Uncategorized
Ireland is Europe’s Most Anti-Israeli Country
By HENRY SREBRNIK Several protesters walked out during Irish President Michael Higgins’s speech at the Holocaust Memorial Day event in Dublin on Jan. 26. Representatives of the Jewish community had asked him not to give the keynote address because, they asserted, critical comments he has made about Israeli actions in Gaza made him an “inappropriate” pick for the event.
They referred to his “grave insensitivity to Irish Jews,” but the president insisted he has always stood up against anti-Semitism.
This was no surprise, because the Republic of Ireland has become Europe’s most merciless critic of Israel. Archbishop Eamon Martin, Ireland’s most senior Catholic figure, in his 2025 New Year’s message also criticized Israel’s military campaign in Gaza as “merciless” and a “disproportionate” response to Hamas’s invasion of the Jewish state.
Two weeks before that, Israel had already announced it was closing its embassy in Dublin in response to the Irish government’s repeated anti-Israel statements, its indifference to rising anti-Semitism, a great deal of it coming from its parliamentarians, and in particular its decision, formalized on Jan. 7, to join South Africa in accusing Israel of genocide at the International Court of Justice (ICJ).
Israel’s Foreign Minister, Gideon Sa’ar, explained the Dec. 15 decision, stating that Ireland had crossed “every red line” with its actions and rhetoric. He accused Ireland of “antisemitism based on the delegitimization and dehumanization of Israel.”
Israel’s ambassador to Ireland said closing the embassy was a “tough decision” for her country to take. Dana Erlich added that Ireland has taken “a more extreme stance than any other country” against Israel.
“This is an abuse of the international multilateral system by South Africa, we were sorry to see Ireland join it, but this joins an accumulation of steps, rhetoric and initiatives that we’ve seen Ireland trying to promote this past year,” she added. The Irish government said there were no plans to close its embassy in Israel.
Since Hamas’ attack on Israel, Ireland has emerged as one of the Jewish state’s fiercest critics and relations between the two countries have frayed. Its middle classes are among the most Israelophobic in all of Europe.
Posters of Israeli hostages are defaced in public spaces, while school textbooks disseminate narratives that demonize Israel and Judaism. Vehement opposition to Israel and Zionism has seen demonstrations in Dublin that include the flying of Hamas, Hezbollah, and Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine flags, with chants that hurl invective at all Jews.
Reports of targeted attacks against Jewish individuals, paired with the embassy closure, have left Jewish residents and visitors without the diplomatic support they need in an increasingly dangerous climate.
On the campus of University College Dublin, a sign read, “Zionist-Free Zone.” Trinity College Dublin was one of the first universities in the world to divest from Israeli companies and the campus is a veritable sea of keffiyehs. (Boycott as a concept and a tool of direct action has its roots in British-colonized Ireland.) The students’ union declared that Zionists were not welcome on campus. Jewish students were offered a safe room if they felt they were in danger.
Yet the republic’s rulers are in denial. “I utterly reject that Ireland is anti-Israel,” declared Prime Minister Simon Harris. We’re just “pro-peace, pro-human rights, and pro-international law,” he insisted.
Harris said his country would arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if he landed there, following the issuance of arrest warrants for both Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Yoav Gallant by the International Criminal Court.
Shortly after, Micheal Martin, the country’s minister of foreign affairs and defence, announced on Nov. 7 that Ireland would be backing South Africa’s genocide case against Israel at the ICJ, in a reflection of the country’s long-standing position of solidarity with the Palestinian cause. His comment came on the same day that the Irish parliament passed a motion saying that “genocide is being perpetrated before our eyes by Israel in Gaza.” Three days later, the Anglican Church of Ireland’s Canon David Oxley claimed that Israelis saw Jews as a “master race” — a term usually associated with Nazi ideology.
But Maurice Cohen, Ireland’s Jewish Representative Council chairperson, said the Irish intervention in the ICJ case risks “oversimplifying a highly complex and tragic conflict, unfairly isolating Israel, and undermining the integrity of the term ‘genocide.’”
Relations between the two countries have long been complex. Ireland only extended de jure recognition of Israel in 1963 and established diplomatic relations in 1975. Until recently, Ireland had refused to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism, unlike most European countries.
Sa’ar alluded to Ireland’s neutrality during World War II, when anti-British Irish nationalists cooperated against Britain with the Nazis. Indeed, on May 2, 1945, then-Prime Minister Eamon de Valera visited the Nazi ministry in Dublin and sent his condolences to the German people over Hitler’s death. A woefully poor decision, his gesture was nonetheless motivated by the overzealous need to demonstrate Ireland’s anti-British, pro-neutrality position.
