SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
ireland
Lessons for Everyone from the Irish Farmer Protests
The demonstrations in Ireland still show how small-scale protests driven by economic malaise can get national attention and prompt change.
Apr 28, 2026
Can anything make farmers turn away from President Donald Trump?
How right-wing populism has gripped rural areas, especially among farmers, is evidenced by the results from the past few presidential elections.
Still, critical challenges are emerging for key constituencies in Trump's base, principally due to the damage that the Iran War is doing in the countryside. Similar conditions pushed Irish farmers to the streets in early April, causing a change among political leadership shortly after, and also helping producers receive some much-needed relief.
That Irish farmers took to the streets shouldn't surprise folks. Earlier this year in January, some of them were also demonstrating, but against the EU-Mercosur trade deal. Not too long ago in 2024, their counterparts across the English Channel throughout many European countries staged weeks of actions to protest free trade deals and excessive bureaucratic regulations. Outside of Europe, in Mexico beginning in 2025 and continuing into 2026, farmers, for many of the same reasons, are blocking roads to demand government intervention to address falling prices for their produce.
The Iran War is placing unnecessary stress on farmers and most other working people. Such conditions are similar to those in Ireland, which led farmers to find common cause with others.
Taking a quick glance at these recent protests taking place around the world, farmers in the United States seem to be asleep at the wheel as producers in many other countries are taking control by challenging their governments and calling for economic justice.
It is not the case that farmers in the US are living large.
In 2025, farm bankruptcies rose by 46% compared with 2024. In 2026, even though there appears to be some movement in a positive direction concerning prices for corn and soy farmers, the jump in what they have to pay for fuel and fertilizer caused by how the Iran War devastates global supply chains is eating into their profits.
Making matters worse, the fertilizer industry is heavily concentrated. A standard metric for measuring concentration—the four-firm concentration ratio (CR4)—shows that the leading four companies in fertilizer markets control about 75% of sales. When that figure is above 40% within a certain industry, according to researchers, then illegal practices such as price-fixing become endemic and consumers pay more than they should at the register. Put simply, the negative economic impacts from the Iran War are compounded by an industry looking for excuses to further jack up prices.
Meanwhile, the current version of the Farm Bill in Congress woefully fails to meet the needs of a farm economy facing crisis.
First, pricing policy to support farmers was decided last year in the One Big Beautiful Bill (OBBB) when the surge in input prices was not on the political radar. Adding insult to injury for our food and farm system, the OBBB also cut food assistance support and climate change initiatives. Speaking to problems farmers are facing, nowhere in the current Farm Bill do we find any discussion of taking on corporate power. Investing in transitioning farms to small-scale, young producers is also mainly an afterthought in the legislation. How hundreds of agribusiness commodity groups support the current version of the legislation, while as many small-scale producer-led groups have voiced opposition, is testament to the fact that our farm policy is about propping up export markets instead of feeding Americans and creating resilient systems.
Trump’s billion-dollar handout to large-scale, mainly high-income farmers at the start of the Iran conflict shows an administration not concerned with sustaining our food system, but with padding the pockets of rich elite allies.
Farmers in Ireland faced similar challenges and felt that they had no choice but to go to the streets. Their actions, drawing comparisons to France’s yellow vests movement, also boasted no clear leaders. In locally organized, spontaneous actions, groups from April 7 to 14 mobilized by blockading strategic oil refineries as well as slowing down traffic on key streets and highways.
Their mobilizations bore some fruit. First, they managed to secure a short-term relief package in the form of direct payments to offset rising fuel costs. Politically, they also caused some political shifts, driving leaders to leave the governing coalition in opposition to how the farmers were treated. While short of generating long-lasting structural change, the demonstrations in Ireland still show how small-scale protests driven by economic malaise can get national attention and prompt change.
Perhaps more importantly for US farmers is how the Irish managed to overcome their relative isolation in society and mobilize with others. Particularly, Irish producers brought truckers to their side, which aided with their efforts at creating roadblocks and slowdowns. Their interests also were aligned, as truckers also have been negatively impacted by rising fuel prices.
With a Farm Bill widely maligned working its way through Congress, legislators have apparently decided to forget about making meaningful changes to our food and farm system. Meanwhile, the Iran War is placing unnecessary stress on farmers and most other working people. Such conditions are similar to those in Ireland, which led farmers to find common cause with others. Now is as good as any other for their counterparts in the US to say enough is enough and denounce a rigged economy that benefits the few at the expense of the many.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Human Rights Groups Demand Ireland Stop Letting Trump Use Airport for 'Unlawful' ICE Flights
"If Ireland is facilitating the monstrous ICE project, then we fear the government has lost its way. Rather than cower and capitulate, it must show courage, compassion, and principle," said the head of Amnesty International Ireland.
Apr 16, 2026
A pair of human rights groups on Thursday called for the Irish government to stop letting the administration of US President Donald Trump use Shannon Airport as a refueling stop for Immigration and Customs Enforcement's deportation flights.
