Ireland vs Israel - To play or not to play, that is the question Read OP for Mod Warning

Every form of protest is virtue signaling unless it is also followed up by action. I see no indication that our govt are going to send our army in to Palestine to protect its people. The majority of the people who protest on the streets every Saturday rarely go any further than that.

That doesn't make protest the wrong thing to do so long as it remains peaceful

Well… What's the opposite of woke, asleep?

Arguably boycotts only work when large swathes of the world join forces and, as we saw in the Eurovision, I don't see that happening anytime soon with Israel.

Any members who haven't committed war crimes should not be held accountable for the actions of others.

This is pretty much inevitable in any boycott though - that people will lose out who have done nothing to merit that.

A boycott of Nestle products will impact on those who do nothing other than work to put food on the table, even when it's aimed at those in the business involved in horrible marketing practices in developing countries.

It may well be the case that there are Israeli footballers who are privately appalled by what's happening in Gaza and now Lebanon.

But it's both impossible to implement a boycott that only punishes those who really deserve it - it could never be accurately determined in all cases (and even if it could, are we really going to go public and say that actually, this Israeli footballer is grand because we discovered that in fact, he's ashamed of the IDF? I'm sure he'd really appreciate that).

And it also misses the point, which is that one aim of a boycott is to generate pressure for change from within the country/company under boycott, by those who are pissed off about being unfairly punished.

Seeing as how you are back on thread, would you be able to specify which IRB laws were broken by South Africa that lead to their exclusion from the 1987 and 1991 Rugby World Cups, as you claimed earlier?

As expected. I think the pro-palestinians over estimate their support in this country. Good to see common sense prevails.

Interesting that the Government had to amend the motiion to say its a matter for the FAI due to the perception of government influence - a couple of posters on this thread were slated for raising this issue. Turns out they're right.

Every motion brought forward by an opposition party is defeated.
This is nothing new and doesn’t define the level of support for Palestinians in the country by any means.

Are you still trying to trot out the nonsensical notion that sports and politics aren’t intertwined?

That’s not what I asked at all, why misrepresent what I said?

Government very much can interfere.
They did when demanding the FAI appear in front of the Oireachtas committee. They did when they bailed out the FAI with public funds.

This government is choosing not to on this matter.

Again I’ll ask, why are you still trotting out the nonsensical notion that sports and politics aren’t intertwined?

Morning!

Any update on the specific violations of IRB laws that lead to South Africa not being allowed the enter the 1987 and 1991 world cups, as you claimed yesterday?

In the event that you haven't been able to find anything specific, would you then agree that what the IRB did was actually unrelated to their own laws, but in reaction to wider public pressure?

If so, using your own logic, it appears that you would consider such a ban on South African rugby to have been something unjustified and unfair.

+1

There are conditions attached to public funding including ensuring it is spent as intended.

South Africa did not have a unified National Federation in the 80s - this only happened after appartide ended.

It had different rugby bodies for different races (which itself is wtong) Up to the 80s, the SARB, which was the "whites only" body fielded "South Africa^ teams.

By most definitions, the SARB did not fulfill tbe criteria of being a National Federation - as it wasnt. It did not represent the entire sport and did not function as a National Governing Body.