, armed Hamas members raid those trucks first, and take what they want, irrespective of real need, for themselves, their extended families, and their tribes. It’s not the amount of food that is the problem, but the distribution of food. Israel has just opened both the Erez Crossing to humanitarian aid and the Port of Ashdod, where ships from Cyprus carrying food and other aid, already checked by Israeli officials on that island, can now dock and offload the food and other aid that can then be taken by trucks for distribution throughout Gaza. Israel has no desire to starve the people of Gaza; it only wishes to make sure that the shipments of food and other aid do not include weapons which Hamas could use to kill Israelis. On April 10, 468 trucks carrying food entered Gaza — the highest number since before October 7.
SKA says
The Irish hatred for Israel and the Jews compounded by gross ingratitude: during the Potato Famine one of the most generous contributions was the £400,000 raised from the British Jewish community by the Baron Lionel de Rothschild – yes! The same “evil Rothschilds” falsely blamed for all the wars of the past two centuries and financial irregularities of the Great Powers during that time.
Mike says
Of course, and I’m hardly the first to point this out, but Irish culture (though predominantly Christian) and Jewish culture have some remarkable similarities, such as a shared love for literature, art, music, sports, dance, alcohol, domestic animals (especially cats and dogs), plus a generally strong work and entrepreneurial ethic, etc. Obviously those things arr not unique to those groups, but they’re especially noticeable.
Stranger Here Myself says
A ‘love for literature, art, music, sports, dance, alcohol, domestic animals (especially cats and dogs), plus a generally strong work and entrepreneurial ethic’? That’s Western European culture in a nutshell, esp. Anglo-Saxon; and a work ethic was once synonymous with Protestantism.
Stranger Here Myself says
btw, I’m reminded of this apposite excerpt from Pat Conroy’s The Lords of Discipline (1980):
carpediadem says
Klezmer music and Irish folk violin music have a big overlap!
Dani says
It won’t be long before the UK has moslem majorities, sharia law and no-go cesspools. Then the fun for these Jew hating irish useful idiots will really begin.
Stranger Here Myself says
At the rate of their immigration from the Third World, the Republic will be Muslim before we will (if only just). They’ll finally gain the united Ireland they murdered so many for—only it will be as part of the Caliphate (they’ll have to learn how to say ‘Tiocfaidh ár lá’ in Arabic).
Mike says
In my view, and I know that a lot of people will strongly disagree with me and even personally insult me, BUT….Ireland should not have liberalized its abortion law to the extent that it has.
I understand that there was outrage over the death of that Indian dentist who was refused a medically necessary abortion, and I personally believe that there should also be exceptions for that, and for rape and incest (if done fairly early in the pregnancy), or if the fetus itself is likely to die due to severe abnomalities.
BUT, the reformed laws basically amount to abortion on demand in my opinion. Send any hate replies…I think Ireland has overcompensated for problems with the original law, though.
Stranger Here Myself says
As the maxim goes, ‘Hard cases make bad law’, but the scenes of ecstatic joy that followed in the 2018 abortion referendum’s wake give the lie that it was anything to do with that hard case rather than simply legalising child murder. (There was delight in some quarters at a supposed ‘push back against liberal elites’ with Ireland’s recent rejection of redefining ‘family’ and de-emphasising motherhood, but it should be noted that was courtesy of only 30% and 32% of Ireland’s electorate respectively —a minority and a fair bit short of the 41% and 42% voting for easy divorce and abortion; while 56% were all ‘family-schfamily, mothers-schmothers, meh, I should vote?’)
btw, en passant, Britain could repeal our Abortion Act 1967 and the rape and mother’s life exceptions would remain legal, courtesy of Rex v. Bourne (1938) and the Infant Life (Preservation) Act 1929, s.1(1)(b). The Abortion Act was not for the hard cases (already covered by statute and common law) but to legalise mass-abortion, on demand and for any reason and none.
jerry glenn says
Ireland surges in the international Islamopandering derby.