In a joint letter to Ireland’s transport minister, Darragh O’Brien, and foreign affairs and trade minister, Helen McEntee, Amnesty International Ireland and Human Rights First urged the Irish government to stop cooperating with President Donald Trump's efforts to deport migrants to third countries.
Using data from its ICE Flight Monitor, Human Rights First determined that Shannon Airport has been used to refuel deportation planes during at least five of these removal operations, which involved what the groups described as "transfers of individuals to countries... they have no ties to and where they have faced arbitrary and prolonged detention and other abuse."
After one of the flights in May 2025, eight migrants from several countries, including Cuba, Mexico, Myanmar, Laos, Vietnam, and Sudan—some of whom had legally been resettled as refugees—were dropped in the East African nation of Djibouti. There, they were held in a shipping container at a US base for at least six weeks before being sent to war-torn South Sudan, where they were promptly detained by authorities. Six of them remain in detention today, with little ability to communicate with their lawyers.
Another group of five men from Cuba, Yemen, Vietnam, and Laos was taken to the southern African country of Eswatini in July. Four of them remain in state custody more than eight months later, despite the authorities giving no official reason for their ongoing detention.
Another flight stopped in Ireland on its way back from dumping eight Palestinian men, who were shackled for the entire journey, on the side of the road in the occupied West Bank. Some of the men had green cards in the United States, and several had wives and children from whom they had been forcibly separated, despite facing no accusations of having committed a crime. Two such flights have taken place.
In total, the groups found that at least 28 migrants had traveled through the Shannon Airport on their way to third countries.
About 300 migrants have been sent to third countries as part of the Trump administration's "mass deportation" campaign, according to a February report by Democrats on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
The administration has spent more than $40 million, part of which has gone to countries willing to take in deportees, including Equatorial Guinea, Rwanda, El Salvador, Eswatini, and Palau, each of which has received multimillion-dollar lump sums.
Most infamously, the administration last year secretly sent more than 280 young men, most without criminal records, to the Terrorism Confinement Center (CECOT), a megaprison in El Salvador, where they were subjected to torture and cut off from communication with their families and lawyers for more than four months before a judge ordered most of them released.Amnesty and Human Rights First have described this practice as a form of "enforced disappearance" under international law.
"To carry out its mass deportation campaign, the Trump administration is flouting international law and cutting deals with dictators. It is also endangering lives, through its opaque web of third country agreements to send people against their will to countries where they have no connection”, said Uzra Zeya, the CEO of Human Rights First.
“Beyond their cruelty, these agreements reflect a transactional foreign policy driven by xenophobia, and they undermine due process and human rights globally," she said. "Ireland should play no part in facilitating these unlawful removals, including to third countries notorious for rights abuses.”
Shannon Airport has become a target of protest over its use as a hub for American military planes, which many in Ireland see as an affront to the country's long history of military neutrality. It has previously come under scrutiny for helping transport detainees renditioned for torture by the CIA during the post-9/11 global War on Terror.
Last week, a man was arrested for allegedly breaking into the facility and damaging a US military plane that was en route to a bilateral military exercise in Poland, according to The New York Times. Though no motive has been made public, the incident evoked other acts of vandalism by anti-war activists opposed to the US military presence.
"People across Ireland and the world look on in horror as the Trump administration continues implementing its vile, racist, and xenophobic executive orders that dehumanize and criminalize people who are, or are perceived to be, migrants and refugees. The administration has brazenly violated the right to due process by unlawfully removing people and subjecting some to enforced disappearance,” said Stephen Bowen, the executive director of Amnesty International Ireland.
Following a request last month for it to stop US deportation flights from using Shannon to refuel, Ireland’s Department of Transport contended that under the 1944 Chicago Convention on International Civil Aviation, US aircraft do not require permission to refuel at Shannon. Transport Minister O’Brien has said the US did not request authorization for the flights to land and that his department had no knowledge of them.
But Bowen says that even though states are not required to obtain permission to land, the convention still requires them to abide by international law, and that the Irish government ultimately has the power to decide how its sovereign airspace is used.
“The Department of Transport’s public responses are just not good enough,” he said. “There are depressing parallels with Ireland’s failure two decades ago to stop CIA-leased civil aircraft using Shannon as a stopover for rendition operations during the US ‘War on Terror’. Despite promises to ‘enforce the prohibition on the use of Irish airspace, airports, and related facilities for purposes not in line with the dictates of international law’, it appears that no concrete actions were ever taken.”
“The government’s timidity in its dealings with President Trump is already a cause for concern," Bowen added. "If Ireland is facilitating the monstrous ICE project, then we fear the government has lost its way. Rather than cower and capitulate, it must show courage, compassion, and principle."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Big Tech Faces More Probes Over AI-Generated Child Sexual Abuse Material
"These platforms are attacking the mental health, dignity, and rights of our sons and daughters," said the Spanish president. "The state cannot allow it. The impunity of the giants must end."
Feb 17, 2026
Big Tech firms are coming under greater scrutiny for the proliferation of child sexual abuse material generated by artificial intelligence-powered chatbots on their social media platforms.
