Palestinians have broken out of Gaza. Good. They came out shooting. What did anyone expect? Remember what happened when they walked out peacefully in 2018, in the Great March of Return?
Author Archives: Richard Haley
Dear David, I’m not going to give war a chance
Today is the twentieth anniversary of the huge demonstrations in London and Glasgow against the imminent US-UK invasion of Iraq. A few days later David Aaronovitch published a nasty, condescending article in the Guardian that he must have hoped would help break the momentum of the anti-war movement. It was headlined “Dear marcher, please answer a few questions.” I took him at his word and sent the Guardian an article with answers to his questions. Naturally they ignored it. Here it is, written on 28 February 2003.
Continue reading “Dear David, I’m not going to give war a chance” »
Spooks and Spin – What was the role of suspected MI5 agent Dennis McFadden?
For almost two and a half years the British media have been running stories about a dissident republican fixer and supposed MI5 agent called Dennis McFadden. Some of the stories have more than a whiff of MI5 propaganda about them. Reporting fairly on MI5 is difficult, but the media need to try harder.
McFadden was exposed in August 2020 when he was described in court as a state agent by lawyers representing ten people charged with offences related to alleged New IRA terrorism. Committal proceedings against the ten have been under way since 24 October 2022 to determine whether there is sufficient evidence for a trial.
McFadden was central to the events leading to these people being charged, but he has not been named as a suspect in the case or called as a witness and has apparently disappeared. The circumstances surrounding his involvement make it virtually impossible to doubt that he was working for the British state.
Nine of the people charged were at the time of their arrest members of Saoradh, a political party that the media often describe as the “political wing” of the New IRA. The tenth person was Issam Bassalat, a Palestinian doctor from Edinburgh. His limited connection with Saoradh was solely through McFadden, and his lawyers say that his presence at a meeting that is key to the charges against him was the result of pressure and deception by McFadden. They say that in any case Dr Bassalat spoke only about the situation in Palestine and committed no crime.
MI5 is said by police to have been a “partner” in the operation – codenamed “Arbacia” – that led to the arrests, and to have made the covert recordings on which the prosecution relies. But the spy agency has so far refused to confirm or deny that McFadden was working for them.
Continue reading “Spooks and Spin – What was the role of suspected MI5 agent Dennis McFadden?” »
Sat 7 May – Global Day of Action for Peace in Ukraine
Saturday 7 May is an international day of action for peace in Ukraine, supported by Codepink, the Stop the War Coalition and the No to NATO network.
The UK’s Stop The War Coalition is calling for the withdrawal of Russian troops, an end to the military escalation by the NATO countries and for all efforts to be focused on finding a negotiated solution to this terrible war and is holding demos around the UK.
The Stop The War Coalition Scotland is calling a national demo in Glasgow, assembling at 11.30am on Saturday 7 May in Blythswood Square, Glasgow.
For events in the US (events elsewhere in the world will perhaps be added here), see www.peaceinukraine.org.
Stopping the War in Ukraine – Five Demands
The war in Ukraine grows more dangerous every day. The US Congress is close to approving a massive new arms and aid package for Ukraine. UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss says “the war in Ukraine is our war” and “we will keep going further and faster to push Russia out of the whole of Ukraine.” US Defence Secretary Lloyd Austin has said he wants to see Russia “weakened.”
These statements create the impression that the US and its allies intend to use the war to catalyse the collapse of the Russian state. If Russian leaders believe that to be the case they will think it worth running almost any risk to try to strengthen their position.
Western statements appear to be calculated to squeeze Russia between a rock and a hard place and block any prospect of negotiation. Continue reading “Stopping the War in Ukraine – Five Demands” »
What About International Law?
There are few things that friends of the establishment dislike more than the kind of contextualisation they call “whataboutism”. When Washington says “Ukraine”, we mustn’t say “Iraq.” They are right, in a way. Trying to keep a score card of war crimes and human rights abuses by the world’s great powers would certainly be a futile task if the aim was to pick demons and saviours.
