Neo-liberalism has not only created a society which is distorted by massive inequalities, it poisons our very language.

• Mick Hall with a piece that initially featured on his own blog Organized Rage.

 

The cancer which is Neo-liberalism has not only created a society which is distorted by massive inequalities, the scale of which the UK has not experienced in the post world war two period; and which are tearing society apart. It now poisons our very language.

The Sound of the Engines

Guest writer Davy Carlin continues his story of growing up in West Belfast's troubled times.

Yet now I thought to myself how lucky I was as to where I lived. With my home nestling on the side of a mountain, Black Mountain, we have beautiful views over the city of Belfast. Then with just a two minute walk sees us to the entrance of a large spacious park.

Canute of the North

"Will the advancing waves obey me, Bishop, if I make the sign?"   
Said the Bishop, bowing lowly, "Land and sea, my lord, are thine."
Canute turned towards the ocean—"Back!" he said, "thou foaming brine.”

"From the sacred shore I stand on, I command thee to retreat;
Venture not, thou stormy rebel, to approach thy master's seat:
Ocean, be thou still! I bid thee come not nearer to my feet!"

But the sullen ocean answered with a louder, deeper roar,
And the rapid waves drew nearer, falling sounding on the shore;
Back the Keeper and the Bishop, back the king and courtiers bore.

From the poem King Canute by William Makepeace Thackery

A New Set of Moral Shackles

• Alfie Gallagher with a piece that featured today on his own blog, Left From The West addressing regulation of the sex industry in Ireland.

Why Obama is Declaring War on Syria

Franklin Lamb writing from Beirut, keeping a readership informed of the conflict in Syria. This piece initially featured on Counterpunch in its Weekend Edition 14-16th June, 2013


The End of Syria as We Know It?

The Accused

Yesterday, 36 years after his original conviction, Pat Livingstone was acquitted of killing Samuel Llewellyn in West Belfast in 1975. Mr Llewellyn, a resident of the Shankill Road, was shot dead by the IRA after being kidnapped while carrying out emergency repairs to homes in the area in the wake of a loyalist bomb attack. It became known as the "Good Samaritan killing".

Looking at a photograph of ‘Big Liv’ yesterday after his acquittal was soothing, seemingly far removed from the days when it was customary for a West Belfast man to merely turn up in a suit and as a result be labelled ‘the accused.’

News Letter photo of Pat Livingstone and his son outside the court where his appeal was upheld.

Now the worm has turned and Liv stands vindicated, able to point the finger at those who conspired to unjustly secure a worthless conviction. The accused in the case of Samuel Llewellyn are the British judiciary and the RUC.

It was clear to everybody remotely interested from the outset that the charge against Pat Livingstone was tenuous to say the least. Convicted on a concocted verbal statement he was fallaciously said to have made outside the jurisdiction of the RUC, it was easy after that for the legal process that disposed of unwanted members of the public to grind into action. Equipped with neither brake nor reverse gear, the conveyor belt trundled on relentlessly until justice had been pulverised. Prejudice not evidence was sufficient to call it in a Diplock Court.

Other than immediate family few cared about an unsafe conviction. Immediately after the Llewellyn killing Pat Livingstone had been the target of a smear campaign by members of the Provisional Movement making it clear to all and sundry that it was hanging him out to dry. Livingstone was a former internee so it was all too easy to presume his culpability rather than prove it. Conferring on him the status of an unwanted member of the public made it all the easier to remove him from public view. Journalists were whispered to from Provisional offices and when the judge sentenced him to serve the rest of his natural life in prison, (illegally as well), there was a collective shrug of indifference. ‘Throw away the key’ was the cry from the British and unionist establishment, made sufficiently loud to drown out the sound of other concerns.

In prison Liv endured the ardours of the blanket protest and because of the sentence he received was unable to attend the funeral of his 14 year old sister Julie who was brutally killed by British state forces the same evening Frank Hughes died on hunger strike.

I never met him during the blanket. We were held throughout in separate blocks. Once it was over, we became close prison friends. Not of the temperament to be academically inclined – that type of discipline had little appeal to him – he was extremely intelligent. Armed with an encyclopaedic knowledge he sustained himself throughout his lengthy spell of imprisonment by reading every type of literature, an activity he combined with following the progress of Glasgow Celtic whom he adored. He was wickedly sarcastic and the two of us shared a wry perspective on jail matters, rarely showing the slightest  inclination to take at face value anything from officialdom, whether Provisional or penal.

Pat Livingstone and myself outside my cell in the H Blocks circa 1991

Once coming back from the visits in 1982 in a prison van he was being dropped off at his block before me. As he was about to get out he turned around and backed out, gesturing to Willie McGrath of Kincora infamy while commenting to me ‘don’t get out with your arse facing him.’  Whether the prisoners or the screws guarding us laughed most is still something I have yet to figure out. But that was Liv, quick and never one to miss an opportunity to make a witty remark.

On rare occasions in our lives we have written to each other, usually when the chips were down for one or the other. That affinity would never have stopped him ripping the back out of me. Typical Liv, just his way, as natural and as frequent as Irish rain.