Ireland's Data Protection Commission (DPC) announced on Tuesday that it was invoking the European Union's data privacy regulations to open an investigation into Grok, the AI chatbot featured on Elon Musk's X platform, after it was used to generate nonconsensual deepfake images, including sexualized images of children.
In announcing the investigation, DPC Deputy Commissioner Graham Doyle said that the commission has been in contact with X for weeks after reports first emerged of Grok being used to generate child sexual abuse material (CSAM).
Doyle said DPC has since decided to launch "a large-scale inquiry which will examine [X's] compliance with some of their fundamental obligations" under European privacy laws.
Spanish President Pedro Sánchez said on Tuesday that his government would ask Spain's Public Prosecution Service to "investigate the crimes that X, Meta, and TikTok may be committing through the creation and dissemination of child pornography by means of their AI."
"These platforms are attacking the mental health, dignity, and rights of our sons and daughters," Sánchez emphasized. "The state cannot allow it. The impunity of the giants must end."
The probes announced by Ireland and Spain mark just the latest actions by European governments against US-based tech giants. Earlier in February, law enforcement authorities in France raided the office of X in Paris, which the Paris prosecutor’s office said was part of an investigation aimed at "ensuring that the X platform complies with French laws, insofar as it operates on national territory."
The UK government's Information Commissioner's Office has also announced an investigation into X that the agency said encompasses "their processing of personal data in relation to the Grok artificial intelligence system and its potential to produce harmful sexualized image and video content."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Use of Ireland Airport for Trump Deportation Flights Denounced as 'Absolutely Reprehensible'
"The US Trump administration's cruel and inhumane mass deportation campaign must be denied any form of facilitation... to the degree that is legally possible," said the head of Amnesty International Ireland.
Feb 09, 2026
Amnesty International Ireland on Monday joined Irish politicians and other critics in condemning the use of Shannon Airport as a refueling stopover for some of US President Donald Trump's deportation flights.
Outrage over the use of the Irish airport has mounted since an investigation published Thursday by the Guardian and +972 Magazine detailed how a private jet owned by Trump donor and business partner Gil Dezer was recently chartered by US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) through the company Journey Aviation to deport Palestinians to the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
"It is absolutely reprehensible that any ICE deportation flights would be allowed stop and refuel in Shannon," said Duncan Smith, a Labour Party foreign affairs spokesperson.
Smith called on the prime minister, or taoiseach, Micheál Martin, and Minister for Transport Darragh O'Brien, both members of the party Fianna Fáil, to "intervene and ensure this ends."
"Ireland cannot in any way be complicit in these ICE flights," he added, according to the Irish Times.
The newspaper published a collection of other reactions from representatives for the country's political parties:
Green Party leader Roderic O'Gorman said, "It is deeply disturbing to learn that Shannon is being used to facilitate the cruel actions of Donald Trump's ICE." He called for the government to clarify the matter.
Social Democrats foreign affairs spokeswoman Senator Patricia Stephenson also said it was deeply disturbing: "The coalition must make a statement on whether it knowingly facilitated these flights," which she claimed were a violation of the human rights of the deportees.
Sinn Féin foreign affairs spokesman Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire said the matter "requires immediate clarification" as he questioned if the flights were compliant with international law.
People Before Profit-Solidarity TD Paul Murphy said, "The fact that these were flights deporting Palestinians just adds insult to injury."
Weighing in with a Monday statement, Stephen Bowen, executive director, Amnesty International Ireland, similarly said that "we are deeply troubled at these reports of ICE deportation flights refueling at Shannon, including to states of which deportees are not even citizens."
"The US Trump administration’s cruel and inhumane mass deportation campaign must be denied any form of facilitation by Ireland to the degree that is legally possible," he argued. "Our government must do everything it can to refuse to allow such stopovers without first assessing if any individuals on board face a real risk of serious harm if transferred."
Ireland's Department of Transport has noted that "stops at Irish airports by private aircraft and commercial charters which are technical stops for non-traffic purposes (ie, not picking up or setting down passengers), do not require prior authorization from the Department of Transport."
Bowen said that "whilst we understand the intricacies of aviation law, it is wholly unbecoming for states to hide behind these when such cruelty and rage is being deployed to weaponize immigration control. Ireland still has legal obligations under the international human rights treaties it has ratified. There can be no doubt that serious human rights violations are taking place during ICE deportations, with many detainees denied legal due process before being deported."
"We are currently looking into this very worrying matter and will be writing to government soon," he added. "However, the government should already be looking at all possible ways to stop Ireland being a link in a chain of suffering, fear, and systemic abuse."
Separately on Monday, Seamus Culleton, an Irishman who is married to a US citizen and has been in an ICE detention facility in Texas since September despite having no criminal record, called on the taoiseach to raise his case with Trump during a White House visit planned for St. Patrick's Day.
Culleton told the Irish Times that his message to politicians in his homeland is: "Just try to get me out of here and do all you can please. It's an absolute torture, psychological and physical torture. I just want to get back to my wife. We're so desperate to start a family."
"I'd be so grateful if we could just end this," he added. I've been detained now for five months. It's just a torture, I don't know how much more I can take."
