It was one of the first days of summer as we sat outside a hip coffee shop in a prosperous part of Dublin.
The middle aged Irish man leaned close and half whispered: “This is the worst place in Europe to be a Jew. We are the smallest minority compared to other countries, with the most pro-Hamas, anti-Israel, anti-semitic population.”
The Jews of Ireland are reeling. The trauma of October 7, the biggest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust, was followed by their fellow Irish people supporting the perpetrators of the killing of 1200 men, women and children. The support cuts across Irish society. Dublin City Council decided the best response to October 7 and the war that followed was to hoist the Palestinian flag above City Hall. “Hold my beer,” said the Irish Government. Ireland then became one of the first countries in Europe to recognize the “Palestinian State” and promptly flew the Palestinian flag over the Irish parliament (an honor not extended to the US after 9/11).
The hostility extends to the towns and cities outside Dublin. There were pro-Palestine protests across Ireland after October 7. Even the “Bakers of Belfast” gave away their cakes as a fundraiser for Gaza. There was nothing sweet for the families of those murdered by people from Gaza.
They started early too: October had not ended and the war in Gaza had barely started before the Irish took to the streets to rub salt in the wound of Israeli grief. This is a headline from October 20, 2023 but there had already been several small rallies in the run up to the day of protest:
The anti-Israeli, anti-Jew hatred is in the smaller towns also.
I took this picture in a small village in Ireland:
The anti-semitism is in high and low culture - or at least what passes for high culture in progressive Ireland. Sally Rooney is perhaps Ireland’s best known author and progressive preacher. Her book “Normal People,” about the passionate relationship of two young Irish people in high school, takes time off from adolescent fumblings to give a lengthy analysis of the Communist Manifesto. It was very popular. President Obama was so impressed he declared Normal People one of his top books of 2019. The TV series based on the novel aired on Hulu and was nominated for four Emmys. Rooney took time off from receiving praise and accolades to announce that she was blocking the translation of her next book “Beautiful World - Where Are You” into Hebrew. At the time the book had been translated into 46 languages but Israel was the only country Rooney vetoed.
That was three years ago. The October 7 massacres has not shattered Ms. Rooney’s unique combination of moral blindness and certainty along with a desire to preach. In a recent 1000 word article for The Irish Times she opined that: “What is taking place in Palestine now is one of the most profound and shocking moral catastrophes of our time. Nowhere in the 1000 words did she mention the victims of or even the words October 7.
In Ireland, Israel’ s darkest day is not so much forgotten as never remembered in the first place. I was in Ireland on October 7. On October 8, the media and establishment were mourning the deprivation that was going to happen because the Israelis had turned off the electricity in Gaza. It was what inspired us to travel to Israel to interviews survivors for our verbatim October 7 play.
The Irish were also the most vociferous in trying to get Israel thrown out of the recent Eurovision Song Contest. Their contestant (a pretend non-binary, pretend witch) tried to get the Israeli contestant expelled and then refused to rehearse with her. This went on as a mob of thousands gathered outside the Israeli entrant’s hotel trying to intimidate her into withdrawing. Interestingly the Irish public vote supported the Israeli contestant suggesting the anti-semitism is concentrated among the elites across Ireland.
Ireland’s progressives are great at copying every bad idea they see on the internet so Trinity College in Dublin even had a pro-Gaza/anti-Israeli encampment. It was a brief protest not because of a lack of interest but because the administration immediately gave into their anti-Israeli demands - delivering a clear message to Jewish students just who is and who isn’t welcome on the campus.
It is this world that Ireland’s Jews woke up to on October 8. There are perhaps 2500 native born Jews in Ireland and a few hundred students and workers and they are in shock. Ireland has spent years congratulating itself about how progressive it had become after legalizing abortion and gay marriage. Ireland’s Jew’s thought they were part of the project. Until they weren’t. But perhaps they shouldn’t be surprised. Before October 7 there was no protest, not even a murmur, when Sally Rooney decided she could not tolerate Israel, with its Jews, whilst allowing her books to be translated for dictatorships across the planet. Perhaps it has always been like this.
I met the Jewish man in Ireland in June around Bloomsday when Ireland celebrates James Joyce’s Ulysses, one of their greatest works of literature. It is a story of personal and political isolation. An unhappy man in an unhappy marriage wanders around Dublin. Leopold Bloom’s wife is at home having a liaison with her lover and Bloom is subjected to insults and feeling of isolation across his native city. Leopold Bloom is an Irish Jew. Joyce wrote Ulysses over 100 years ago. Long after people no longer read Sally Rooney - they will be reading James Joyce - probably because he didn’t preach or trade in pieties. He saw the truth and wasn’t afraid to write about it.
Ireland is a cold, cold place for Jews.
Phelim McAleer & AnnMcElhinney’s Off-Broadway play OCTOBER 7 - a verbatim drama of the day - was at the Actors Temple Theatre until June 16th. They plan to bring it to US Campuses in the Fall. To help make this happen you can contribute at www.October7thePlay.com
Besides inventing road bowling, James Joyce, Robert Boyle, and celebrating St. Patrick’s Day, which Americans identify as a day to get drunk and act stupidly, what is it you guys do again?
The gvt distorted Ireland, that no longer resembles the Irish people that have nutured/defended/saved it, is a Cold, Cruel & Small place in the world. Ireland and the true Irish spirit will rise and rid the land, like St Patrick, of the evil that has invaded it. Strength is inherent and cannot be crushed. The Irish will show the world how it is done.