EA on RTE: Week in Review — New Governments From Ireland to Syria; Naughty Prince Andrew

UPDATE, DEC 18:

I joined a panel on Virgin Media TV’s The Tonight Show for analysis of the Netanyahu Government’s targeting of Ireland, trying to protect Israel’s “open-ended” war on Gaza.

Watch from 11:31

The other panelists are Harry McGee of the Irish Times and Jacob Woolf of Jews for Palestine, and the host is Gavin Reilly. The discussion is preceded by commentary from Lazar Berman of the Times of Israel.

An extract from the discussion:

“This is not an anti-Israel issue, this is not an antisemitic issue, it's an issue of international humanitarian law.”@ScottLucas_EA says the closure of the embassy and comments from politicians here and in Israel distracts people from the serious issues at hand.#TonightVMTV pic.twitter.com/HJE0r5onxY

— TonightVMTV (@TonightVMTV) December 17, 2024

McGee and I also analyse the maneuvers for a new Irish Government follow the November 29 election.

ORIGINAL ENTRY, DEC 17: I joined Dublin NewsTalk’s The Hard Shoulder on Monday to analyze Israel closing its embassy in Ireland.

Listen to Discussion from 2:03.20

The Israelis, pursuing Prime Minister’s Benjamin Netanyahu “open-ended” war on Gaza, said they were responding to Dublin formally joining the petition at the International Court of Justice against “genocide” of Palestinians.

I take this apart, explaining that the issue is not one of “anti-Israeli” or “anti-Semitic” action but of international humanitarian law and mass killing of civilians.

The issue is not whether Israel had a right to respond to what Hamas did on October 7, 2022. It is whether Israel was disproportionate in its response and whether Israeli officials said Gaza should be “ethnically cleansed”.

The other guest is businessman Declan Ganley, who repeats the Israeli Government’s talking points, including the disinformation that Dublin retroactively changed the definition of genocide.