A spokesperson for Ireland's Department of Foreign Affairs—led by Minister Helen McEntee of the Fine Gael party—confirmed that it was providing "consular assistance" through the consulate in Austin and "our embassy in Washington, DC is also engaging directly with the Department of Homeland Security at a senior level in relation to this case."
Responding to Culleton's description of his experience, Smith of the Labour Party noted that "just last week I raised the concerning fact that data showed an increase in Irish citizens interacting with Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention and deportation procedures."
"Mr. Culleton's testimony is absolutely harrowing, and marries with what immigration lawyers on the ground tell us about the very real and disturbing conditions that Irish citizens are facing inside ICE detention facilities," Smith said, urging McEntee to "seek any and all information" about everyone from Ireland now in US custody.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Catherine Connolly's Win in Ireland Proves Good Things Can Still Happen
In a world of strongmen, a voice for peace and a beacon of hope shines through.
Nov 01, 2025
On November 11 2025, independent Member of Parliament Catherine Connolly will become the new president of Ireland after winning an overwhelming victory over the fiercely unpopular Heather Humphreys.
In her acceptance speech, President Connolly vowed to remain rooted in service, stay humble, and actively practice neutrality. She is anti-war, anti-imperialist, pro-reunification, an advocate for disability rights, and fluent in Irish. She has also been openly critical of the European Union's inaction on Gaza, and is distrustful of France and the United Kingdom due to their massive armament programs.
In her words, Connolly strives to be "a moral compass in a world increasingly driven by profit and spectacle. A voice for those too often silenced."
Who is Connolly?—The Politician Not Afraid to Stand Against the Consensus
As a former barrister, from a humble background, Connolly has spent her years volunteering with the elderly and taking night classes to train in law. She formally entered politics in 1999 with the mission of tackling Ireland's dire housing shortage crisis.
After serving 17 years as a councillor in Galway for the Labour Party, she left, citing a lack of support, and began her journey as an independent. In 2020, she became the first woman elected to chair debates as deputy speaker in the Dáil Éireann.
Rather than pandering to corporate interests, the wealthy elite, or a personal ego trip bent on abusing power (naming no names), Connolly offers a hopeful vision for a more compassionate and responsible approach to politics.
Connolly's victory marked an important moment for independent candidates around the world. As the world slides to the right, her humble message of peace, inclusivity, and democracy is a powerful reminder that there is light. We must continue to draw attention to and support those who stand up against the establishment.
Connolly has shown that it is possible for well-deserving underdogs such as Zohran Mamdani, Jeremy Corbyn, Zack Polanski, and Bernie Sanders to bring common-good policies into the mainstream.
2025 Irish Presidential Election—Game-Changing for this Divided Nation
In a demonstration of her ability to unify opposing voices, Connolly's landslide win came after she secured the support of opposition parties Sinn Féin, the Social Democrats, People Before Profit, and even her former party, Labour.
As an independent, Connolly pledged, in her opening speech, to be a '"president for all." Her victory was secured after gaining the largest number of first-preference votes ever—the equivalent of 63%.
When we look at the bigger picture, however, it tells the story of a divided, disillusioned, and apathetic Ireland tired of the two-party system. Voter turnout was just 45.8%, and a huge 213,738 votes were either invalid or spoiled. This accounted for almost 13% of the overall vote, notably, more than 10 times the number in the last presidential election.
In the run-up to the election, violent riots broke out in the capital for two consecutive days. They took place in front of a hotel housing asylum seekers in an anti-immigration sentiment being witnessed across large parts of Europe. This is just one example of the ongoing immigration tensions in Ireland.
Irish citizens are frustrated with the government after years of austerity measures, the ongoing housing crisis, poor public services such as healthcare, and the fact that key candidates, such as Maria Steen, were not on the ballot.
Connolly's Policies—A Progressive Ireland Led by a Moral Compass
With Connolly's left-wing, progressive, and anti-war stance at the reins, the world eagerly awaits to see if Ireland can be the guiding light that so many nations need right now. In the face of fascist, authoritarian leaders such as Donald Trump, Viktor Orbán, Xi Jinping, Vladimir Putin, Benjamin Netanyahu, and Nicolás Maduro, we desperately need a new playbook.
Some of Connolly's stances include:
- Strong advocacy for Irish reunification through a peaceful and democratic process;
- The legalization of same-sex marriage. She stands for equality for all individuals, regardless of their sexual orientation;
- Providing access to safe and legal abortion services. She advocates for reproductive rights and a woman's right to choose;
- A compassionate and humane approach to immigration;
- A universal healthcare system that is accessible to everyone;
- Addressing the housing issue and getting people experiencing homelessness off the streets;
- The promotion and preservation of the Irish language by encouraging its integration into education and public life;
- Comprehensive and urgent climate action to reduce carbon emissions, promote renewable alternatives, and support conservation efforts;
- Implementing a wealth tax to address economic inequalities and fund public services;
- Enhancing democratic processes to ensure transparency, accountability, and increased public participation;
- Promoting peace through diplomatic means and maintaining neutrality. She is critical of NATO and other military alliances; and
- Vocal advocacy for peace in Gaza, ending the blockade, and promoting humanitarian efforts to end the suffering of the Palestinian people. She supports a more ethical approach to international arms sales and highlights the complicity of those weapons which are used to commit war crimes, genocide, and create long-lasting human suffering.
