Long Room. As an important tourist attraction, also representing a valuable source of income, Trinity decided to fine the students’ union, knowing full well that the sums involved could not be met by the union who had no intention of ending their protest. It was Trinity who buckled with little resistance, agreeing to review all their financial connections with Israel, promising to withdraw from all funds that could be associated with the IDF or the occupation or with Israel, in general. The students union also received support from a number of Trinity academics….
Last November, in a Guardian article, written by Rory Carroll and Lisa O’Carroll, the following remarks were ascribed to Niall Holohan, a former high ranking Irish diplomat with long experience in the Middle East as he explained Ireland’s especially vocal pro-Palestinian stance:
Holohan claims that another factor in Ireland’s outlook has been its tiny community of approximately 2,500 Jews – barely 0.05 per cent – that contrasts with sizeable and influential Jewish communities in Britain and France. ‘It’s given us a freer hand to take what we consider a more principled position,’ he said.
So easily the mask slips, endorsing the worst kind of antisemitic conspiracy theory; that Jews act as a cabal influencing governments and economies and (therefore) Ireland with its minuscule Jewish population is ‘freer’ to govern itself independently. Here is a reflexive antisemitism which blindly sees all Jews as a monolith tied duplicitously to Israel, although in this case, we are deemed not large enough to threaten the state. His short statement drips with contempt, revealing how such antiquated anti-Jewish racism presents itself in contemporary political commentary, without the least self-doubt….
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