But that isn’t the point. The purpose of context and history is to create a picture of how international law actually works in the hope of understanding what consequences might follow from particular actions. You would be unwise to jump to conclusions about an alleged breach of domestic law without looking not only at the evidence, but also at police actions and case law and perhaps also the sociology of comparable incidents. You would be even more unwise to approach international law in ignorance of its case history. There is no international police force and no single straightforward court system comparable with domestic court systems. The concept of customary international law – the accumulation of unchallenged actions by states – has no real parallel in domestic law. War crimes prosecutions always involve politics in a much more explicit way than domestic prosecutions. You cannot talk about international law without talking about history.
So what about Afghanistan and Iraq?
The Road to Armageddon
From stopping a war to starting one in 7 lines. We are about half-way through line 6 at the moment.
Stop the war in Ukraine.
Stop Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Sanction Russia to stop Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Send arms to stop Russia’s war in Ukraine.
Ukrainians are defending Europe, Europe must defend Ukraine.
Send food, send missiles, send planes, send troops, send tanks.
War! War! Death! Death!
Monsters
Originally written on 24 February 2022, the day Russia launched a full-scale invasion if Ukraine.
War is monstrous. And it creates further monstrosities that are hard to un-make. Those who were previously banging drums that could only lead to war seem to think that the monstrousness is news and somehow vindicates their previous warmongering.
No one who brought the current incarnation of the monster into being can escape responsibility. The circumstances that bred it were largely created by the US, through its commitment to potentially endless NATO expansion and its apparent ambition of holding something much more than the balance of power in the Eurasian landmass. And then the final responsibility for unleashing the dogs of war was Putin’s. There are no excuses for either side.
Dr Issam Hijjawi Bassalat is home
Dr Issam Hijjawi Bassalat was released on bail on Monday 13 December 2021 and is back home in Edinburgh.
He was granted bail by the High Court in Belfast on 9 December, having previously been refused bail in Dungannon Magistrates Court. District Judge Michael Ranaghan had ruled that the heart attack that Issam had suffered in prison did not amount to a change in his circumstances
On 14 December Issam was acquitted in Edinburgh Sheriff Court of a separate charge under Schedule 7 of the Terrorism Act 2000 relating to a stop-and-question incident at Edinburgh airport in early 2020. He was represented in court by Ryan Sloan of Aamer Anwar & Co Solicitors.
Issam was arrested in August 2020 in an MI5 sting said to have been directed against the New IRA. He was held on remand in Maghaberry Prison until his release in December 2021.
He continues to fight against the charges brought against him in Northern Ireland. A commital hearing for Issam and his nine co-defendants is expected to be held later this year.
Issam would like to thank everyone around the world who has helped him to reach this point, whether by writing supportive letters to the court, standing surety, or by helping to spread word about his case. International support has been particularly valuable and will continue to be crucial as the legal fight-back continues.
MI5’s Irish Charade
An MI5 sting directed at the New IRA is raising some tricky questions. The big questions are “why now?” and “what about Lyra McKee?” And “what has a Palestinian doctor from Edinburgh got to do with all this?”
Ten people were arrested in August in an operation said by police to be directed against the New IRA. Nine of them were members of the revolutionary Irish republican party Saoradh. One of them was a Palestinian doctor from Edinburgh, arrested at Heathrow airport and then taken to Belfast to be charged under terrorism legislation. His name is Issam Hijjawi Bassalat. His arrest triggered a little flurry of media speculation about supposed links between republican terrorism and Middle Eastern terrorism, helped along by the usual nameless security sources.
The operation has a name, as they do in the movies. It’s called Arbacia. Arbacia is a type of sea urchin that looks rather like the spiny-rayed sun that appears in the Saoradh logo. The police evidently want Saoradh to know that they are targeting it. At a press conference on 24 August Chief Constable Barbara Gray said: “This investigation did not start last week and it will not end this week.” She added: “It is a longer term investigation that will look into every aspect of the activities of the New IRA in its entirety.”
In fact there have been no further arrests. Gossip from a “security source” reported in the Guardian on 12 October carries a hint of finality that was absent from earlier reports. So what has been going on? Continue reading “MI5’s Irish Charade” »