Sinn Féin voted against a European Parliament motion condemning the Hamas attack on Israel earlier this month, while People Before Profit has claimed many Israeli hostages are part of “occupation forces”.
Sinn Féin’s sole MEP Chris MacManus was one of four Irish MEPs who last Thursday voted down a motion strongly condemning the October 7 attacks, which left more than 1,400 Israelis dead.
The motion also called for the elimination of the “terrorist organisation Hamas”, as well as the release of hostages.
Independents Luke ‘Ming’ Flanagan, Mick Wallace and Clare Daly were also among the 21 MEPs who voted down the motion, which also called for a “humanitarian pause” to allow the delivery of aid and for Israel’s response – which has left more than 5,000 people in Gaza dead – to be within international law.
It comes as People Before Profit TD Paul Murphy defended a leaflet distributed by his party which states “no one wants to see hostages taken but again, many of those taken are members of the occupation forces or settler movements”.
It has been widely reported that while some of the more than 200 hostages taken by Hamas militants are soldiers, many are civilians – including people with disabilities, children, grandparents and even a nine-month-old baby.
A People Before Profit activist’s email to TDs and senators last week claimed many of the Israeli civilians killed on October 7 were caught in crossfire between Hamas and the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) and “indeed, many were likely shot with IDF bullets”.
The email also cites hostages reported “being treated with dignity by Hamas fighters”.
Mr Murphy said Hamas is “a right-wing Islamist organisation” but declined to say if its members were terrorists.
“We are opposed to hostage-taking and the targeting of civilians,” he said.
“We call for the release of all the hostages held by Hamas and the release of over 10,000 Palestinian prisoners held as hostages by Israel, including thousands who are being held without charge or trial, and hundreds of children.” He said people should “continue to bombard TDs” with emails asking them to condemn “genocide by Israel and advocate for an immediate ceasefire”.
Mr MacManus defended his vote last week, saying the resolution was “not sufficient to deal with the catastrophe happening before our eyes”.
He said he consistently voted to condemn Hamas in separate votes on parts of the resolution, but said the final version was “unbalanced”, adding: “Anybody who is serious about addressing the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza is calling for a ceasefire.”
In a joint statement, Mr Wallace and Ms Daly said: “We reject this resolution and we think ordinary Irish people will feel the same when they read it.
“The resolution is completely silent in relation to Israel’s treatment of Palestinian people to date. It acts as though history began on the 7th of October. There is no mention of Israel’s crimes against humanity.”
They said the resolution does not call for a ceasefire but instead “fudges” that point.
“It’s an appalling and dangerous statement on behalf of the parliament. It uses the language of terrorism in relation to Hamas, but Israel’s actions are portrayed as a legitimate response,” the MEPs added.
I dare you to post this to /r/ireland
Based.
According to wikipedia, the Jewish population in Ireland went from 5000 in the early 1900s to 800 today. What a sharp drop! A naive eye might wonder if there was any foul play.
Fuck these guys. Populist windbag chancers pacifying their socialist wing. Same goes for our MEPs, they got in on a wave of anit-austerity fervour and immediately became tankie arseholes. None of these spineless commie windsocks speak for us. I say that as a very left-leaning Irishman lol
*edit* for the record, free Palestine plz
I do not understand why some progressives, or progressive movements, find it difficult to unequivocally condemn Hama’s actions, and at the same time, oppose Israel’s dispossession and subjugation of Palestinians?
In my view, hatred, retribution and revenge are not fertile ground for liberation politics. To the contrary, they lead to reactionary and blind nationalism. They lead to dehumanization. Hamas, and for that matter Al queda and ISIS, represent a form of conservative and rightwing nationalism. Iran represents a form of clerical fascism. Non of them are advancing progressive liberation politics.
None of this justifies Israel’s occupation and subjugation of the Palestinian people and the Israeli campaign of ethnic cleansing. None of this justifies collective punishment and bombing civilians.
In my opinion, secularism in politics and democracy offer the way forward. Ethno-nationalism, both Israeli or Palestinian, will only lead to more useless violence.
🇮🇪 Terrorists 🤝 🇵🇸 Terrorists
Isn’t Sein Finn rooted in their own terrorist history?
Solidarity
As each week goes by my belief that Sinn Fein and the DUP are just as bad as each other continues to fade as SF continues to fall from the very strong dislike category into the borderline hated category.
That’s the exact reason why Europe will get more and more problems inflicted by Islamic radicalization.
The fear to call it by name, the need to appease the intolerants, or just extreme blindness
Hope people will now stop idealizing Irish culture.