The island was under English and then British rule for more than 800 years (and Northern Ireland remains part of the United Kingdom). That “has undoubtedly shaped how people from Ireland engage with post-colonial conflicts,” asserted Jane Ohlmeyer, a history professor at Trinity College.
So clearly, some of the Irish hostility to Israel derives from the anti-British, anti-imperialist perspective of Irish history: the idea that the Palestinian experience at the hands of Israel is similar to that of the Irish with the British.
“Leaders often ask me why the Irish have such empathy for the Palestinian people. And the answer is simple: We see our history in their eyes,” former prime minister Leo Varadkar explained. “A story of displacement, of dispossession, national identity questioned or denied, forced emigration, discrimination, and now, hunger.” Not surprisingly, Jilan Wahba Abdalmajid, the Palestinian ambassador to Ireland, agreed, maintaining that Irish support comes from a history of shared experiences.
Henry Srebrnik is a professor of political science at the University of Prince Eddward Island.
Uncategorized
US Officials Tell i24NEWS Israeli Concerns About Gaza Board of Peace Are ‘Unfounded’
FILE PHOTO: U.S. President Donald Trump is interviewed by Reuters White House correspondent Steve Holland (not pictured) during an exclusive interview in the Oval Office in the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., January 14, 2026. REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein/File Photo
i24 News – Amid the criticism in Israel over the composition of the “Board of Peace” and the bodies set to govern the Gaza Strip, as well as concerns that Hamas could continue to threaten Israel under the new plan, officials in Washington suggest these concerns are unfounded, i24NEWS understands.
A Senior US official tells i24NEWS: “Turkey, Qatar, and Egypt were instrumental in achieving the ceasefire, securing the return of the living hostages, and bringing back the deceased. They have co-signed commitments that Hamas will follow through on its part of the plan, and the Board of Peace will work with them to ensure compliance.”
The underlying message is clear: President Trump will make the calls, and the US will ensure full implementation of all objectives of the plan, first and foremost the demilitarization of Gaza, regardless of the positions or hostile statements towards Israel coming from Turkey and Qatar.
Uncategorized
One Person Killed, 14 Hurt in Blast in Iranian Port of Bandar Abbas, Iranian Media Reports
FILE PHOTO: An aerial view of the Iranian shores and Port of Bandar Abbas in the strait of Hormuz, December 10, 2023. REUTERS/Stringer/File Photo
At least one person was killed and 14 injured in an explosion in the southern Iranian port of Bandar Abbas on Saturday, a local official told Iranian news agencies, but the cause of the blast was not known.
The semi-official Tasnim news agency said that social media reports alleging that a Revolutionary Guard navy commander had been targeted in the explosion were “completely false.”
Iranian media said the blast was under investigation but provided no further information. Iranian authorities could not immediately be contacted for comment.
Separately, four people were killed after a gas explosion in the city of Ahvaz near the Iraqi border, according to state-run Tehran Times. No further information was immediately available.
Two Israeli officials told Reuters that Israel was not involved in Saturday’s blasts, which come amid heightened tensions between Tehran and Washington over Iran’s crackdown on nationwide protests and over the country’s nuclear program.
The Pentagon did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
US President Donald Trump said on January 22 an “armada” was heading toward Iran. Multiple sources said on Friday that Trump was weighing options against Iran that include targeted strikes on security forces.
Earlier on Saturday, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian accused US, Israeli and European leaders of exploiting Iran’s economic problems, inciting unrest and providing people with the means to “tear the nation apart.”
Bandar Abbas, home to Iran’s most important container port, lies on the Strait of Hormuz, a vital waterway between Iran and Oman which handles about a fifth of the world’s seaborne oil.
The port suffered a major explosion last April that killed dozens and injured over 1,000 people. An investigative committee at the time blamed the blast on shortcomings in adherence to principles of civil defense and security.
Iran has been rocked by nationwide protests that erupted in December over economic hardship and have posed one of the toughest challenges to the country’s clerical rulers.
At least 5,000 people were killed in the protests, including 500 members of the security forces, an Iranian official told Reuters.
Uncategorized
How a law used to protect synagogues is now being deployed against ICE protesters and journalists
After a pro-Palestinian protest at a New Jersey synagogue turned violent in October, the Trump administration took an unusual step — using a federal law typically aimed at protecting abortion clinics to sue the demonstrators.