There was no justification for the killing of Samuel Llewellyn. A non combatant, he happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. What his family thought they knew about his death has now been shattered by the combined efforts of the RUC and British judiciary in securing a verdict for which there was no justification. Its role often overlooked, the northern judiciary was complicit in crimes against society and it is unfortunate that no proper investigation has ever been conducted into its role. The judiciary was as cavalier about law and rights as Anglo Irish bankers were about the economy. And now the relentless determination of a former blanket man has, in the court of public opinion, moved judges from the bench to the dock.

Siding with the Oppressor: The Pro-Islamist Left

Maryam Namazie with a pice in which she argues that a section of the Left has abandoned its historical mission. It initially featured on her own blog.

The below is my postscript to One Law for All’s new publication Siding with the Oppressor: The Pro-Islamist Left. It is a companion volume to Enemies not Allies: The Far-Right. You can read full report here: SidingWithOpressor_Web.

Temporary Police State

Guest writer Sean Matthews with a piece on the recent G8 convention in Fermanagh.

At the post G8 press conference, PSNI Chief Constable Matt Baggot claimed the G8 summit in Enniskillen was the 'most peaceful and stable' in its history. The G8 gangsters may have left dazzled and wined by our local political class but beneath the media spin and smokescreen lies the ugly reality of a new Northern Ireland of one rule for the rich and powerful, while the rest of us must accept our place in the ladder or face the consequences. We only need to look no further than the selective internment of Marian Price and others.

Unquestionable adoration of Obama is ludicrous

Left Wing TD Clare Daly with a piece that first featured in the Irish Examiner on the 21st June 2013.

This & That: Take 21

Ministerial Hurrah for the Overlord

In a gushing example of what TD Clare Daly described as sycophantic behaviour ...  subservient tugging of the forelock as your feudal overlord pays you a visit', the Minister for Finance and the Minister for the Disappeared show unbridled enthusiasm for the leader of world capitalism, President Barack Obama, during his recent visit to Belfast.

Outrageous Treatment of Michael Campbell

Prisoner rights campaigner, Pauline Mellon with a piece on the imprisonment of Michael Campbell in Lithuania. It was written on 21st of June 2013 within hours of the writer attending a meeting meeting concerning Michael Campbell's case.

I would like to draw your attention to the very disturbing case of Irish citizen Michael Campbell. Michael is currently serving a twelve year prison sentence in Lithuania in what has been described as in inhumane and degrading conditions. Michael has been imprisoned since January 2008.

Essential for Understanding Provisional Irish Republicanism

Robert White, Professor and Chair, Department of Sociology, Indiana Universit-Purdue University, Indianapolis (IUPUI) with a letter that featured in the Irish News on 21/06/2013 in response to a comment by Newton Emerson. The Irish News, however, did not print the full letter, including — most important — the URL for the online documentary that is open access. The documentary, like the Irish Republican Movement Collection in general, is out there for students, scholars, and interested others to help them become informed and develop their own judgement on what happened between 1969 and today.

Irish politician lays into Obama and his hypocrisy during the G8 meeting

Left wing TD Clare Daly gives a perspective on President Barack Obama and the Fermanagh G8 event radically different from the prevailing narrative.

Free Stephen Murney, Victim of British Political Repression

Guest writer Steven Katsineris, Vice Chairman of the James Connolly Association, Melbourne, Australia with a piece on republican prisoner Stephen Murney.

Those unfortunate to find themselves interned by remand, despite not being found guilty of anything, can be imprisoned for lengthy periods with no sign of either a date for trial or release. Political internees can find themselves in gaol for up to 2 years, or more, under this repressive, draconian policy, awaiting a trial... - Stephen Murney. 1/6/13.

Proving Marx's Dictum

Mick Hall with a piece from his blog on the onging conflict in Turkey. It featured on the 18th June.

Turkey police receive orders to arrest protesters who stand still, proving Marx's dictum: "History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce."

Rejoining the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association.

Guest writer Dr John Coulter is a Radical Unionist commentator and a former columnist with The Blanket. He is currently writing an e-book about republicanism as an outsider looking in. The e-book is entitled An Saise Glas (The Green Sash) The Road to National Republicanism. The chapters are being published exclusively on The Pensive Quill. In this latest chapter, he examines how republicanism can relaunch the famous Celtic Tiger economy by leaving the European Union and rejoining the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association.

US and Israel Lobby Reels from Hezbollah al-Qusayr Victory

Franklin Lamb writing from Beirut on the ongoing conflict in Syria. The article initially featured on Counterpunch on the 7-9th June, 2013

Although al-Qusayr may not be the decisive battle for Syria, it is irrefutably an important turning point in the crisis which has given the regime much sought military momentum. Plenty of adjectives and some clichés are being bandied about from Washington to Beirut to describe the al-Qusayr battle results and significance.  Among them are "game-changer," "mother of all battles," "altered balance of power," critical "turning point in the civil war," and so on.