Can someone explain to me what the motion was really about? I am saying this because the two MEPs of the Portuguese Communist Party voted against it and members of the party claims the motion supports Israel bombing Gaza .
I’m shocked I tells ya
Every country has their populist loonies unfortunately
the opposite would have been called hyprocrisy
Oh wow, sinn féin sticking up for terrorists, *who could have seen that coming*
The reason they voted against the motion is it called for the “elimination of Hamas”, which effectively would give EP support to the current activities of the IDF.
This week Sinn Fein asked people to commemorate the bomber Thomas Begley who died whilst handling the bomb. Not only did he kill himself he also killed nine bystanders. Sinn Fein and Hamas aren’t that different
Wow, that’s some contrived BS. ‘Yeah we know they’re hostages _but_ -‘ good lord, listen to yourself man.
‘Crossfire’ means they died from IDF bullets? You don’t know that. IDF was caught with their pants down that day, Hamas went on a murder spree, they would be lucky to be seeing crossfire, so who’s correct and who’s a total and utter bollox?
Long story short: the Irish lefty wagons are anti semitic by both sidesing this.
Irish supporting terrorists?? Imagine my shock
Terrorists support terrorist shock!
Oh ffs! Why didn’t they just condemn them?! They’re just going against populist vote as member of the opposition in Irish government. She literally said in a dail address that she condemned the actions of Hamas. They’re bringing unwanted attention to Ireland now cause half the sub here thinks we’re antisemitic for supporting a free Palestine when all anyone here wants is for people to just stop killing each other. F**k sake.
Tbf Ireland has a long history of not standing up to nazis. So this is hardly surprising.
Not surprising. The political wing of a terrorist organisation supporting their fellow terrorists.
Why do these fuckers have any saying in a European institution?
I’m a dual US/Irish citizen. I’ve never understood the love Irish people have for the Palestinians. I feel for the civilians too and I 100% support a two-state solution. But Jews were historically oppressed for millennia just like we were.
And I don’t think many of them understand how popular Hamas is among average Palestinians. I mean there’s a reason why there haven’t been elections in the West Bank for a long time. They don’t share many values with the west.
Just so people know. One of the founders of the modern Sinn Fein Gerry Adams is friends with the Hamas leadership. You can even google pictures of them together
29 comments
Sinn Féin voted against a European Parliament motion condemning the Hamas attack on Israel earlier this month, while People Before Profit has claimed many Israeli hostages are part of “occupation forces”.
Sinn Féin’s sole MEP Chris MacManus was one of four Irish MEPs who last Thursday voted down a motion strongly condemning the October 7 attacks, which left more than 1,400 Israelis dead.
The motion also called for the elimination of the “terrorist organisation Hamas”, as well as the release of hostages.
Independents Luke ‘Ming’ Flanagan, Mick Wallace and Clare Daly were also among the 21 MEPs who voted down the motion, which also called for a “humanitarian pause” to allow the delivery of aid and for Israel’s response – which has left more than 5,000 people in Gaza dead – to be within international law.
It comes as People Before Profit TD Paul Murphy defended a leaflet distributed by his party which states “no one wants to see hostages taken but again, many of those taken are members of the occupation forces or settler movements”.
It has been widely reported that while some of the more than 200 hostages taken by Hamas militants are soldiers, many are civilians – including people with disabilities, children, grandparents and even a nine-month-old baby.
A People Before Profit activist’s email to TDs and senators last week claimed many of the Israeli civilians killed on October 7 were caught in crossfire between Hamas and the Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) and “indeed, many were likely shot with IDF bullets”.
The email also cites hostages reported “being treated with dignity by Hamas fighters”.
Mr Murphy said Hamas is “a right-wing Islamist organisation” but declined to say if its members were terrorists.
“We are opposed to hostage-taking and the targeting of civilians,” he said.
“We call for the release of all the hostages held by Hamas and the release of over 10,000 Palestinian prisoners held as hostages by Israel, including thousands who are being held without charge or trial, and hundreds of children.” He said people should “continue to bombard TDs” with emails asking them to condemn “genocide by Israel and advocate for an immediate ceasefire”.
Mr MacManus defended his vote last week, saying the resolution was “not sufficient to deal with the catastrophe happening before our eyes”.
He said he consistently voted to condemn Hamas in separate votes on parts of the resolution, but said the final version was “unbalanced”, adding: “Anybody who is serious about addressing the humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza is calling for a ceasefire.”
In a joint statement, Mr Wallace and Ms Daly said: “We reject this resolution and we think ordinary Irish people will feel the same when they read it.
