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Irish lesson on this Easter Weekend [1]
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Date: 2025-04-20
Noted Palestinian historian Rashid Khalid left his post at Columbia, and move to Ireland. His words:
Examining Ireland and Palestine as the “first and last laboratories where the British state experimented with settler colonialism”, Professor Khalidi argues that “Ireland served as a template for the expansion of the British Empire over its long history” and that many of the tactics we see being deployed in Palestine were first tested and implemented in Ireland. Ireland’s struggle with Britain and that of the Palestinians with the Zionist movement and its British colonial support base have many differences but the similarities with Ireland’s colonial history are striking, says Professor Khalidi. “Both involved military conquest and the sponsorship by the British crown of the settlement of foreign colonists in the target country for political and ideological reasons. In both cases, this colonial settler project was dependent on the overwhelming might of a metropolitan power. Also in both cases, this project involved discrimination”
Prof. Khalidi is not the only historian who has noted on Ireland being used as a laboratory for Empire.
What is even more interesting are the following
The Irish experience with Empire shatters (or should shatter) some commonly held misconceptions about racism. The Irish victims were just as white as their English masters. How do you explain that ? It should, at the least, throw conventional understandings of racism into a dustbin.
It should, at the least, throw conventional understandings of racism into a dustbin. Ireland was also the first colony that was subject to partition (growing up in India, I had assumed that it was India) imposed by the colonial masters on a largely unwilling population.
Like other colonies (or victims of racism/Empire), the reality gets very complicated if you delve into it deeply. Not everyone in Ireland was a “victim”… some were very blatant victimizers (of other Irish, and of other people around the world). The way this happens should also throw conventional understandings of racism into the dustbin
And finally, and most impressively...Ireland also happens to be the only former colony that has today largely undone the negative legacies of partition.
This holy weekend happens to have a very significant meaning in Ireland.
On Easter Monday in 1916, Irish nationalists took over the General Post Office in Dublin, and launched an armed rebellion against British rule. The revolt was quickly suppressed, but it is considered a seminal moment in Irish history. Many of the leaders who subsequently led the Irish national movement were junior participants in this Easter Rising.
And finally, on Good Friday in 1998, British and Irish politicians signed a pair of agreements that officially ended “the troubles”. Ireland became the first colony to have made a serious attempt at undoing the partition. What is remarkable to me (meaning I did not think it would happen) is that this Good Friday Agreement appears to have survived Brexit.
So, in the spirit of Easter, here is my takeaway as to why Ireland was able to undo partition, while Palestine/Israel and India/Pakistan/Bangladesh etc. appear to be perpetually destined to live it.
All participants in the Good Friday Agreement were able to say a simple sentence: Of course discrimination is bad. It is wrong that Protestants are discriminated against in the Republic, and it is equally wrong that Catholics are discriminated against in Northern Ireland. This is according to Alastair Campbell, one of Tony Blair’s communications guy. Once you can say that, everything else becomes possible (though it still takes hard work).
This is according to Alastair Campbell, one of Tony Blair’s communications guy. Once you can say that, everything else becomes possible (though it still takes hard work). Unfortunately, I don't see that happening anytime soon, either in India/Pakistan/Bangladesh, or Israel/Palestine. And here in the USA, it is a particularly troubling time with nativism on the rise.
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