Army in Al-QusayrIt does appear that the victory of the Syrian government forces at al-Qusayr is a strategic achievement, if also a humanitarian disaster for the civilian population still waiting for the ICRC and SARCS, (Syrian Arab Red Crescent Society) emergency help. Al Qusayr is located in Homs province, an area central to the success of the Syrian government’s military strategy. It is situated just west of the shortest route from Damascus to the coast, at a juncture where regime forces have struggled to maintain control. Rebel control of al-Qusayr had disrupted the regime’s supply lines from the port of Tartus and was open for the cross-border movement of Gulf arms to rebels via Lebanon's Bekaa Valley.

Government control of al-Qusayr also provides a ground base for the Assad government to move to retake control of the north and east of Syria. This cross-roads city just 6 miles from the Lebanese border has many strategic ramifications: breaking the opposition's 18 month control of much of Homs province, facilitating government forces momentum generally across Syria, and psychological, by raising the morale of exhausted Syrian forces while energizing the Assad government and its allies to finish the conflict and focus on long-promised reforms and try to relieve Syria from the nearly 27 months of hell for its people.

Perhaps less appreciated here in Beirut are al-Qusayr’s effects on the Zionist occupiers of Palestine and their currently traumatized US lobby.

From conversations and emails with former colleagues at the Democratic National Committee (on which this observer served during the Carter administration) as well as with Congressional insiders, a picture emerges of nearly debilitating angst among those committed to propping up the apartheid state in the face of truly historic changes in this region that have only just begun to re-shape the region.

The reactions from various elements of the pro-Israel lobby range from the Arabphobic Daniel Pipes’ fantasy essay in the Washington Times this week entitled “Happy Israel” to Netanyahu’s increased threats issued from Tel Aviv about what Israel might do if his three cartoon “red lines” are breached, to more pressure on the White House by Israel’s agents in Congress who are demanding that Obama act immediately to undo “the major damage done at Qusayr”.

Several aspects of “the Qusayr rules and results” are being discussed at the HQ of the racist anti-Defamation League (ADL) which has summoned an emergency gathering of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations to craft a solution to the problem. The tentative agenda reportedly includes for discussion and action the following:

The twin defeats at al-Qusayr and at Burgas, Bulgaria -- the latter should not be underestimated, according to one AIPAC activist who works on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, given that it substantially knocks out the props from the lobby’s project to get the European Union to list Hezbollah as a terrorist organization, thus interfering with the Islamic party’s fundraising. The lobby is reacting angrily to Austria’s Chancellor Werner Faymann and Foreign Minister Michael Spindelegger’s statement about that country’s decision to withdraw its 380 peacekeeping troops, more than one-third of the 1000 United Nations Disengagement Observer Force, (UNDOF) contingent, from the Golan Heights.

The lobby is claiming that Austrian move constituents an existential threat to Israel because it opens the Quneitra crossing, the door to the Golan, for the Syrian civil war to spill over the border into Israel. At the same time it is being argued that al Qusayr lifts pressure off Hezbollah, Iran and Syria as well as the Palestinian resistance and gain all more fighters who sense victory for the current regime and major gains for all in the political dynamics of the region.

The Israel embassy in Washington has chimed in with a statement that the Austrian withdrawal threatened the role of the UN Security Council in any future negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians, while at the same time encouraging Hezbollah to move into the Golan.

Israel stalwart, Eric Cantor (R-Va) told a "brown bag" lunch gathering in the House Rayburn Building cafeteria late this week that the “fall of al Qusayr, will facilitate the Assad regimes advance on areas north of Homs province and will likely return to Damascus control of important rebel-held areas in the north and the east. Cantor claims that the Assad regime victory effectively cuts off an important supply route to the rebels which will leave the armed opposition even more weakened and scattered. Israel is demanding an immediate US supported counter-offensive consistent with the demands made by US Senators John McCain and Lindsay Graham.

The apartheid state also is demanding that the White House scrap Geneva II, claiming that Assad is now too strong for the US/Israel to benefit from such a dialogue. “If the international community is serious about seeking to enforce a negotiated settlement, they will first have to do something to decisively change the balance of power on the ground ahead of any serious negotiations,” he added.

When asked about giving US aid to Lebanon, Cantor reportedly sneered, as he expressed his shock that Hezbollah had so many troops and, without US boots on the ground, would be very difficult for Israel to defeat, he reportedly replied, “Forget about Lebanon, it never was a real country anyway, just call the whole place over there Hezbollah and let’s send in the marines to finish the job.”

One congressional staffer who attended the meeting winced at the thought of US marines again being sent to Lebanon given their previous experience there nearly 30 years ago.

The Lobby is also concerned about the fact that the Arab League and the Gulf countries might be softening in their ardor to confront Syria and Hezbollah, GCCwho they view as now being full partners in this crisis. A media source at the Saudi Embassy in Washington has complained that the six member Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) has spent more than a billion dollars on the opposition and have, to date, little to show for their “investment.” Nor does Israel have much to show to date for its deepening role in the crisis given that its air strikes are widely viewed in Washington and internationally as being counterproductive and helping to unite Muslims and Arabs in the face of their common global enemy.

