Talking to all sides the only way to stable peace

Shane O’Doherty in his letter “We must condemn Hamas as we did the paramilitaries” (August 9) makes parallels with the IRA campaign and Hamas in Palestine. 

He praises the consensus in the Dublin establishment against the IRA and even the censorship of Section 31 as a good model to use against Hamas.

There are other parallels. The conflict in the North has its roots in the Plantation of Ulster when the British expelled the militarily defeated Irish from their homes and lands, replacing them with a population of English/Scots settlers.

The Israelis are doing the same in Palestine. Unionists referred to their state as “a Protestant parliament for a protestant people”, not far from “a Jewish parliament for a Jewish homeland”.

Many Irish people see the outbreak of the IRA campaign as resulting from the Dublin government’s failure to protect the nationalist population from discrimination in voting, jobs, housing etc under unionist rule. Palestinians also see a similar failure of the United Nations to protect them from similar abuses by the Israelis using the United States veto on the Security Council.

The IRA was designated “a terrorist body” by the British and the Dublin establishment. That

prolonged the war for many years.

In the end the British and Irish establishment had to concede that truth and reality and talking to all sides was the only way to a stable peace. This lesson applies equally to Hamas.

Jim Monaghan

Dolphin’s Barn

Dublin 8