November 2023 Dublin riots, are a dark omen for Ireland and Europe.

I could not believe that last week, November the 23rd, the city I have been living for almost 20 years would go up in flames, just because of a knife attack would spark a far-right inspired riot. (Image)

The violence broke out after three young children and their care assistant were attacked in Gaelscoil Choláiste Mhuire, a primary school on Parnell Square East, in the north of the city centre on Thursday afternoon. A five-year-old girl and the woman were seriously injured and remain under medical care, while the two other children, a five-year-old boy and a six-year-old girl, suffered less serious injuries.

The then unconfirmed reports on Thursday that the perpetrator was an immigrant to Ireland poured fuel on the fire (it’s since been reported that although the suspect is Algerian-born, he is a naturalised Irish citizen who has lived in Ireland for two decades). That was enough to become a spark, that led to the explosive events that followed.

The incident itself took place at 13:30 pm Dublin time, but by 7 o'clock the city centre was in flames. Thirteen shops were damaged or looted, 11 police cars damaged and destroyed along with three buses and a tram. One officer was seriously injured. From anti-immigrant and counter-protests outside the school, it progressively got worse and it turned into a full mayhem.

I live and work in Dublin central, my apartment is only two blocks away from the epicenter; I could see, hear and even smell everything that took place that night from my balcony. And while the Irish leadership would love to bury this as quickly as possible, by downplaying the far-right while pushing for the "thug" and anti-social element in this occurrence, I will beg to differ.

It is true that many of those who got involved in the riots, were just opportunists and "thugs", trying to cause mayhem and steal shops by breaking into them, during the chaos. But not all of them fall in this category. Since the Covid epidemic ended, I have often watched in horror from my balcony, small groups of Irish nationals protesting for "Ireland for the Irish", "Irish first", or "no more refugees" in the streets below. Not great in numbers, just in the few tens of individuals, but that was unheard in Ireland 20 years ago when I first arrived in the country.

Only last May, far-right anti-immigrant activists have claimed responsibility for setting fire to a makeshift camp housing asylum seekers in Dublin. Posting on social media, the group Real Message Eire claimed they were angry at the presence of what they call a "shanty town" with "illegal migrants and communists", in a predominantly working-class neighbourhood of the Irish capital. And that was not the only time such thing happened.

From peacefull protests some years ago, when the Syrian refugee crisis errupted, when Irish participants would claim "we are not racists, we are just concerned that these people will not be properly accomodated in our rural region", we have seen burning of refugee centres and now a full on graffiti spraying on migrant shops, riots, protests and burning buses with sprayed on messages like "OUT" in Dublin. (Image)

All this time the signs were there to see, but the Irish leadership and indeed society do what the Irish do best; denial. The authorities just sat on their own thumbs, with the typical Irish attitude "ah sure it will be grand", perpetuating the image and thought of Ireland being a very tolerant and welcoming country; which it used to be. But the signs of the few years have been increasingly pointing to a worrisome trend and development, plus no government or authority wanted to openly call a spade a spade and even more importantly, do something about it.

Since the Ukrainian refugee crisis, the Irish people have seen their country take in a huge number of refugees from the war torn country, offer them free housing, social welfare benefits, free postage to send parcels back in the country and many more benefits. Since the conflict began, more than 98,500 people from Ukraine have arrived in Ireland. That sadly happened right after the Covid pandemic, which saw the living standards of many deteriorate, whilst as result of the continuing support for Ukraine in its war against Russia, the cost of living in Ireland has skyrocketed.

Irish people also face at the same time, an ongoing housing crisis which is a direct failure of its own politicians and society. As of March 2023, despite years of consecutive governments saying that housing is a priority, the housing crisis is getting worse. According to figures from the Department of Housing 11,754 people are homeless and relying on emergency homeless accommodation. This is up on 10,492 in March 2022 and 7,991 in May 2021.

This affects vulnerable families and people the most of course, and many of those who participated in the riots could come from such background. Rents in Dublin and Ireland overall are crazy and there is no end in sight, as the refugees put pressure on the country's property market. I work in a company's HR department, and since the pandemic ended we lost so many young, Irish, talented employees that simply cannot affort to rent in Ireland any more with the entry salaries companies offer nowadays, and they opt-out to migrate to Southern Europe, the UK, or Canada for better quality of living and life-work balance. This in one of the EU nations with the highest GDP.