The ADL reportedly wants the White House to act fast “to do something” in light of a new Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll released on Wednesday, the day of the Syrian government’s victory at al Qusayr, showing that only 15% of Americans polled advocated taking military action, and only 11% supported providing the rebels with arms. A quarter of respondents, 24%, favored taking no action, similar to the White House current position.

Abe Foxman, ADL’s President for Life, and inveterate anti-Semite tracker, myopically sees anti-Semitism, and surely not Israel’s decades of crimes against humanity as the cause for other “anti-Semitic” polls released this week. Those included the recent one commissioned by the BBC which confirmed that Israel is not only ranked second from the bottom of 197 favorably viewed countries, including as a danger to world peace, and just about the world’s most negatively viewed country, but its support globally continues to evaporate. Views of Israel in Canada and in Australia remain very negative with 57 and 69 per cent of their citizens holding unfavorable views. In the EU countries surveyed, views of Israeli influence are all strongly negative with the UK topping the list with 72 per cent of the population viewing Israel negatively.

As Ali Abunimah noted this week, “The persistent association of Israel with the world’s most negatively viewed countries will come as a disappointment to Israeli government and other hasbara officials who have invested millions of dollars in recent years to greenwash and pinkwash Israel as an enlightened, democratic and technological 'Western' country."*

With Wednesday's National Lebanese Resistance (Hezbollah) victory at al-Qusayr, coming as it does 97 years to the month after the Triple Entente’s (UK, France & Russia) May 1916 secret Asia Minor Agreement, generally known as Sykes-Picot, the scheme to control the Middle East following the defeat of the Ottoman Empire has furthered crumbled. Its "Rosemary’s Baby" progeny, the colonial Zionist occupation of Palestine, is increasingly being condemned by history to an identical fate.

According to a growing number of US and European officials and Middle East analysts as well as public opinion polls, it is solely a matter of time until, like al-Qusayr, Palestine is returned to her rightful, indigenous inhabitants.

*
"Israel one of world’s most unpopular countries and it’s getting worse: BBC survey," Ali Abunimah, Electronic Intifada, June 6, 2013

Secularism is my right; freedom is my culture

Below is Maryam Namazie's speech at the May 2013 Women in Secularism conference in Washington DC. It originally featured on her own blog

Participants joined in an action to defend Amina Tyler, Imad Iddine Habib, Bangladesh’s bloggers and Alex Aan

Dark Cloud Descending

An evening or two back I found myself ruminating on censorship in Egypt. In truth there is not much need to go to Cairo in search of censors. They infest climes closer to home. In Belfast, given half a chance, they would congregate on tiptoes at the shoulders of its denizens just to have a quare auld gawk at what citizens might be reading.

Loyalists in Last Chance Saloon

Dr John Coulter wit his latest from the Irish Daily Star which featured there on 11th June 2013

Loyalists have entered the Last Chance Saloon with the unveiling of the new liberal McUnionist Party fronted by Basil and wee Johnny.

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Long Hot Summer Days ... and Checkpoints

Guest writer, former Blanket regular, Davy Carlin, within a further installment of life growing up in West Belfast. 

My mum had got married to my stepfather when I was about three years old. Seeing the pictures of the wedding with the women with long hair and the fellas with their side burns showed also a picture of that ‘mad’ seventies fashion. Although it must be said that it, and the Retro style have come back {although updated} which is followed closely by my wife Marie.

'Address not Redress'

Sean Doyle, of the Wicklow Independent Workers Union with an address he gave at the Billy Byrne Monument, Wicklow Town 0n 22nd May 2013.

Only courage today can change the course of history. It must know no boundaries or border. Surely if we have learned anything it is little comfort too little too late for a lot of poor unfortunate people e.g. in the occupied 6 counties British recognition of mass murder in Derry on Bloody Sunday 1972, 13 civilians shot dead and one who died 4.5 months later from injuries sustained. And after years of perjury and lies given under oath, their unfortunate families had to wait 30 years for the truth.

Demystifying Political and Religious Power

In this internet era his videos spread like wildfire, and his parodies of the Egyptian president and lampooning of the Islamists' edicts have made him the champion of the liberals and, more broadly, of an Arab world badly in need of political, social and cultural emancipation - Benjamin Barthe

Prosecuting Peaceful Protest

The following statement was issued by the Steering Committee of Greater Ardoyne Residents Collective (GARC) 

The Greater Ardoyne Residents Collective (GARC) condemns in the strongest terms the impending prosecution of Ardoyne residents set for the 9th July 2013 for merely being on the streets of Ardoyne on the 1st of December 2012 at the time an Apprentice Boys Parade passed by. This draconian action must be condemned by all right thinking people.

How Lebanon’s Palestinians Are Being Pulled Into Syrian War

Franklin Lamb in Homs Palestinian Refugee Camp, Syria with another of his insightful piece into the conflict in Syria. It featured in Counterpunch on 22nd May, 2013

Historically, Palestinian refugees, wherever they have sought temporary sanctuary following the ethic cleansing of their country by the 19th Century Zionist colonial enterprise, and pending their Return to Palestine, have insisted on avoiding local and international conflicts while seeking a modicum of interim civil rights from the host countries.

