We must condemn Hamas as we did the paramilitaries

The Irish Republic distinguished itself for 40 years with an all-party consensus that paramilitary violence, north and south of the Ulster border, was anathema.

From the far left to the far right, there was even support for extreme, Section 31 political censorship of media. However much Irish people were inflamed by British Army or British Government excesses in Northern Ireland, they did not confer legitimacy on IRA acts of violence, nor acceptability on Sinn Féin leaders. Even the Bloody Sunday massacre, by British Army paratroopers in Derry, in 1972, did not excuse IRA violence, we were told.

So it surprises me that the constant rocket attacks on the civilian population of the sovereign, democratic state of Israel by the fundamentalist, and theocratic, Islamic Al-Quds Brigades and the Hamas Al-Qassam Brigades, hiding out in Gaza, should be exempt from such condemnation. It is equally surprising that the state of Israel should be denied the respect owed to a democratic nation wishing that its right to exist be recognised.