The other day I posted a video showing an Irish Senator and internationally recognized human rights activist, David Norris, speaking impassionately about the Israeli-Gazan situation, sparing no criticism of Israel's disproportionate response to Hamas's aggression that has cost so many lives. I wondered what things would be like if we had politicians with that kind of ferocious integrity.
Scotian made a heartfelt and well-considered comment that I think merits its own post. Here it it:
I think we have to also consider the difference in the efforts in NA by the pro-Israel-at-all-costs lobby to crucify anyone here who dares do what this Irish Senator did have had over the past few decades as opposed to his home environment. I'm not saying this to make excuses, because I agree this needs saying and the inability of any leader (and I do not just mean the federal party leaders either, but any major voice in our society) here to do so is a massive disappointment to me, but it is not like there is no reason for it, and I think to ignore the reason in this discussion is to enable it to an extent.
I stopped getting into discussions on this topic myself because I was tired of the unending abuse (and I *always* made a point of being clear I was talking about Israeli government policy specifically when I did, never anything else, and still was hounded for my "jew-hating"), and with my health issues I only have so much stamina to work with so I pick my battles instead of engaging on all fronts I care about as I used to in my younger and healthier days. Now, when these forces focus on someone as insignificant as I am to that extent and I see them focus on more prominent voices even more so then I am forced to always take their presence as a factor in my mind whenever I look at such failures as one of the reasons for that failure of discourse to happen. Last time I looked the EU and Ireland especially does not have anywhere near the same overwhelming pro-Israel-at-all-costs lobby presence that we in NA do, and I do think that is a factor which must never be forgotten about.
Our political dialogue on this issue has been massively distorted by that lobby's presence. It had been really bad in the USA for decades, but the past decade or two has gotten pretty ugly here as well, especially once the Harper regime came to power. I do wonder though how many Canadians are out there quietly watching the current dominance of this force and getting ever more frustrated by it, in the end it would not surprise me to see a massive backlash form against this force and Israel itself because of this blatant interfering in our domestic political affairs/conversations.