Chris Bray: Boston College Wins Victory For Recovering Ground Given Up

This piece by Chris Bray initially featured on Boston College Subpoena News.

The journalists are mostly wrong. A federal appeals court decision in Boston this week is a victory, of sorts, but not for oral history. Neither is it much of a victory for Boston College, which filed the appeal. In the end, the university merely protected confidential archival material that its own curious negligence put at risk. (Read the First Circuit’s complete opinion here.)

Time to Merge

As yet another pro-Union party is launched to further split the Unionist vote, former Blanket columnist and Radical Unionist commentator, Dr John Coulter, uses his Ireland Eye column in the British Labour Party's Tribune magazine to explore the concept if it is time for republicans and nationalists to unite and form a single party in the North. This is a longer version of his column which appeared in Tribune on 31 May, 2013.    

Law and Order Man

It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his job depends on not understanding it - Upton Sinclair

Gerry Kelly doesn’t seem to get it or more probably pretends not to get it. It is hard to believe he is so obtuse that the gettable is unreachable. While he is far from stupid it can be difficult if not impossible for someone to get something if their career depends on them not getting it. In those circumstances feigning not to notice is a better option.

Double Standards and Downey Arrest

Martin Galvin with a letter to the Irish News that featured on 4th June 2013. It addresses the arrest of John Downey

                   
A chara

Barra McGrory has called for an end to the “vacuum of uncertainty”, whether to prosecute or pardon in pre-1998 conflict cases. Meanwhile the only real deciders, the British, showed no uncertainty in sending constabulary to arrest John Downey at Gatwick airport.

HET Harrass Saint Columba

Guest writer Thomas Dixie Elliott with a light hearted take on a pageant type event in Derry on Friday evening reenacting the return of Saint Columba to Derry. Thousands attended. It was part of the UK City of Culture, strange as that title may sound for an Irish City.


Saint Columba was arrested by the PSNI on Frdiay after leaving the Oak Grove Bar in Bishop Street. He is being questioned by the historical inquiries team (HET) in regards to a battle in 561 which he is accused of starting over a book. Thousands of men died in the battle but Saint Columba says he was in Iona at the time.

Ruairí Ó Brádaigh 2nd October 1932 - 5th June 2013

Guest writer Martin Longwill with an obituary on Ruairí Ó Brádaigh on behalf of the James Connolly Association Australia. Ruairí Ó Brádaigh was laid to rest today in Roscommon.

The James Connolly Association Australia wish to extend our deepest sympathy to the family, friends and comrades of the late Ruairí Ó Brádaigh, particularly to his wife, children, grandchildren and great grandchildren.

'For what died the children of ‘69'

Sean Doyle of the Wicklow 1981 Hunger Strike Commemoration Committee, with an address he delivered at the Billy Byrne Monument, Wicklow Town on the 11th May 2013.

As hunger strike has been one of our much recourse for justice through the centuries against British occupation’s relentless quest to criminalise our freedom struggle it reminds me of the poem “The King’s Threshold” by W.B.Yeats:

Ireland: Political prisoner Martin Corey denied justice

Barry Kearney, a member of the James Connolly Association Australia, Melbourne, with a piece that originally featured in Green Left Weekly on 3rd June 2013.

Martin Corey is a 63-year-old man jailed in the six counties of Ireland's north still claimed by Britain. He has been held for three years without trial.

Appeals court restricts release of Boston College tapes: RTE interview with Anthony McIntyre

Anthony McIntyre, lead researcher for the Belfast Project and former IRA member, comments on the ruling which restricts the number of tapes to be released to 11. RTÉ Radio 1: Morning Ireland 4th June 2013. As ever, thanks to our transcriber.

Click here to listen to interview

One Ireland - One Vote

Aidan Ferguson, Seán MacDiarmada Ard Eoin 1916 Societies PRO with a call for an all-Ireland referendum as distinct from the partitionist one Sinn Fein is demanding.

On behalf of the 1916 Societies I request your support for our campaign to hold an All Ireland Referendum on Irish Unity.

Fianna Eireann was a success

Guest writer Padraig O'Deorain with his thoughts on Na Fianna Eireann.

Mol an oige agus tiocfaidh sí.
Praise the youth and they will blossom.

Marian Price Release Welcomed

This statement is from Rights Watch UK (formerly British Irish Right Watch) on the release of Marian Price. The statement was drafted for the www.freemarian.co.nr website. Please take the time to read this statement.

Rights Watch (UK) welcomes the release of Marian Price from custody. We hope that any outstanding criminal charges pending against her can be dealt with expeditiously by the judicial system in Northern Ireland.

The H-Block Struggle

Brad Duncan with a review of Smashing H Block by F. Stuart Ross. It initially featured on Solidarity.


Over the past decade there has been a flowering of critical, unorthodox and revisionist historical writings that examine the armed conflict that raged between 1969 and 1997 over Britain’s occupation of the north of Ireland — a period commonly referred to as “The Troubles.”

Marian Price Free At Last

Sandy Boyer with his thoughts on the release from internment of Marian Price. His piece first appeared in Socialist Worker.