And if we link what has happened in Ireland last week, with what has been happening across Europe for the past few years, it is easy to see that our leaders are failing us repeatedly. Around the same time when the riots in Dublin were happening, another shock wave rippled through Europe; the veteran anti-Islam populist leader Geert Wilders has won a dramatic victory in the Dutch general election. After 25 years in parliament, his Freedom party (PVV) won 37 seats, well ahead of his nearest rival, a left-wing alliance.

This development follows similar outcomes in Italy, Sweden and many other EU nations in recent years and if the next one is France, the EU is heading for yet another major crisis, or even fight for its existence. All our ruling elites can do, is blame Putin for the rise of the far-right in our continent, but never themselves, or take stock from the outcome of their policies during the past few decades. That is decadence, corruption, folly and a disgrace.

The problem is, that while I totally empathise with the anger some youths may feel about their reality and the predicament which the rulers of their countries have inflicted upon them, violence and racism are never the solution or the answer. Although it is true that the attacker (who has been arrested, remains in custody and injured) in Dublin is an Irish citizen of migrant stock, many rumors circulate about him: that he was arrested before for another knife crime and that he suffers from mental illness. The Irish authorities, always so cautious have not yet released a statement on the motives for the attack, and that in my opinion is a mistake, as it allows certain perhaps unfounded speculations to be circulated on social media by the same groups that instigated the riots.

But even if we accept that the attack was a terror or any other racist assault against the Irish society, those who belive in such rumours conveniently ignore that two other foreigners, a Brazilian and a French national, risked their lives to stop the knife attack. Passing by on a moped is Caio Benício, a delivery driver originally from Brazil, stopped and used his helmet as a weapon to stop the attack. In addition, Alan Loren-Guille, a French student on his way to work in a restaurant, also intervened and knocked the attacker's knife out of his hand.

Such issues will never be resolved with more hatred, so please do not turn this country into another far-right haven. The Irish authorities and government may have acted fast to detain those responsible, but this is a short-term solution. In a few months or even years, the monster of populism could return if appropriate actions are not taken, and Ireland if it is not careful could have its very own "Breivik" moment in history. Wether the Irish or indeed the European leaders want indeed to prevent such thing from happening in the future, they better come with solutions for their citizens' needs soon and stop their own kind of populism, of constantly blaming outside factors or countries and their leaders, for their mistakes.

Europe better tread carefully in the future.

For the past year and a half, we all been watching a terrible disaster unfolding. This time not in the Middle East or Asia, but right on our doorstep; Ukraine.

"Putin's War", as Western media often portray it, is anything but though. These kind of conflicts have happened many times before in history, one of such times it was Greece that suffered the consequences of the struggle between East and West, with the Greek Civil War happening back in the post WW2 '40s.

That conflict was the first proxy war of the Cold War and represents the first example of postwar involvement on the part of the Allies in the internal affairs of a foreign country, an implementation of George F. Kennan's containment policy. Greece in the end was funded by the United States (through the Truman Doctrine and the Marshall Plan) and joined NATO (1952), while the insurgents were demoralized by the bitter split between the Soviet Union's Joseph Stalin, who wanted to end the war, and Yugoslavia's Josip Broz Tito, who wanted it to continue. (Wikipedia)

Drawing parallel's from one disaster, we can see what future awaits Ukraine for the coming decades, if it manages to win this war and maintain its territorial integrity; it cannot do it alone, unless NATO goes to war with Russia, but no one is prepared to do this yet. We have a stalemate as it stands, with Russia still occupying roughly the same amount of territory, since the start of the war.

The West insists on helping the embattled nation at all costs, "for as long as it takes" to achieve victory! The problems is, does any of them care about the human casualties, or teaching Putin another lesson is the only thing that matters? In addition, does any of the Western leaders have any vision of what will happen to Ukraine, once it joins NATO and EU, will it be just another unstable, problematic member like Greece or the Balkans?