Now, federal authorities are attempting to deploy the same law against journalists as well as protesters against Immigration and Customs Enforcement amid the agency’s at times violent crackdown in Minneapolis.
Former CNN anchor Don Lemon, a local journalist, and two protesters were arrested after attending a Jan. 18 anti-ICE protest at a church in St. Paul, Minnesota, Justice Department officials said Friday. Protesters alleged the pastor at Cities Church worked for ICE.
The federal law they are accused of violating, the Freedom of Access to Clinic Entrances Act, or FACE, prohibits the use of force or intimidation to interfere with reproductive health care clinics and houses of worship.
But in the three decades since its passage in 1994, the law had almost entirely been deployed against anti-abortion protesters causing disruptions at clinics.
That changed in September of last year, when the Trump administration cited the FACE Act to sue pro-Palestinian demonstrators at Congregation Ohr Torah in West Orange, New Jersey.
It was the first time the Department of Justice had used the law against demonstrators outside a house of worship, Harmeet Dhillon, an assistant attorney general for the department’s civil rights division, said at the time.
The novel legal strategy — initially advanced by Jewish advocacy groups to fight antisemitism — is now front and center in what First Amendment advocates are describing as an attack on freedom of the press.
“I intend to identify and find every single person in that mob that interrupted that church service in that house of God and bring them to justice,” Dhillon told Newsmax last week. “And that includes so-called ‘journalists.’”
How the law has been used
The FACE Act has traditionally been used to prosecute protesters who interfere with patients entering abortion clinics. Conservative activists have long criticized the law as violating demonstrators’ First Amendment rights, and the Trump administration even issued a memo earlier this month saying the Justice Department should limit enforcement of the law.
But in September, the Trump administration applied the FACE Act in a new way: suing the New Jersey protesters at Congregation Ohr Torah.
They had disrupted an event at the Orthodox shul that promoted real estate sales in Israel and the West Bank, blowing plastic horns in people’s ears and chanting “globalize the intifada,” a complaint alleges.
Two pro-Israel demonstrators were charged by local law enforcement with aggravated assault, including a local dentist, Moshe Glick, who police said bashed a protester in the head with a metal flashlight, sending him to the hospital. Glick said he had acted in self defense, protecting a fellow congregant who had been tackled by a protester.
The event soon became a national flashpoint, with Glick’s lawyer alleging the prosecution had been “an attempt to criminalize Jewish self-defense.” Former New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy pardoned Glick earlier this month.
The Trump administration sued the pro-Palestinian protesters under the FACE Act, seeking to ban them from protesting outside houses of worship and asking that they each pay thousands of dollars in fines.
At the time, Nathan Diament, executive director of the Orthodox Union Advocacy Center, told JNS he applauded the Trump administration “for bringing this suit to protect the Jewish community and all people of faith, who have the constitutional right to worship without fear of harassment.”
Diament did not respond to the Forward’s email asking whether he supported the use of the FACE Act against the Minneapolis journalists and protesters.
Mark Goldfeder, CEO of the National Jewish Advocacy Center, a pro-Israel group that says it uses legal tools to counter antisemitism, did not express concern over the use of the FACE Act in the Minnesota arrests — and emphasized the necessity of protecting religious spaces from interference.
“The idea that ‘you can worship’ means nothing if a mob can make it unsafe or impossible,” Goldfeder wrote in a statement to the Forward. “So if you apply it consistently: to protect a church in Minnesota, a synagogue in New Jersey, a mosque in Detroit, what you are actually protecting is pluralism itself.”
Goldfeder has also attempted to use the FACE Act against protesters at a synagogue, citing the law in a July 2024 complaint against demonstrators who had converged on an event promoting Israel real estate at Adas Torah synagogue in Los Angeles. That clash descended into violence.
The Trump administration Justice Department subsequently filed a statement of interest supporting that case, arguing that what constituted “physical obstruction” at a house of worship under the FACE Act could be interpreted broadly.
Now, similar legal reasoning may apply to journalists covering the Sunday church protest in Minneapolis. Press freedom groups have expressed deep alarm over the arrests, arguing that the journalists were there to document, not disrupt.
The arrests are “the latest example of the administration coming up with far-fetched ‘gotcha’ legal theories to send a message to journalists to tread cautiously,” said Seth Stern, chief of advocacy for Freedom of the Press Foundation. “Because the government is looking for any way to target them.”
The post How a law used to protect synagogues is now being deployed against ICE protesters and journalists appeared first on The Forward.