On May 15, 2011, Marian Price was imprisoned after she held up a piece of paper for a masked man at an Irish republican commemoration. On May 30, 2013, with her health broken, she was finally released.

Agreed Ireland Revisionism

Sean Bresnahan guest writes a piece that examines the thinking behind the 'agreed Ireland' concept that has reemerged in Sinn Fein discourse.

Seanna Walsh stated just the other night on the BBC's 'The View' that the Hunger strikers died for an 'agreed Ireland', the phraseology here being reminiscent of the vagary of language used to coax the republican rank and file down the road that eventually led to the 1998 Good Friday Agreement and used to present this Agreement itself as some form of successful outcome to the long war that preceded it.

Bible-Thumpers go sacramental

Former Blanket columnist and TPQ regular Dr John Coulter with his latest feature from the Irish Daily Star. It featured there on the 27th May, 2013.

Robbo's Jeremiah jibe about whinging and moaning pests prophesying doom and gloom for Stormont has got the Bible-thumping brigade in a real tizzy.

Keeping the Plebs at Bay

Guest Writer, anarchist writer and activist, Sean Matthews with his thoughts on the upcoming G8 gathering in Fermanagh.

The media charm offensive has begun as our local corrupt political class roll out the the red carpet to the notorious gang of eight, dealers of austerity, state terror and imperialism.  The beautiful tranquil lakes of Fermanagh will be turned into a 'ring of steel’ with security fencing extending for miles protected by an army of professional thugs and watchtowers to keep the rest of us plebs at bay.

Lebanon greets the Special Rapporteur for Palestine, Richard Falk, with an ear full

Franklin Lamb writing from Damascus with a piece that initially featured in Intifada Voice of Palestine

Professor Emeritus at Princeton University and Special UN Rapporteur for Palestine, Richard Falk

The United Nations Special Rapporteur for Palestine, Professor Richard Falk, came to Lebanon last week on an unofficial visit to survey opinion while fact finding the condition in Palestinian refugee’s camps.

It was the Professors first visit to Lebanon since the fateful summer of 1982.   Back then, en route by sea to Beirut, which was under Israeli siege and blockade, Falk was Vice-Chair of the Sean McBride Commission of Inquiry into Israeli crimes against Lebanon. Mid-way between Cyprus and Lebanon, the Zionist navy, in a blatant act of piracy on the high seas, intercepted, boarded and commandeered the vessel. Eventually, under reported American pressure via US Envoy Morris Draper’s telephoned profanity to Tel Aviv, the pirates allowed Falk’s delegation to disembark at the port of Jounieh, just north of Beirut.  Draper, who like so many US diplomats, claims he finally “saw the light after retiring”, told this observer that “I never swore so much in my life as I did at those SOBS during that summer of 1982 and after I learned the details of Ariel Sharon’s choreography of the Sabra-Shatila massacre!” Ambassador Draper added, “The world will never know the extent of Israeli crimes committed against Lebanon and its refugees until Washington threatens to cut off all aid until Tel Aviv opens up its archives on this period.”

Professor Falk, as he mentioned during several events here, including a first-rate conference on the status of Palestinian refugees in Lebanon and their struggle for the most elementary civil rights to work and to own a home, organized by the Institute of Palestine Studies, came to Lebanon not to offer counsel to Lebanon’s sects or even to the Palestinians. (The IPS, founded in 1969, is considered by this observer and many others, as the most reliable and authoritative source of information on Palestinian affairs and the Arab-Israel conflict.)

Falk came to listen and to learn. He did both. He listened intently to each speaker, scribing hurried notes regarding the current conditions of Palestinian refugee, including education and health status, in Lebanon’s 12 camps and two dozen “gatherings,” reports that were presented by several academics and NGO’s based here.

Professor Falk got an ear full from Lebanese based advocates for the elementary Palestinian refugee Right to Work and to own a home. Rights that are accorded every other refugee in every country in the world including Zionist occupied Palestine. Rights that are given to every citizen from any country as soon as they clear immigration. Dr. Falk was advised that all that is required is that those who claim to be the forces of Resistance use their majority power in Parliament and take 90 minutes to repeal the racist 2001 law ( 20 minutes) and grant the right to work for Palestinians ( 70 minutes) who were forced into Lebanon 65 years ago this month.

Falk and others in attendance at the briefings found the findings sobering and alarming.  They included but are not limited to, the following:

There are currently 42,000 Palestinian refugees from Syria who have been forced into Lebanon as a result of the crisis in Syria. The United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East – UNRWA -reported to the IPS workshop, that they expect 80,000 Palestinians by the end of the year.  Others estimate the December 2013 number will exceed 100,000. According to figures, forwarded to Professor Falk by the Palestine Civil Rights Campaign, supplied by refugee camp committees, approximately 6,000 Palestinians who fled Syria remain in Lebanon’s Bekaa |Valley, close to the Syrian borders, in two main gatherings, al-Jalil (4,216 refugees) and central Bekaa (2,352). In the North, Baddawi camp hosts 4,116 and Nahr al Bared 2,016.   In Beirut, Burj al-Barajneh camp hosts 2,928 additional refugees from Syria, Shatila and the surrounding areas 2,800, and Mar Elias 862. In the South, 8,549 refugees arrived to Ain al-Hilweh and 2,400 are dispersed around Saida. Mieh Mieh camp hosts 1,512, with an additional 2,160 in  Wadi al-Zaineh. Further south to Tyre, Palestinian refugees from Syria are distributed among Shabriha (184), Rashidieh (1,370), Al Bass (478), Burj al-Shemali (2,800), Qasimiyeh (372), and Jal al-Bahr (128).