This is clearly another war between the West and Russia for supremacy, similar to that of the Greek Civil War. Ukraine is being used by both sides to settle old scores once and for all, and one can only wonder why don't Americans just don't go to war with Russia themselves in the Pacific and their shared borders close to Alaska, but insist on dragging everyone else in the vortex of their power struggles with their old arch-enemy. Whoever wins that slaughter, gets Greece, Ukraine and Europe, or the rest of the world for that matter.

Europeans already pay a high cost for this war, we have all noticed our cost of living sky rocketing, despite all anti-Russian propaganda by our media, and Ukraine cheering. This war could have been easily avoided, if the two sides just gave up the "super-power" complex. But no, this bras de fer is not new, in fact it never went away. The West has maintained the arrogant "winner" complex of the Cold War, and wishes that neither Russia, China or anyone else ever challenge their hegemony again. But the world is changing. Plus, for how long can the West maintain this unethical monopoly in the world's riches and when poorer nations'citizens pour into Western lands, the solution they can think of is "building walls and make them pay for it?"

The struggles between Russia and the West started with the emergence of Vladimir Putin, as a dominant figure in Russian politics. And partly, this is the West's fault too. In a recent BBC documentary series, "Putin, Russia and the West" we can see that ever since the Libyan Civil War and the West's involvement in it, relations started going sour between NATO and Putin, after a few very promising years of reconciliation efforts. Russia's view was the any outside involvement in Libya should not be a "regime change", rather a humanitarian assistance, to save lives. Putin, who was acting as a Prime Minister, while Dmitry Medvedev was Russia's President at the time, openly clashed back then even, as Medvedev tried to approach and please the West, negotiating the conflict with them. Putin on the other hand, a former KGB man, knew from the start that this is a regime change operation.

US President Obama and his Western allies, proved Putin right, as they ousted Muammar Gaddafi from Libya despite Russia's objections, making it very difficult for Medveden to defend any trust in the West again among his country's elites, pushing of course the Russian public opinion, firmly behind Putin. In the Syrian Conflict, Putin was able to solidify his dominance in Russian politics, again after Western insistance of another "regime change" and a decisive victory in favor of Assad.

It is then a wonder why then Western Powers condemn Russia when they meddle in other nation's affairs, while they do exactly the same in regions of their interest. I would wholeheartedly support the Western cause, if I saw that in the aftermath of each Western invasion or bombardement, countries like Libya, Syria, Iraq or Afghanistan saw their political, financial and societal standards rise. But this is not the case. In fact what we have seen, is that these regions are far worse after the "removal" of their "dictators", so why do we continue messing countries up, and then we do not like dealing with the consequences; refugees, migration, instability.

We are proving Putin right all the time. His stance of "no regime change", sounds much better, than the hypocrytical Western "humanitarian cause". If our leaders trully cared about human rights, there would be no need for "Black Lives Matter" demonstrations in America, or riots in France over the killings of migrant youths. Why we do not focus on bettering our own societies first, but insist on meddling in other nations' affairs?

It is simple; our leaders do not like "dictators", because they are harder to handle and manipulate. Little do they care about human rights in other nations. If a "dictator" is not West friendly, our governments and elites, cannot get access to the wealth and riches of that nation, under favorable for Western interests terms. We never bother Saudi Arabia, despite their terrible human rights records (women and LGBT individuals or migrant worker treatment). They play nice with USA and many of its Western allies, notable the UK. However Gaddafi and Assad, were not nice to the West like the Saudis, nor is Putin.

If the West establishes a new puppet regime, it can then achieve its goals in the region. This is not a conspiracy theory. John Bolton, a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations and former White House national security adviser, admitted that he had helped plan attempted coups in foreign countries. He made the remarks to CNN after the day's congressional hearing into the Jan 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.

So how can the US blame Russia for doing exactly the same? The Americans do not even show any regard for their own allies. In 2012, a Greek prosecutor pressed charges of treason and trying to destabilize Greece against unknown suspects, over an alleged 2008 plot to overthrow the then-conservative prime minister, Costas Karamanlis. Court officials said the plan was hatched to thwart efforts by Karamanlis efforts to improve energy relations with Russia and included overthrowing and even killing the premier. It was not clear who was behind it. Eeehmmm...

