Sinn Fein Spreads Anti-Semitism, and BDS, in Ireland

Sinn Fein, the Irish pro-independence party that for a long time sponsored the Irish Republican Army (IRA) as its terrorist wing, allied itself with the anti-Israel cause many decades ago. Now, writes Ruth Dudley Edwards, it still propagates hatred of the Jews and their country:

Sinn Fein . . . trains its gullible followers to be virulent anti-Semites. They fly Palestinian flags much less as a mark of their compassion for Palestinians than as a sign of their hatred of Israelis. Loyalists, [who want Northern Ireland to remain part of the United Kingdom], see Israel as beleaguered and fly Israeli flags not because they hate Palestinians, but because they hate republicans [i.e., those in favor of detaching Northern Ireland from Britain]. . . .

Pro-Zionist in the 1920s and 30s, when [Zionism] was seen as a plucky anti-British movement for self-determination, once the state [of Israel] came into being public opinion shifted to seeing it as a colony imposed by the British on the native population. Ignoring Jews’ ancestral rights and Arab intransigence and inhuman treatment of refugees, Israelis became the bad guys and Irish political leaders unthinkingly endorsed policies that would lead to the total destruction of Israel. . . .

Sinn Fein is stepping up its anti-Israeli activism, since these days it needs, for electoral reasons in the south, to pretend it wants reconciliation with unionists, so its foot soldiers need a legitimate target for hate.

It has been worryingly successful in spreading its poison. . . . Dublin’s Lord Mayor Micheál Mac Donncha is Sinn Fein’s most recent anti-Israeli poster boy. . . . He’s been a key player in persuading the council to support the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement (BDS), which seeks to strangle Israel, and demands the expulsion of its ambassador.

Read more at Belfast Telegraph

More about: Anti-Semitism, BDS, I, Ireland, Israel & Zionism

Why South Africa Has Led the Legal War against Israel

South Africa filed suit with the International Court of Justice in December accusing Israel of genocide. More recently, it requested that the court order the Jewish state to allow humanitarian aid into the Gaza Strip—something which, of course, Israel has been doing since the war began. Indeed, the country’s ruling party, the African National Congress (ANC) has had a long history of support for the Palestinian cause, but Orde Kittrie suggests that the current government, which is plagued by massive corruption, has more sinister motives for its fixation on accusing Israel of imagined crimes:

ANC-led South Africa has . . . repeatedly supported Hamas. In 2015 and 2018, the ANC and Hamas signed memoranda of understanding pledging cooperation against Israel. The Daily Maverick, a South African newspaper that previously won an international award for exposing ANC corruption, has reported claims that Iran “essentially paid the ANC to litigate against Israel in the ICJ.”

The ANC-led government says it is motivated by humanitarian principle. That’s contradicted by its support for Russia, and by [President Cyril] Ramaphosa’s warmly welcoming a visit in January by Mohamed Dagalo, the leader of the Sudanese-Arab Rapid Support Forces (RSF) militia. Ramaphosa’s smiling, hand-holding welcome of Dagalo occurred two months after the RSF’s systematic massacre of hundreds of non-Arab Sudanese refugees in Darfur.

While the ANC has looted its own country and aided America’s enemies, the U.S. is insulating the party from the consequences of its corruption and mismanagement.

In Kittrie’s view, it is “time for Congress and the Biden administration to start helping South Africa’s people hold Ramaphosa accountable.”

Read more at The Hill

More about: International Law, Iran, South Africa