“The resolution is completely silent in relation to Israel’s treatment of Palestinian people to date. It acts as though history began on the 7th of October. There is no mention of Israel’s crimes against humanity.”
They said the resolution does not call for a ceasefire but instead “fudges” that point.
“It’s an appalling and dangerous statement on behalf of the parliament. It uses the language of terrorism in relation to Hamas, but Israel’s actions are portrayed as a legitimate response,” the MEPs added.
I dare you to post this to /r/ireland
Based.
According to wikipedia, the Jewish population in Ireland went from 5000 in the early 1900s to 800 today. What a sharp drop! A naive eye might wonder if there was any foul play.
Fuck these guys. Populist windbag chancers pacifying their socialist wing. Same goes for our MEPs, they got in on a wave of anit-austerity fervour and immediately became tankie arseholes. None of these spineless commie windsocks speak for us. I say that as a very left-leaning Irishman lol
*edit* for the record, free Palestine plz
I do not understand why some progressives, or progressive movements, find it difficult to unequivocally condemn Hama’s actions, and at the same time, oppose Israel’s dispossession and subjugation of Palestinians?
In my view, hatred, retribution and revenge are not fertile ground for liberation politics. To the contrary, they lead to reactionary and blind nationalism. They lead to dehumanization. Hamas, and for that matter Al queda and ISIS, represent a form of conservative and rightwing nationalism. Iran represents a form of clerical fascism. Non of them are advancing progressive liberation politics.
None of this justifies Israel’s occupation and subjugation of the Palestinian people and the Israeli campaign of ethnic cleansing. None of this justifies collective punishment and bombing civilians.
In my opinion, secularism in politics and democracy offer the way forward. Ethno-nationalism, both Israeli or Palestinian, will only lead to more useless violence.
🇮🇪 Terrorists 🤝 🇵🇸 Terrorists
Isn’t Sein Finn rooted in their own terrorist history?
Solidarity
As each week goes by my belief that Sinn Fein and the DUP are just as bad as each other continues to fade as SF continues to fall from the very strong dislike category into the borderline hated category.
That’s the exact reason why Europe will get more and more problems inflicted by Islamic radicalization.
The fear to call it by name, the need to appease the intolerants, or just extreme blindness
Hope people will now stop idealizing Irish culture.
Can someone explain to me what the motion was really about? I am saying this because the two MEPs of the Portuguese Communist Party voted against it and members of the party claims the motion supports Israel bombing Gaza .
I’m shocked I tells ya
Every country has their populist loonies unfortunately
the opposite would have been called hyprocrisy
Oh wow, sinn féin sticking up for terrorists, *who could have seen that coming*
The reason they voted against the motion is it called for the “elimination of Hamas”, which effectively would give EP support to the current activities of the IDF.
This week Sinn Fein asked people to commemorate the bomber Thomas Begley who died whilst handling the bomb. Not only did he kill himself he also killed nine bystanders. Sinn Fein and Hamas aren’t that different
Wow, that’s some contrived BS. ‘Yeah we know they’re hostages _but_ -‘ good lord, listen to yourself man.
‘Crossfire’ means they died from IDF bullets? You don’t know that. IDF was caught with their pants down that day, Hamas went on a murder spree, they would be lucky to be seeing crossfire, so who’s correct and who’s a total and utter bollox?
Long story short: the Irish lefty wagons are anti semitic by both sidesing this.
Irish supporting terrorists?? Imagine my shock
Terrorists support terrorist shock!
Oh ffs! Why didn’t they just condemn them?! They’re just going against populist vote as member of the opposition in Irish government. She literally said in a dail address that she condemned the actions of Hamas. They’re bringing unwanted attention to Ireland now cause half the sub here thinks we’re antisemitic for supporting a free Palestine when all anyone here wants is for people to just stop killing each other. F**k sake.
Tbf Ireland has a long history of not standing up to nazis. So this is hardly surprising.
Not surprising. The political wing of a terrorist organisation supporting their fellow terrorists.
Why do these fuckers have any saying in a European institution?
I’m a dual US/Irish citizen. I’ve never understood the love Irish people have for the Palestinians. I feel for the civilians too and I 100% support a two-state solution. But Jews were historically oppressed for millennia just like we were.
And I don’t think many of them understand how popular Hamas is among average Palestinians. I mean there’s a reason why there haven’t been elections in the West Bank for a long time. They don’t share many values with the west.
Just so people know. One of the founders of the modern Sinn Fein Gerry Adams is friends with the Hamas leadership. You can even google pictures of them together
Ireland is antisemitic.