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LETTER: Lobbyists pressurise Collins to apologise?

August 18th, 2019 8:00 PM

By Southern Star Team

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It's hard to understand what pressure he was put under to make such an apology given that lobbying is how American politics works and the strength of Israeli lobbying, even here in Ireland, is well known.

SIR – Niall Collins, FF spokesman for foreign affairs, felt he had to apologise for his remarks on the ‘huge Jewish lobby in the US.’ 

It’s hard to understand what pressure he was put under to make such an apology given that lobbying is how American politics works and the strength of Israeli lobbying, even here in Ireland, is well known. It was the US Zionist lobby that in the first place aided the creation of the State of Israel in 1947-48 through their preparation of and voting for the UN Partition Plan for Palestine.

Today such Israeli lobbying has, if anything, intensified to include powerful groups such as Christians United for Israel and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) which dwarfs even that of the National Rifle Association.

The effectiveness of such lobbying is credited with shutting down talks with Syria; withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal; preventing criticism of illegal occupation of Palestine, demolitions, etc; acknowledgement of Jerusalem as the disputed capital and a massive US aid budget of .8 billion pa.

AIPAC meets with every candidate running for Congress. Their identification of any who are considered unfriendly, together with endorsement of and directed funding to sympathetic opponents guarantees their failure in election. As Jack Straw, former UK Foreign Secretary, stated: ‘Pro-Israel Policy groups such as AIPAC work with unlimited funding to divert US policy in the Middle East.’ 

This explains why criticism of Israel is muted despite repeated violations of international law, including invasions and occupations, and why the US vetoes UN Security Council resolutions of condemnation of Israel.   

The Jewish Institute for National Security of America (JINSA) depends on ‘educating’ US Congressional, military and security specialists to amalgamate US-Israeli interests and its board consists of far-right politicians such as Dick Cheney and the current Trump favourite security adviser and regime-changer John Bolton.   

Quinn compares Collins' remarks as similar to those that have put Jeremy Corbyn's Party under huge pressure. Niall Collins was correct in highlighting Israeli lobbying and how it includes the Zionist claim that anyone who criticises such Zionist lobbying or Israel is an anti-Semite or self-hating Jew.  

Bob Storey,

Skibbereen. 

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