Israel and a chink of light

Israel aircraft dropped thousands of leaflets on areas of Gaza near the Egyptian boarder, telling ordinary Palestinians to leave their homes as they were about to destroy them. More refugees, though quite where they're supposed to go nobody knows. A school is destroyed and thirty people killed because its grounds were once used by a mortar team from Hamas (we can see a video of it on youtube, accompanied by mind-boggling Israeli propaganda). No doubt if terrorists used Westminster Abbey grounds to attack the Houses of Parliament the RAF would raise it to the ground, plus any unfortunate people within.

We are past expecting civilised conduct from Israel.

The chink of light is Obama. I know we all have great hopes of him after the vengeful, self-interested, militaristic policies of his born-again-Christian predecessor, but on Israel I had the impression from his election website that he favoured the country and planned to pour huge sums of money into it. Fortunately, the latest information is that he intends to open lines to Hamas, though not through direct diplomatic channels. If this is indeed true it is welcome. Israel is incapable of rational or intelligent thought where its security is concerned, but in the end it is only by talking and negotiation that the future of the Middle East can be settled. This is how Britain ended the so-called Troubles in Northern Ireland. Not by laying waste to Irish towns and villages, occupying southern Irish land, building settlements, laying siege to Donegal, humiliating Irish people on their way to work, imprisoning politicians, etc.

Tomorrow the people of Dublin have a chance to voice their protest against the genocide in Gaza. I do hope the march is well attended. It starts at 1.00 p.m. at the Central Bank in the centre of Dublin. It will end at the Israeli Embassy (122 Pembroke Broad, D4). There are similar actions throughout Ireland this week.