Robert Besser is a news editor who has worked in television and newspapers in the United States, Asia and the Middle East.
“Israel continues to commit the greatest evil the world has witnessed in recent memory....This week we witnessed the targeting of healthcare workers and rescuers in Gaza. A mass grave was discovered containing 15 humanitarian workers executed one by one, buried by an Israeli bulldozer.”-- Aodhan O Riordain, Irish member of the European Parliament, April 3, 2025
"Prime Minister Netanyahu, who is in breach of so many bits of international law, and who has beached the sovereignty of three of his neighbors, in relation to Lebanon, Syria, and would like in fact actually to have a settlement in Egypt.” - Michael Higgins, Ireland President, December 18, 2024
"I think the world is now sickened and absolutely disgusted with the level of bombing, and starvation that is ongoing in Gaza.........The weaponization of aid is a war crime, and that is what we are witnessing here in Gaza." - Michael Martin, Ireland Prime Minister, May 20, 2025
Ireland has carved out a special place among the always-surrendering European nations due to its blood-curdling hatred of Israel and, separately, the staggering levels of alcoholism among its citizenry.
Indeed, the latest news that no one noticed coming out of Ireland is that their president, whose name you have never heard of and is not worth looking up, has requested that UN troops be sent to Gaza to make sure the un-starving Moslems are properly fed.
Since 2021, my job as an editor called for me to review Irish newspapers every day and refer stories to be rewritten.
In monitoring Ireland’s newspapers, I found myself immersed in a daily flood of stories about sports and alcohol, on which no serious newspapers would waste ink. There were more news stories about rugby, cricket and soccer than any other country I have covered.
Even worse, there was a constant publishing of breathless front page stories about new regulations and changing opening hours for the nation’s pubs, as well as price increases for their beloved beer and alcohol. For the Irish, this is critical news.
I suppose I should not have been surprised about the Irish focus on pubs and alcohol, since it is a country in which 20 percent of the public are officially declared alcoholics, a number which is privately acknowledged as being 40 percent.
Or, here is what Wikipedia says: “In 2021, 70% of Irish men and 34% of Irish women aged 15+ were considered to be hazardous drinkers.”
But the only news story that can knock booze off the front pages of Irish newspapers is Israel, the single most obsessive subject of newspapers and television in Ireland. And every story they publish or air has as its narrative that Israel is simply the devil. There is no problem that the Irish do not lay at the feet of the Jews.
During the ongoing Ukraine war, the Russians have kidnapped tens of thousands of Ukrainian children, and only recently the Chinese threw one million Moslems into re-education camps, while 1,000 Christians per month are being slain by Moslems in Africa, but among the Jew-hating Irish, the only news story is about Israel and its devil Jews.
On August 23, the forgotten president of Ireland called for UN troops to be sent to Gaza. To the surprise of many, he might even include a couple Irish soldiers in such a deployment. However, since whatever pubs there were in Gaza have been flattened, Ireland will have to find sober soldiers to send. Good luck with that.
Deploying Irish soldiers to Gaza would be a surprise, since during World War II, when free men faced an existential threat to civilization, the Irish government refused to send troops to fight the Germans.
Still, some 40,000 Irish men and women knew better and fled to join the British military. This at a time when Ireland’s population was just under 3 million.
Forty thousand was about the same number as those Jews in pre-state Israel who joined British forces during World War II. There were only 450,000 Jews in Israel in 1939.
Indeed, throughout the 1930s and 1940s, the Irish government was vocal in its support of Nazi Germany, with the then-little president of Ireland going so far as to sign the German embassy condolence book at their Dublin embassy after Hitler blew his brains out in 1945. The Irish prime minister and foreign minister also signed the Hitler condolence book.
In fact, Ireland proudly revealed its true face when, in 1943, its people elected to parliament the antisemite Oliver Flanagan. Even in the midst of the Shoah, as the Jews of Europe were being incinerated, Flanagan rose in his maiden speech in the Irish parliament to declare, “There is one thing that Germany did, and that was to rout the Jews out of their country. They crucified our savior 1,900 years ago and they are crucifying us every day of the week.”
And just as the Irish did not object to the Hamas pogrom of 2023, so the Irish people--as well as the government, the universities and the Catholic church--did not object to Flanagan’s Jew-hatred, but in fact rewarded him by doubling his vote count in the next election. Clearly, cursing Jews proved to be a winning strategy among Irish voters.
And no doubt the Irish raised a pint (or ten) for this Jew-hater, when Flanagan went on to be appointed Ireland’s Defense Minister.
Also during the Shoah, standing up in parliament Flanagan objected to Ireland taking in 500 Jewish children. The government bent to his will and left the Jewish children to die in Nazi Europe.
Of note, in 1978 the antisemite Flanagan was awarded the highest honour the Catholic church can bestow upon a lay person by the Pope, being conferred as a Knight of the Order of St Gregory. Perhaps the Vatican rewarded Flanagan for promoting Catholic doctrine through his outspoken Jew-hatred.
Indeed, throughout the extermination of the Jews, Ireland sought to only take in those Jews who could prove they had converted to Christianity.
Recalling the Shoah and Ireland’s gleeful slamming of its doors on Jews seeking rescue, there was also Charles Bewley, Ireland’s ambassador to the Vatican and, later, pre-war Berlin.