With her pledge to be accountable to the citizens of Ireland, her policies are people-and-planet focused. Her commitment to justice, equality, and transparency is a refreshing change from the status quo. Rather than pandering to corporate interests, the wealthy elite, or a personal ego trip bent on abusing power (naming no names), Connolly offers a hopeful vision for a more compassionate and responsible approach to politics.
Let's hope that her recent win bolsters the campaigns of other progressive candidates and serves as a reminder that positive change is possible. This is a huge win for the left; let's keep the momentum going.
In the words of Catherine Connolly: "Use your voice in every way you can, because a republic and a democracy need constructive questioning, and together we can shape a new republic that values everybody."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Gaza and Ireland: Shared Experiences and a Warning Going Gorward
Famines, especially those driven by political subjugation or military occupation, have often produced persistent calamitous consequences for the survivors long after the bullets stop flying or the bombs dropping.
Oct 12, 2025
Regardless of how the long-delayed, welcome ceasefire in Gaza plays out, there are historic parallels that shed a warning on the future for Palestinians devastated by a two-year genocidal war following decades of ruinous occupation.
Early media reports raise red flags. It is uncertain whether the agreement will lead to a permanent end to Israel’s war on Palestinians, especially given the long-term far-right Israeli goal of full ethnic cleansing of both Gaza and the West Bank.
Further, Netanyahu’s extremist government has made no commitment to fully withdraw from Gaza, and there is no commitment to any real plan to rebuild the massive devastation Israel has created in Gaza with any role for any Palestinian leadership. And even with the announced ceasefire “food, water and medicine remained scarce,” the New York Times noted.
One horrific fact is clear. As of October 5, at least 67,139 Palestinians have been confirmed killed with tens of thousands more unaccounted for and likely still buried under rubble. Of those dead, more than 20,000 were children. At least 459, including 154 children, have died from starvation due to the famine imposed by Israel as a weapon of war.
Famines, especially those driven by political or military policy, have often produced persistent calamitous consequences for the survivors. Signs are already evident for Palestinians in Gaza. A study led by the UN Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) for Palestine Refugees, published by the medical journal The Lancet this week, disclosed that nearly 55,000 children under the age of six in Gaza are estimated to be acutely malnourished.
UNRWA researchers found that 5 percent of children screened in January 2024 showed evidence of wasting. By May 2025 May 2025, “levels of wasting among screened children rose to nearly 16 percent, with almost a quarter of these suffering severe acute malnutrition, the most dangerous form of the condition,” the Guardian described.
Even before the war, after years of an Israeli blockade of Gaza, children in Palestinian refugee families in Gaza were already “food insecure,” said UNRWA nutrition epidemiologist Dr. Masako Horino, and now, due to the famine “face an increased risk of mortality.”
What does the future hold? A forewarning could be found in perhaps the world’s most chronicled famine in Ireland from 1845 to the early 1850s, following a devastating potato blight, a crop that dominated the food source in Ireland. An 1841 census recorded a population of 8.4 million people in Ireland. Ten years later, following years of famine and a mass emigration by desperately sick people, many forced off their land by British landlords, the population had plummeted to just 6.5 million, and it continued to decline for decades.
In 2025, the combined population of the Irish Republic, even after the economic gains of the so-called Celtic Tiger since the 1990s, and ongoing British controlled Northern Ireland, is still just 6.8 million people, less than before the famine. By comparison, the United Kingdom’s population in 1840, including all of Ireland, was 26.7 million. Today, the UK population, including Northern Ireland, has climbed to nearly 70 million.
In what may well be the definitive history of Ireland’s suffering, "Rot. An Imperial History of the Irish Famine," Padraic Scanlan, explains that the Irish famine does not fit the international law definition of starvation crime. That requires deliberate action “by government or military committing the crime must act either to destroy the means of producing or obtaining food, or to forcibly displace people to cause starvation.” These are terms that directly apply to Israel’s forced famine in Gaza.
Though Scanlan does not directly address Gaza, there are multiple parallels. “The hyper dependence of so many of the Irish poor on the (potato) crop was an adaptation to English and British conquest, and to the subsequent growth of the British empire and imperial capitalism,” he writes.
Central to that were intentional policies following the Protestant Reformation. “English forces seized almost all Irish land” held by Catholics and “redistributed it to Protestant loyalists. The English Parliament passed the Penal Laws, which legalized the persecution and dispossession of Catholics (in Ireland) and strictly limited Ireland’s political and economic independence.” Echoes of Israeli apartheid policies, especially in Gaza and the West Bank, are not hard to find, from land grabs by settlers to discriminatory laws, denial of political rights, and other restrictions and repression.
Increasingly, Irish people, especially in rural areas, were landless, forced to pay rent to British landlords, while the British political leadership stripped Ireland of any potential wealth through its devotion to early capitalist market fundamentalist policies, including export and transfer to England of other food products and capital.