Karamanlis pursued closer cooperation with Russia on energy issues, annoying Greece’s western allies. He supported the South Stream gas pipeline, which would bring Russian natural gas to Greece and western Europe and rival the Nabucco, the U.S.-backed pipeline that will convey gas from central Asia to the West. Yeah sure, it is "not clear who was behind it", just like there is not enough evidence to explain the 2022 Nord Stream pipeline sabotage. Funny because every time Russia or China do something wrong, the West always finds enough evidence to condemn them, yet when it is them staging coups even in allied nations, somehow there is never enough proof!

Former UK Prime Minister Liz Truss allegedly sent a message saying ‘It’s Done’ to the U.S Secretary of State Antony Blinken immediately after the Nord Stream attack. Yet the US as always refuses to admit the obvious. Who else would blow Russian pipes in the North Sea, since the Russians paid to built it and they could just turn it off, instead of blowing it to stop the gas flowing into Europe?

Is it any wonder also, that the Greek Economic Crisis, started in 2009, a year after the attempted coup to kill or overthrow Karamanlis in 2008, for his pro-Russian stance? Suddenly scandal after scandal hit Greece and the whole of Europe and America turned on Greece, ridiculing the country, bringing it to its knees with bullying and debt, all because the intentions of a Greek PM. The works of John Bolton come to mind here for sure. No other EU nation receiving an IMF bailout (ie Ireland, Portugal) faced such humiliation like Greece.

With attitudes such as these by Western leaders, is it any wonder why Putin has this bullish and standoffish attitude towards the West? I am not sure I agree with his stance, but I totally understand it after all the things the West has done over the years. Ideally I would like closer relations between Europe and Russia, but America and the European puppet governments it has established over the years, are a thorn. When the USA does not hesitate to plot to assasinate a Prime Minister of an allied nation, in order to push for their gas pipes and interests in Europe, in an ever ongoing effort to "de-Russify" our continent, how can Russia trust us and cooperate nicely?

The West keep hiting Russia economically hard, by sabotaging any projects that will allow closer EU-Russian collaboration, then it cries wolf when Russia fights back and acts the same way in Georgia and Ukraine. We do not just expand NATO and EU, we are cutting away partners, markets and source of income for Russia, to push for American ones and we are doing this by staging coups like the ones in Greece, or bribing the aspiring EU/NATO member states' leadership with money in order to join our "club" and denounce Russia. Any efforts for closer relations with Russia are faced with the threat of assasination or coup, just like the case of Greece.

Why does it always have to be us or them, and why we can never be with both and either of them? If America portrays itself as the "land of the free", it surely does not allow for much freedom to its allies once they join their club, unless they do its biding. These are developments that should worry all European citizens. This is a proof of democratic deficit in the West, evidence of corruption, of a fascist regime similar to what we accuse Russia of.

Anyone who does not hate Russia at the moment in Europe is being treated as "Putin's mouthpiece", a "paid troll paid by Kremlin" (including me most of the times), and no one wants to see things for what they are. We are not allowed to express our concerns openly, think or question the current status or our government's actions in Ukraine. We are forced to pay for this war, just as we were forced to save European and American banks in the economic crisis of 2009 (remember the crisis started in the USA, plus no bailout money stayed in Greece, Ireland etc) and no amount of protests can change anything. We are not being heard. This is scary.

I for one would worry more about the state of European democracy, as I am a European. If Russians love Putin, it does not affect me as I am not a Russian citizen, but that does not mean I must not cooperate or trade with them, as we do with Turkey (a brilliant example of Western democracy by the way) or Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States.

It really does bother me where Europe is heading, right under US control, with the full collaboration of our own "elected" leaders. We are becoming a US colony and it is obvious (something that I suspected but did not want to accept that it could not be changed in the future) that the EU itself is nothing more than a US tool to bring the whole of Europe under their absolute control, and we as citizens have no say whatsoever in our own future. European leaders must reconsider and stop this path we are heading. They lied to us and promised that a "united Europe" would stand with Russia, China AND the USA as an equal partner and contender, becoming a global player for the betterment of the lives of all EU citizens. But sadly all we see is the sell out of our future and reputation as Europeans, to the interests of the "few" in the West.