Bewley worked overtime in Berlin to convince Ireland to not take in a single fleeing Jew. In reports to Dublin, Bewley warned his government that Jews were involved in pornography, abortion and the “international white slave traffic.” Bewley also wrote reports to his government supporting the German’s anti-Jewish Nuremberg Laws.
And during Bewley’s time as ambassador to Germany, from 1933 to 1939, fewer than 100 visas were issued to terrified Jews running for their lives.
This, clearly, was the Ireland of the 20th century, while today’s weekly Jew-hating demonstrations proudly display the Ireland of the 21st century.
Starvation….genocide….ethnic cleansing….apartheid....you name it, the Irish accuse the Jews of it. And throughout Israel’s ongoing war, Ireland has enthusiastically hosted weekly marches and riots against the Jews.
It is worth noting that even as the president of Ireland, who is the commander in chief of their armed forces, calls for raising a UN army to feed Gaza, he cannot even inspire his Irish citizens to serve their own country. As of 2023, Ireland was only able to man two of its eight-vessel naval fleet to patrol its waters, as six ships remained out of action and permanently tied up at their berths for want of sailors.
The last pogrom in the UK was in Limerick, Ireland in 1904. At that time, there were 170 Jews living in Limerick, out of a city population of 38,000.
Today there are no Jews. Even the fearless Chabad has not set up shop in Limerick.
The Limerick pogrom was urged on during church services officiated by Father John Creagh, whose January 11, 1904 sermon was about how Jews conduct business, entitled, “How the Israelites trade.”
Said Father Creagh: “Twenty years ago and less, Jews were known only by name and evil repute in Limerick. They were sucking the blood of other nations, but those nations turned them out. And they come to our land to fasten themselves like leeches. Their rags have been exchanged for silk. They have wormed themselves into every business. . . The furniture trade, the milk trade, the drapery trade—and they have even traded under Irish names. . . . The victims of the Jews are mostly women. . ….The Jew has a sweet tongue when he wishes.”
Following Father Creagh’s sermon, his very devout congregants ran into the streets of Limerick to hunt down Jews, following the examples of their Christian brothers in Germany, Ukraine, Poland, Russia, Romania, Moldova, Hungary and on and on.
This Limerick pogrom lasted 30 days, with drunken Irishmen kicking in the doors of Jewish homes and shops, and looting them. And of course, the Jews were forced to flee Limerick.
Meanwhile, today the Limerick pogrom is long-forgotten among the alcohol-addled Irish. And it is with no small irony that it is the very descendants of the Limerick Jew-haters who march weekly against Jews and Israel.
And you can bet your first dram of whisky that the Irish weekend marches must end at the moment Ireland’s pubs open.
Unfortunately for the Irish, what happened in 1904 Limerick is not only recent history, but for the Jews it is as though it occurred only minutes ago.
And we take special note that the vast majority of those officials in Ireland’s church, the government and the universities, approved or kept quiet in the face of the Jew-hating Catholic priest who called for his congregants to attack Jews.
Indeed, even among those famed Irish authors and poets, there were those who praised the priest.
And today, as Ireland lectures Israel non-stop about morality, we ask who in Ireland opposed their home-grown antisemites Flanagan or Bewley? How many Jews did the Irish kill when they refused them entry during the Shoah? What right do such a hateful people as the Irish have to lecture the Jews?
So listen up, Irish president. And listen up hate-filled Irish church, universities and news media.
While the Irish will not long remember today’s Jew-hating protests, since they wake up daily with such pounding hangovers, be advised that we Jews will remember the Irish.
We will remember that as we suffered so horribly on October 7, the Irish embraced the Hamas animals. And they lied about and defamed Israel about starving Arabs in Gaza, just as they danced their drunken Irish jig as the Irish sealed their borders to ensure Jews would be captured and exterminated by the Germans during the Shoah.
And, by the way, what Irishmen demanded that the Arabs provide aid when they surrounded and starved the Jews of Jerusalem in 1947-48?
Since Christianity was introduced into Ireland in the 5th century, the Irish have had a special bond to the blood libels of the Jews, making the Jews the cause of their never-ending failures and problems.
Indeed, in 2025 after the Israeli government found it was impossible to continue relations with the Jew-hating Irish, Jerusalem closed our embassy in Ireland.
But in truth, no one in Israel took much notice because, after all, it was only the embassy in meaningless Ireland.
So please Ireland, keep your Israel-hating president whose name we do not know,to yourselves, and keep your Israel-hating prime minister and parliamentarians, whose names we do not know, and continue publishing your news stories about soccer, beer and alcohol, and each night give a hand to the 40% of Irish alcoholics, as they stagger out of your pubs.
But above all, Ireland, just leave the Jews and Israel alone.
Yet, perhaps there is a divine purpose in Ireland’s Jew-hatred, as we once again are witnesses to the truth of Hashem’s well-known pledge: “I will bless those who bless you, and curse him that curses you.”
For 35 centuries we Jews have watched countries rise and quickly disintegrate. And so it will be with the Irish, as the Jew-hating Ireland was nothing yesterday, remains nothing today and will be forgotten tomorrow.