Frederick Douglass, Scanlan notes, visited Ireland at the invitation of slavery abolitionists in 1845-46, and was shocked by what he observed. Douglass viewed that “the Irish poor and the enslaved and free Black workers in the US were united by a common struggle to survive in different, but pitiless, conditions.”
Longtime British racialized stereotypes of poor Irish laborers were reinforced by the rising orthodoxy of market ideology. The Irish rural poor were depicted as “resistant to modernity and reform,” as “inert and indolent,” as ”lazy, apathetic, backward,” unwilling to work for wages, and similar pejoratives. Those slanders were seen as “justification for conquest, and British rule. British relief programs during the famine were characterized by work requirements, means testing, or agreement to surrender land, to qualify for food assistance.
Ultimately, British landlords and would-be investors welcomed evictions and forced migration to "liberate" what was deemed “valuable land from inconvenient or unproductive tenants,” Scanlan writes, another parallel to how Israeli settlers, with the assistance of the Israeli government and military, treat West Bank Palestinians. There are even US land speculators leading the current Gaza peace negotiations.
Racist, supremacist rhetoric is pervasive in Israeli dehumanized depictions of Palestinians as well, with even worse terms like “human beasts,” “children of darkness,” and insensitivity to the murder, even of Palestinian children, which have escalated since October 7, 2023.
It has carried over to indifference to those dying of famine. In Ireland, the famine killed the weakest and most vulnerable, Scanlan reminds his readers. “The soup kitchens like the public work programs kept people alive but not healthy.” In Gaza too, we’ve heard claims that it has been pre-existing conditions or other justifications, not deliberate famine, that have led to starvation deaths.
Other European countries also suffered famine deaths in the 1840s from the potato blight, “but only Ireland experienced demographic collapse during and after the blight pandemic,” Scanlan adds. “Years of starvation and disease dissolved bonds of community and family in the hardest-hit parts of Ireland.”
Ireland’s history with settler colonialism, occupation, political repression, and famine has helped make the Irish people among the strongest critics of Israel’s genocide and for many years among those with the most solidarity for Palestinian rights. The population decline in Ireland, and many years needed to finally secure political freedom for the Republic of Ireland, and ultimately unification of the island are a message. Even if the proposed ceasefire agreement does lead to an end to the war and some gains for Palestinian sovereignty and rights, it will be up to the entire international community and all of us to demand it.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Israeli Government Social Media Urges Europe to 'Remove' Muslims
"What would the reaction would be if an Arab state wrote this about synagogues and Jews?" asked one critic.
Aug 27, 2025
Israel faced backlash this week after its Arabic-language account on the social media site X published a message warning Europeans to take action against the proliferation of mosques and "remove" Muslims from their countries.
"In the year 1980, there were only fewer than a hundred mosques in Europe. As for today, there are more than 20,000 mosques. This is the true face of colonization," posted Israel, a settler-colonial state whose nearly 2 million Muslim citizens face widespread discrimination, and where Palestinians in the illegally occupied territories live under an apartheid regime.
"This is what is happening while Europe is oblivious and does not care about the danger," the post continues. "And the danger does not lie in the existence of mosques in and of themselves, for freedom of worship is one of the basic human rights, and every person has the right to believe and worship his Lord."
"The problem lies in the contents that are taught in some of these mosques, and they are not limited to piety and good deeds, but rather focus on encouraging escalating violence in the streets of Europe, and spreading hatred for the other and even for those who host them in their countries, and inciting against them instead of teaching love, harmony, and peace," Israel added. "Europe must wake up and remove this fifth column."
Referring to the far-right Alternative for Germany party, Berlin-based journalist James Jackson replied on X that "even the AfD don't tweet, 'Europe must wake up and remove this fifth column' over a map of mosques."
Other social media users called Israel's post "racist" and "Islamophobic," while some highlighted the stark contrast between the way Palestinians and Israelis treat Christian people and institutions.
Others noted that some of the map's fearmongering figures misleadingly showing a large number of mosques indicate countries whose populations are predominantly or significantly Muslim.
"Russia has 8,000 mosques? Who would've known a country with millions of Muslim Central Asians and Caucasians would need so many!" said one X user.
Israel's post came amid growing international outrage over its 691-day assault and siege on Gaza, which has left more than 230,000 Palestinians dead, maimed, or missing and hundreds of thousands more starving and facing ethnic cleansing as Operation Gideon's Chariots 2—a campaign to conquer, occupy, and "cleanse" the strip—ramps up amid a growing engineered famine that has already killed hundreds of people.
Israel is facing an ongoing genocide case at the International Court of Justice, while Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant, his former defense minister, are fugitives form the International Criminal Court, where they are wanted for alleged war crimes and crimes against humanity including murder and forced starvation.
European nations including Belgium, Ireland, and Spain are supporting the South Africa-led ICJ genocide case against Israel. Since October 2023, European countries including Belgium, France, Malta, Portugal, Slovenia, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Norway, and Spain have either formally recognized Palestinian statehood or announced their intention to do so.