Falk knew, before gracing Lebanon with his visit, that UNWRA is basically out of money and cannot continue to meet its mandate for aiding Lebanon’s Palestinians even less those arriving from Syria at the rate of more than two dozen families per day. On 5/5/13, the popular committee representative at Jalil Camp near Baalbec reported that they receive on average 8 additional families per day, with dozens now living in the Jalil camp cemetery.

(photo: flamb at Masnaa crossing on 4/20/2013) And still they come from Syria’s 10 Palestinian refugee camps! Not sure where they will stay in Lebanon or if they will receive any assistance. Soon they will discover that the only help they will receive is from their own in the 12 camps and two dozen ‘gatherings’

(photo: flamb at Masnaa crossing on 4/20/2013) And still they come from Syria’s 10 Palestinian refugee camps! Not sure where they will stay in Lebanon or if they will receive any assistance. Soon they will discover that the only help they will receive is from their own in the 12 camps and two dozen ‘gatherings’

Palestinian children in Lebanon, Falk was advised, unfortunately provide textbook examples of the fact of life that it is difficult to concentrate on school when ones stomach is growling with hunger. And it’s even harder to stay in school when there’s even a remote chance to work odd jobs and earn money for food – something education doesn’t immediately offer.  One new local initiative is the Meals for Schools, whose organizers hope serve food to impoverished schoolchildren in Lebanese slum areas. One idea is to give coupons for meals to schools.   Unfortunately the scope will not include Palestinian children “at this time due to limited funding”, according to one AUB student hoping to help children stay in school by helping them to have breakfasts.

Palestinian refugee children have limited access to the public educational system in Lebanon. Only 11 per cent these “foreign” children can access free public education in Lebanon while most refugees can’t afford the high tuition fees of private schools. Palestinian refugees who attend one of the 58 UNRWA begin at age seven since UNWRA cannot afford pre-school level education. Consequently, for Palestinians here, while the elementary sector comprises more than 60% of students, the number drops to 28% in intermediate and only 10% at the secondary level. While the attendance rate for 7 year olds is 98.6%, by the time they reach age 11 attendance falls to 93.4%.   But from this level, the primary level school completion rate cascades to only 37%, due to astronomical dropout rates. The above figures reveal that Palestinian education levels have been indeed progressively dropping in recent years. This is further supported by the passing rate in the Brevet Official exams (official diploma qualifying entry into secondary) which was in some schools as low as 13.6% in some schools according to the UNRWA results of Brevet exams, despite the average passing rate in UNRWA schools being 43% for the 2009-10 academic year.

Professor Falk was briefed on myriad realities including the fact that Palestinians camps in Lebanon remain sites of control and surveillance by the Lebanese Army. People’s mobility and access to construction materials have been restricted by the army check points at the entrance of camps. Palestinian refugees are forbidden by law – since 2001 – to own or inherit real estate in Lebanon; consequently when a Palestinian dies, even if she or he inherited property between 1948-2001, before a wave of revenge led to the 2001 racist law, the property goes to Sunni Muslim Dar al-Fatwa one of the richest real estate holding entities in Lebanon.  Accused of deep corruption by some, their leadership has a history of opposing full civil rights for Palestinian refugees here remain opposed to home ownership.

The UN’s humanitarian chief, Valerie Amos, reported this week that seven million people need humanitarian assistance in Syria. “The needs are growing rapidly and are most severe in the conflict and opposition-controlled areas” of the civil-war ravaged country, the global body’s humanitarian chief Valerie Amos told the U.N. Security Council. Amos  cited data showing there are 6.8 million people in need — out of a total population of 20.8 million — along with 4.25 million people internally displaced and an additional 1.3 million who have sought refuge in neighboring countries.

Falk was briefed on most recent household surveys of Palestinian refugees carried out by the American University of Beirut which show that two thirds of Palestine refugees are poor. The extreme poverty rate in camps (7.9%) is almost twice of that observed in gatherings (4.2%). The study also developed a Deprivation Index based on components of welfare which included components such as good health, food security, and adequate education, access to stable employment, decent housing, and ownership of essential household assets. The Deprivation Index showed that 40% of Palestine Refugees living in Lebanon are deprived. The study reported that 56% of refugees are jobless and only 37% of the working age population is employed (Hanafi et al. 2012). It is unsurprising that the poor socio-economic situation often encourages students to leave school to get a paid job.

Despite the importance of education fewer Palestinian refugee students are actually interested in continuing their higher education. Lack of motivation to learn, is believed to be one of the main reasons for the high dropout rates.   Palestinian refugees’ access to Lebanon’s public university is limited by their status as foreigners, and their access to private universities is restricted by a lack of resources to pay tuition fees (Hroub, 2012).

