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From the outset, the IPSC affiliated itself to an organisation called the Irish Anti-War Movement (IAWM). As many have observed before, the majority of people at such “anti-war” demos support violence and this holds true for the IAWM. It is run by Ireland’s answer to George Galloway, Richard “Bold Boy” Boyd Barrett, whose mission in life seems to be expelling the Israeli Ambassador to Ireland. Boyd Barrett is the adopted son of one of the wealthier men in Ireland, reputedly named in the Ansbacher Report on high-finance tax concerns. He is a leading member of the far-left Socialist Workers Party and is notorious for appropriating worthy issues as his own. He offers uncritical support for Hamas and Hizbullah, and could be found screaming for intifada on the streets of Dublin, which even alienated numerous pro-Palestinians.
After the 2006 Lebanon War, the IAWM brought Ibrahim Mousawi, a spokesman for Hizbullah, to Ireland to address “peace activists” in Belfast, Dublin and Galway where he spoke with pro-peace luminaries like Aengus O’Snodaigh of Sinn Fein/IRA. He is the head of the Hizbullah owned pro-Islamic Jihad satellite TV station, Al-Manar. France has banned the station because of its vicious anti-Semitic content. He was invited back in 2007 to attend a Dublin conference, but Irish Justice Minister Brian Lenihan denied him entry to Ireland. The IAWM described it as a “disgraceful attack on the anti-war movement” How right was the government to refuse Mousawi entry? Mousawi was banned from entering the United States due to his links to the terrorist organisation. He referred to Jews as “a lesion on the forehead of history” and said “pain is the only language that the enemy [Israel] understands” Clearly a latter day Gandhi.
The IAWM helped organise the “Al Aqsa Festival: Gaza’s Victory, The Road to Al Quds” at the prestigious RDS venue in April 2009, featuring a bouncy castle presumably for fledgling jihadists. The war in Gaza was described as a “victory.” Extremists like Sheikh al Baz said the conflict had “restored to every Muslim his honour and dignity” and Azzam Tamimi said, “Once you recognise Israel, you say to the world that the rape of my country and my people is acceptable,” and “It is a crime against humanity to recognise Israel’s right to exist…” Boyd Barrett said that it is “entirely legitimate” to assert “Israel has no right to exist” since “it is not a normal state but a state built on violence, oppression and apartheid.”
Absurdly enough, the same Boyd Barrett was involved with preventing Holocaust-denier David Irving from speaking at a University in Ireland and this, for some, proves he is not anti-Semitic. Peculiar, then, that he should have no problem cavorting with Islamic extremists who hold very similar values pertaining to the Jews. Perhaps he is just being disingenuous about Irving. If he is sincere, this odd, somewhat schizophrenic behaviour relates to a condition described in another article – it is an alternative, politically correct version of anti-Semitism that has a very different face to the to the far-right anti-Semitism of old.
With the recent Gaza Flotilla incident, Boyd Barrett and the IAWM established a “blockade” of the Israeli Embassy in Dublin on the 4th of June – the police described the protest as “peaceful” and did not intervene when it stopped staff from going about their business. On the 8th of June, they held another so-called “peaceful” pro-Palestinian protest with the IPSC outside the Israeli Embassy.
The demonstrators used the Arabic “Khaybar, Khaybar, ya Yahoud, jaish Muhammad sa yaoud” chant. Interestingly, the only mention of the hate chant in the mainstream media was featured with a lengthy denial in the pro-Palestinian Irish Times newspaper. While it does not literally mean “Death to the Jews,” it has the same substantive meaning. It translates as “Khaybar, Khaybar, O Jews, the army of Muhammad will return.” Coincidentally, this is what the Turkish jihadists were chanting on the Mavi Marmara. It recalls the surprise assault in 629 AD on the Jewish community of Khaybar in Arabia led by Muhammad himself. The people of the community were killed or enslaved. This was part of the eradication of the substantial Jewish presence in Arabia. Sadly, such hate-filled protests often outside embassies have been the norm rather than the exception in recent weeks. Protests were often violent, engaged in flag burning etc. but it was only to be expected – a sample of events from 2009 tells the same story.
This time the police did step in and prevent the demonstrators closing the Embassy. Raymond Deane could be seen in pictures jostling with the police and wrote a whining letter to one of the national newspapers about his treatment. Meanwhile, Boyd Barrett and the IAWM have promised to continue holding demonstrations at the Israeli Embassy after protesting to seek boycott of Israel at some of Dublin’s busier supermarkets last weekend. This is just a sample of the protests in Ireland after the flotilla incident. The moral of the story: nothing seems to motivate quite like hate.
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