Keep ReadingShow Less
This St. Patrick’s Day, Let’s Celebrate Solidarity Against Colonialism
On this day we would do well to remember a chapter of often forgotten history, the relationship between the Irish people and the Choctaw Nation.
Mar 17, 2025
The Irish do love a good story and a good celebration. The celebration of St. Patrick’s Day has evolved from the observance of the death of St. Patrick in the fifth century into a celebration of Irish culture and heritage. The corned beef, cabbage, potatoes, and Guinness I understand; the green beer—not so much.
While the modern day “Wearing O’ the Green” for many adds to the fun, the original adoption of green ribbons, clothing, and hats by the Society of United Irishmen and the street ballad “The Wearing of the Green” (lamenting the oppression of the 1798 Irish rebellion) were never known by many and forgotten by most.
The Choctaw, unlike the British government, recognized the humanity and suffering of the Irish people, even as the Choctaw still suffered and had little to give.
During the 700 years of British colonial rule of Ireland, the Irish like all subjects of British settler colonialism suffered violence and coercion to further the economic power of the empire. The methods of how to control native populations, the land, and natural resources varied from empire to empire, but those methods resulted in resistance and often wars of rebellion. Worldwide, whether in Ireland, India, Africa, Asia, the Americas, or the Palestinian state—people, eventually, will reject their oppressors.
On this St. Patrick’s Day we would do well to remember a chapter of often forgotten history, the relationship between the Irish people and the Choctaw Nation. In 1847, during the worst of the Irish famine, the Choctaw Nation, roughly 15 years after their forced journey from their ancestral home in Mississippi to Indian territory in Oklahoma on the “trail of tears and death,” collected and sent $170—over $5,000 in today’s money—to Midleton in County Cork, Ireland.
The Choctaw, unlike the British government, recognized the humanity and suffering of the Irish people, even as the Choctaw still suffered and had little to give. They had been forced to cede 11 million acres, they still mourned lost family members, yet they gave what they could, seeing that their own suffering was now lived by the Irish.
Often, times of suffering and adversity bring out, as former U.S. President Abraham Lincoln called it, “the better angels of our nature.” The people of Ireland and the Choctaw Nation shared a common suffering and formed a common bond that still exists. In 2018, Taoiseach Leo Varadkar visited the Choctaw Nation in Oklahoma and noted, “A few years ago, on a visit to Ireland, a representative of the Choctaw Nation called your support for us ‘a sacred memory.’ It is that and more. It is a sacred bond, which has joined our peoples together for all time. Your act of kindness has never been, and never will be, forgotten in Ireland.”
Indeed they did not forget, and in 2020, as the Navajo and Hopi tribes suffered during the Covid-19 pandemic, the Irish people, citing the generosity of the Choctaws, raised nearly $2 million for the Navajo and Hopi peoples. In gratitude for the gift, Gary Batton, chief of the Choctaw Nation of Oklahoma, said, “We have become kindred spirits with the Irish in the years since the Irish potato famine... We hope the Irish, Navajo, and Hopi peoples develop lasting friendships, as we have.”
Colonialism has a long and tragic history, sadly still seen today. If only as an afterthought, while celebrating St. Patrick’s Day, we should remember the common bond that exists between the oppressed peoples of the world. Perhaps we might call upon those “better angels of our nature” and do what we can to resist the oppression here, in Palestine, in Ukraine, in Africa, and realize that across oceans or even across the street, we must recognize each other’s humanity.
Keep ReadingShow Less
What Americans Need to Know About St. Patrick's Day
It's not about shamrocks and beer.
Mar 17, 2025
St. Patrick's Day is celebrated by millions of Americans every year.
It's a recognition of the shared heritage of two great countries.
But the meaning of St. Patrick is something most Americans get exactly wrong.
This misunderstanding reveals why these two nations—once so similar—are now worlds apart.
Here's what Americans need to know.
***
[Sound of a bullet chambered, waves breaking in indifference.]
Venice Beach, twilight.
I'm minding my own business when—
[Flash]
A gun is pointed at my face.
Random violence. Pointless. American.
But this isn't just about crime. It's deeper.
In America, violence isn't a national crisis—it's a block-by-block lottery. You're safe until you're suddenly not.
I grew up in Ireland, and we simply don't live this way.
Why?
Because violence isn't just about guns—it's about trust.
The Real Heist
[Cut to marble floors, quiet handshakes, silent theft.]
While Americans are busy fighting each other—left vs. right, immigrants, tariffs—the real robbery happens quietly:
- Trust gutted—institutions hollowed until safety nets snap.
- Inequality weaponized—the rich feast; everyone else fights each other over crumbs.
- Desperation manufactured—crime, addiction, despair—all intentional side-effects of profit-driven division.
Ireland is no saint. But this desperation doesn't dominate, because trust—even when imperfect—remains intact. Arguments rarely become instant death sentences. Less inequality means fewer people forced into despair. Institutions still hold, even when they falter.
The difference? People in Ireland still expect their institutions to function. Americans expect them to fail.
