IN a plot twist nobody saw coming, it looks like we are going to war with Israel. Not with tanks and planes, thank the Lord, because we’d literally last five minutes. No, it’s a different weapon of choice in this case – bureaucracy and sternly worded letters to the European Union were the starting point.
After years of drills and training, mainly by men in patterned jumpers writing pithy letters to The Irish Times and local newspapers, it appears Ireland is ready to put its pen to the paper on an international level.
We have already called for a suspension of Israel’s EU trade benefits until it cleans up its act on human rights, focusing on Article 2 of the EU-Israel Association Agreement, which ties trade privileges to human rights standards. We are backed by Spain, a country that knows a thing or two about protest.
The EU-Israel Association Council, which oversees relations, might not be delighted with Ireland’s stance. After all, Article 2 is usually treated like the fine print on an insurance policy – you know it’s there, but is anyone ever going to use it? Ireland has made it clear: human rights aren’t a ‘maybe’ but a ‘must’.
And things have escalated somewhat this week with Netanyahu’s government withdrawing the Irish ambassador to Israel altogether and closing the embassy, at least for the moment. Yikes.
The withdrawal was a response to Ireland’s decision last week to support South Africa’s petition at the International Court of Justice accusing Israel of genocide. And now we have Israeli foreign ministers brandishing Simon Harris an anti-Semite, words that left the Taoiseach so appalled, it took him many hours to formulate a reply on TikTok.
Then Michael D jumped into the row on Tuesday, describing the Israeli claim as ‘slander’. Of course, the whole thing is no laughing matter, and again sees Ireland well outside the international consensus. And with more instability to come in Syria, you get the sense there will be some very rocky times ahead.
Show me the way ...
COMMISERATIONS to our poor misfortunate local rowing hero Paul O’Donovan who had to go through one of the toughest evenings in his professional life last week. Taking home the RTÉ Sportsperson of the Year Award, up against probably the most impressive array of sporting heroes ever to set foot in a television studio for the event, you got the sense that every atom in Paul’s body wanted to leave the place.
About 10,000 years of West Cork humility were screaming in his genes as the praise was lavished on his absolutely stunning 2024 and the list of personal achievements and accolades that went on for longer than the Ilen River.
He took it in his stride, of course, and made us proud as he always does. But I’d say he was happy to be on the road south all the same, away from the cameras and the praise and the bulls**t, so he could get back down to work. Whether he hitched a lift home or not this time, is not yet clear.
Curb your dictators
I HAD an idea for a TV series this week. It’s focused around Putin’s luxury retirement village for toppled dictators, a place called Barvikha which lies to the west of Moscow. On the surface, Barvikha seems ordinary but on closer inspection its side streets reveal grandiose dachas hidden behind high walls and ornate gates.
Once a haven for Soviet loyalists, it now hosts a motley group of toppled tyrants and their families. Bashar al-Assad is the latest to have been granted asylum there, on ‘humanitarian grounds’, ironically enough. Among the other residents are the family of Slobodan Milošević, the late Serbian president and ‘cough cough’ convicted war criminal. There are also three former presidents: Aslan Abashidze of Georgia’s Ajarian Autonomous Republic, convicted in absentia for terrorism and murder; Viktor Yanukovych, Ukraine’s former president who fled after the 2014 Revolution of Dignity and Askar Akayev of Kyrgyzstan, ousted during the 2005 Tulip Revolution. Bunch of tulips.
It strikes me as a great premise for a sitcom, with the former warmongers and torturers having to make do with a privileged but boring lifestyle in the enclave; tending to their gardens, picking up groceries, competing over who gets to chair the residents’ committee … Curb Your Totalitarianism anyone?
Taking the hump
I READ this week that a humpback whale has made one of the longest migrations ever recorded, travelling at least 13,000km.
It was spotted in the Pacific ocean off Colombia in 2017, then popped up again several years later near Zanzibar in the Indian Ocean.
The epic journey may be caused by climate change as he travels in search of some decent grub he can no longer get at home, or the intrepid explorer may just be looking for a mate, say scientists.
I hope it’s the latter. There’s been a lot of that going on recently.
Two rescued Siberian tigers, Boris and Svetlaya, were released over 100 miles apart in the vast Russian wilderness but managed to find each other again.
Scientists say Boris legged it the equivalent of the width of Taiwan, mostly in a straight line, to reunite with Svetlaya on her patch.
Six months later, the pair wasn’t just playing house; they were raising a litter of cubs. And they say love is dead?
