When I was a teenager I would constantly see Israel on the news. I would ask people what it was about, but I felt like no one ever explained it properly. Because I couldn’t understand why anyone would support Israel.
I grew up during the Troubles in the UK. I heard about car bombs and nail bombs, and the IRA. I hated the IRA. Bunch of murderers. They would claim every target was military even though innocent people died.
I understood it was something to do with Northern Ireland. Some wanted to be British. Others wanted to be Irish. They couldn’t be both. But I didn’t see how any of this justified murder. Or throwing bricks at school children because they were the wrong religion.
When some of my friends went to Belfast for St. Patrick’s day in the early 2000s they ended up trapped by the riots. They were forced to hide from the chaos and the violence, fearing for their lives.
In school I had learned about Henry VIII and the founding of the Church of England. I learned about the religious turmoil that caused. Amongst which was the attempt to convert Ireland to a Protestant nation as well.
I learned about Cromwell’s occupation of Ireland. I learned that he wasn’t as bad as the Irish made out. In fact, he actually tried his hardest to prevent any cruelty against them. So imagine my surprise when I mentioned this in front of an Irish person for the first time and they reacted with anger.
I was confused, but I brushed it off as them not having studied as much history as I did. Even so, I was careful not to mention Cromwell in front of other Irish folk as it was clearly a sensitive topic. Then one day I decided to do a little more reading on Cromwell.
What I had been taught was wrong. The syllabus provided to English schools was wrong. Cromwell was cruel to the Irish. Sure, he tried to make it look like he didn’t. Tried to prevent or punish the harsher things he knew were inevitable. But he was in no way a friend of the Irish.
Well, I got one thing wrong. I moved on and thought little more of it. I went to China and spent most of my life in Asia. Then, after leaving China, I moved to Ireland.
In Ireland I started learning more about the country’s history. Things I had been ignorant of before. I learned how the Great Famine had decimated the country’s population. I learned how truly horrific events like Bloody Sunday really were. I learned about the razing of Cork after a rebellion.
I learned that I had been lied to about Ireland. Either through glossing over the cruelty, or just flat out lying in the syllabus, the things I thought I knew about our history were not the full truth.
And I heard one word in relation to Ireland’s history with England that I had never heard before. It was a word that shocked me to the core. A word I refused to accept at first, because it wasn’t that bad. Right? But eventually I had to face the word.
And the word was genocide.
England had always wanted control of Ireland. But not just control. They wanted to convert them to prim and proper Protestant English folk. They banned their language, destroyed their churches and cities, and forced many to convert to the good old Church of England. It was, at the very least, an attempt at a cultural genocide.
And, while I don’t condone or think it fully justifies their actions, I understood the IRA. They weren’t murdering people for the hell of it. In their eyes they were fighting a war, one for their very right to exist. And the violence of the English was how they justified their actions to themselves.
So I do have some sympathy for people growing up in Israel and swallowing the propaganda. But not much. If I can recontextualise the lies that were told to me, anyone can. Because the truth is much darker than many will like to admit. Israel has been slowly dismantling and occupying Palestine for decades. And anyone who backs these actions will eventually need to face up to that same word I did.
It is a genocide. It has always been a genocide. And unless it is stopped, it will always be a genocide.