Trust itself is being deliberately dismantled, turning neighbors into threats instead of allies.
And when trust collapses, what and who fills the void?
Manufactured Chaos
[Cut to your uncle, veins bulging, shouting about "libtards!"]
Left vs. Right: the puppet show you can't stop watching.
- Two-party spectacle: a staged distraction from real theft.
- Media outrage: addictive scrolling keeping you blind to what's really happening.
- Global chaos: Siding with dictators, up is down, bad is good.
Your neighbor isn't robbing you.
They are. Slashing the federal government, agencies, medicaid, SNAP under the guise of efficiency and long-term good to turn billionaires into trillionaires while consolidating power. All the while…
Pulling your strings.
Carjacking your anger.
They aren't just feeding your fear—they're refining it into a weapon.
St. Patrick's Fire: A Moral Inferno
[Cut to 433 AD. Hilltop. A forbidden flame.]
The Irish High King had one rule: No fire before mine.
Then Patrick lit his fire—a flame of open defiance.
The Druids warned: "If that fire isn't put out, it'll never be extinguished."
They were right. It burned through an empire for 800 years.
So, what's America's fire?
- It's not partisan warfare.
- It's not scapegoating migrants.
- It's a moral stand against those profiting from fear—against those robbing your fundamental right to live without fear.
Who Are the Real Snakes?
Patrick banished snakes from Ireland—but there were no snakes. They were poisoners of trust, hope, and community.
America's snakes?
- Social media owners who profit from, and shape, fear.
- Politicians who weaponize division.
- Corporate interests dismantling your safety to line their pockets.
President Donald Trump isn't fighting snakes—he is the snake. But he's not alone. They're everywhere, wearing different skins, exploiting the fear they manufacture.
The Only Question That Matters This St. Patrick's Day
Forget distractions. Forget the puppet show.
Ask yourself this:
Do I feel safe?
Not just from violence—
- Safe from losing healthcare overnight?
- Safe from sudden joblessness?
- Safe enough to trust your community, your future?
America doesn't have to be this way.
They built it like this.
Which means you can unbuild it. And trust can be rebuilt.
But you must see the snakes. If you don't, you'll never fight the right battle—you'll fight each other while they watch and profit.
***
St. Patrick was a slave. He defied a corrupt king. He lit a fire.
That fire was truth—a moral truth against injustice. And it can't be put out.
It burned through 800 years of oppression, famine, and war.
He didn't just bring religion—he brought something far more powerful.
St. Patrick's Day isn't about shamrocks or beer.
It's about your resistance.
This year, don't just celebrate.
Act.
Light. Your. Fire.
Keep ReadingShow Less
Not 'Anti-Israel,' Says Irish Leader After Israeli Embassy Closed, But 'Pro-International Law'
"Ireland will always speak up for human rights and international law. Nothing will distract from that."
Dec 15, 2024
Ireland's Taoiseach Simon Harris on Sunday responded to charges by the Israeli government—which earlier in the day shuttered its embassy in Dublin—by saying the Irish government has not been "anti-Israel" in its positions over the war in Gaza, but rather "pro-peace, pro-human rights, and pro-international law."
In a statement explaining the official closure of the diplomatic outpost, Israeli foreign minister Gideon Saar said the "decision to close the Israeli embassy in Dublin was made in light of the extreme anti-Israel policy of the Irish government."
The ministry's statement noted that "the Israeli ambassador in Dublin was returned to Israel at the time following Ireland's decision to unilaterally recognize a 'Palestinian state'," which took place in May of this year.
Saar said Ireland had used "antisemitic rhetoric" against Israel, though did not specify what language he was referring to, and also accused the country of "crossing every red line in its relations with Israel."
In addition to formally recognizing a Palestinian state, the government of Ireland has also backed South Africa in its genocide case against Israel, brought before the International Court of Justice (ICJ) earlier this year.
In his Sunday response to Israel's decision, Harris said he was "deeply disappointed" in the move even as he "utterly rejected" Israeli assertions.
"Ireland's foreign policy is founded on our deep commitment to dialogue and to the peaceful resolution of disputes," Harris said, adding that embassies worldwide "play a very important role" in maintaining that commitment.
"Ireland wants a two-state solution and for Israel and Palestine to live in peace and security," he concluded. "Ireland will always speak up for human rights and international law. Nothing will distract from that."
In a separate reaction to Israel's decision, Micheál Martin, the Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs, said there were no plans to retaliate diplomatically or reciprocate by closing the Irish embassy in Israel.
"The continuation of the war in Gaza and the loss of innocent lives is simply unacceptable and contravenes international law," Martin said. "It represents the collective punishment of the Palestinian people in Gaza. We need an immediate ceasefire, the release of all hostages and a surge of humanitarian aid into Gaza."
"Ireland and Israel will continue to maintain diplomatic relations," he added. " Inherent in that is the right to agree and disagree on fundamental points."
Keep ReadingShow Less
See More
Most Popular
To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good.
News & Opinion
Trending
Common Dreams, Inc. Founded 1997. Registered 501(c3) Non-Profit
Privacy Policy