Shameful and ignorant attack on Gaza aid activists
To label such eminent Irish people as the Nobel Peace Prize laureate Mairéad McGuire and the former UN assistant secretary general Denis Halliday as D-list celebrities and idiots only highlights his own ignorance. Both these lauded human rights activists have won several international prizes for their work in conflict resolution.
The only prize Mr King is likely to win is one bestowed by Big Brother where displaying gross ignorance in public has transformed a few nobodies into minor celebrities.
The fight for Palestinian human rights is far from a “comfortable” cause taken up by the “chattering classes”. Many international peace activists have been seriously injured and killed over the years while trying to publicise the plight of the Palestinian people.
Long before the murder of the 10 or more people on May 31, there was the high-profile crushing to death of the young American volunteer Rachel Corrie by an Israeli bulldozer while campaigning against the demolition of homes in the Gaza strip. We can all be proud of the Irish ship keeping her name alive. Hers is but one of many such murders by the Israeli Defence Forces that have never been punished.
Let Steven King look up the others on the internet for his own education. He asserts that not a single one of the “ship of fools” in the May flotilla was motivated by a thirst for freedom, positive visions of the future or a willingness to take serious personal risks.
Did Mr King personally interview every one of the 500 activists on the flotilla? I understood journalists had to verify statements through triangulation of sources.
The 10 or more people murdered shows there was a serious risk to life and limb. According to Mr King, the 400 Turkish people in the flotilla were Islamists. Again, did he verify this by interviewing them all? Can no secular Turkish person be driven to take action in outrage against the continuing abuse of human rights in the Gaza Strip? This was surely the motivation behind Mairead McGuire’s and Denis Halliday’s involvement in the mission. Mr King’s unsupported statements only shame their author.
Most likely there were some hardcore Islamists and anarchists on this mission. It is widely accepted human rights protests attract a percentage of troublemakers with little humanitarian sentiment. But is this a reason for not holding public protests?
The quotation from the Anglo-Irish 18th century philosopher Edmund Burke, “the only thing necessary to the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing”, is familiar to most of us.
Let us continue verbally and actively to repudiate Israel’s collective punishment of the Palestinian people and disregard for international law, even at the “risk” of being labelled “fools” by Steven King.
Dr Mary McLoughlin
Spy Hill
Cobh
Co Cork
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