The old cliché that stated that “The Palestinians are the most educated Arab nation”, is just a myth today. This educational hemorrhage among young Palestinians has been attributed to a number of factors such as the deteriorating socio-economic conditions amongst Palestinian refugees and the growing disillusionment with schooling and the benefits it brings. Palestinian students also suffer from an education acculturation as they are forced to learn only the Lebanese curriculum without being able to access the country’s system. The following section examines these three main challenges.

Statistics indicate that just under half of the classrooms in public schools have less than 15 students per class while 20 % are overcrowded with 26 to 35 students per class. However, in UNRWA schools, the average number of students per classroom is 30 making them the most crowded classrooms in Lebanon.

With respect to the UN refugee agency, (UNHCR) the current situation in both Syria and among the more than 450,000 Syrian in Lebanon is only marginally better than the conditions of arriving Palestinians. As Maeve Murphy, UNHCR’s Senior Field Coordinator in Lebanon’s Bekaa Valley, explained to this observer and others during a visit on 5/5/13, near the Nicolas Khoury Center in Zahle, Lebanon, amidst sea of hundreds of Syrians, some waiting for three months or longer just to get registered, the UN refugee agency is also unable to meet its mandate for the same reason as UNRWA and the World Food Program and others. Ms. Murphy reported that over 453,000 Syrians have either registered with the U.N. agency or are waiting to register. An additional several hundred thousand people are thought to be refugees but haven’t approached the U.N.

Complicating the desperate situation of Palestinian and Syrian refugees seeking sanctuary in Lebanon is the fact that millions of Syrian refugees face food rationing and cutbacks to critical medical programs because oil-rich Gulf states have failed to deliver the funding they promised for emergency humanitarian aid, an investigation by James Cusick  for The Independent on Sunday has found. Pledges for $ 650 minion in donations from various sources including Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Bahrain, made during  the January 2013, Kuwait UN  emergency conference, have yet to materialize.

The World Food Program (WFP), the food aid arm of the UN, says it is spending $19m a week to feed 2.5 million refugees inside Syria and a further 1.5 million who have fled to official camps in Jordan, Turkey, Lebanon and Iraq. By July, the WFP says, there is no guarantee that its work on the Syrian crisis can continue. A spokesman told the UK Independent,  “We are already in a hand-to-mouth situation. Beyond mid-June – who knows?”

The emergency conference in Kuwait – hosted by the Emir of Kuwait and chaired by Mr Ban Ki Moon – promised to bring a “message of hope” to the four million Syrian refugees. Mr Ban proclaimed the outcome a shining example of “global solidarity in action”. The reality has been markedly different. Oxfam recently issued an appeal: “The League of Arab States must urge all Arab countries that have pledged to the Syrian crisis, to be transparent and to share information about their commitments, and mechanisms for fulfilling their pledges.”

Mousab Kerwat, Islamic Relief’s Middle East institutional funding manager, said: “It’s better for countries to stay away from donor conferences than to attend and make pledges they don’t intent to keep. As a minimum, they should communicate where their pledges have gone in a transparent process. If Professor Falk was weary as he left Lebanon from all the data, visits, and wrenching experiences he was presented with, it would be understandable. But the humanitarian and scholar he showed no signs of fatigue but rather appeared to be energized by the experience. Given his history as a supporter of resistance to occupation and oppression, Richard Falk’s assurances that he will continue his work armed with the above sampling of data offers new hope for Palestinian and Syrian refugees from Syria and to those who support their Right and Responsibility  to  Return to Palestine.

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About the Author

Franklin Lamb, a former Assistant Counsel of the US House Judiciary Committee at the US Congress and Professor of International Law at Northwestern College of Law in Oregon, earned his Law Degree at Boston University and his LLM, M.Phil, and PhD degrees at the London School of Economics. Lamb is Director, Americans Concerned for Middle East Peace, Beirut-Washington DC, Board Member of The Sabra Shatila Foundation, and a volunteer with the Palestine Civil Rights Campaign, Lebanon. He is the author of The Price We Pay: A Quarter-Century of Israel’s Use of American Weapons Against Civilians in Lebanon. He can be reached at: fplamb@gmail.com He is a regular contributor to Intifada Palestine, and is doing research in Lebanon.

Out of the Big Picture

Guest writer Hugh McAfee with some thoughts on the real power behind policing in the North. The writer draws on the CAJ document The Policing You Don’t See: Covert policing and the accountability gap - Five years on from the transfer of ‘national security’ primacy to MI5 which was published in 2012.

1798 at the Shamrock

Court Drastically Restricts Handover From Boston College Archive

Joint statement from Ed Moloney & Anthony McIntyre on First Circuit court’s decision to heavily truncate number of Boston College interviews to be handed over to PSNI:

From the very outset of the serving of these subpoenas over two years ago we have striven to resist completely the efforts by the PSNI, the British Home Office and the US Department of Justice to obtain any and all interviews from the Belfast Project archive at Boston College.