Middle East horrors underline success of the Good Friday Agreement

As the horrors unfolded in Israel and Gaza last weekend, it prompted comparisons with our own peace process and how visionaries and risk-takers dictate the paths nations take for generations. In the final weeks of his presidency in 2000, US president Bill Clinton tried to broker a peace deal between the Israelis and Palestinians. It was the culmination of efforts by Clinton to replicate his success in Northern Ireland in the Middle East but his attempt failed.

During that pivotal time in the 1990s, the Israeli-Palestine conflict didn’t produce a figure of the calibre of John Hume. A new book called ‘The Persuader’ has revealed that Hume was minutes away from leaving politics in 1992 only to be talked out of his impending decision by close ally Mark Durkan. This sensational story has been kept secret for three decades, but it’s scary to think how different the history of modern Ireland would have been if Hume had gone ahead with his resignation.

The Middle East peace process also didn’t have its equivalent of Gerry Adams and Martin McGuiness who persuaded the militants to lay down their arms; neither did it have a David Trimble: leaders who are able to bring a majority of their own constituency with them.

The legacies of Bertie Ahern and Tony Blair have been tarnished by their respective actions in other areas of their careers, but it was they who propelled the process to its culmination in the Good Friday Agreement. Ahern and Blair had a strong personal relationship, as did Albert Reynolds and John Major before them. Every one of them was crucial to peace emerging, as were less lauded but equally significant figures such as Mo Mowlam and George Mitchell.

Clinton couldn’t find figures of similar calibre in the Middle East in 2000. Poignantly, a poll in 2011 found that, by then, 58% of Israelis and 50% of Palestinians supported a two-state solution based on Clinton’s proposals in December 2000.

A similar opportunity has not been within the grasp of the Israelis and Palestinians since. The ramifications of the latest violence will surely be felt for years to come as the spiral of violence grows more gruesome.

Many people have come to take the Good Friday Agreement for granted. The DUP and their Brexiter allies even want to alter or dismantle it. What is taking place in the Middle East is a chilling reminder of the terror that could be still happening in Ireland, and how grateful we should be for the path people of vision took in the 1990s.

BUDGET DAY 

Maybe it’s because of the rugby World Cup but it felt like the budget was attracting more attention during the summer than it has in the last week. You may remember the letter from the three Fine Gael junior ministers putting pressure on Fianna Fáil’s Michael McGrath in the lead-up to his first budget. It was all a bit weird but hints of tension in the coalition were quickly smacked down.

McGrath has performed an effective double-act with his FG counterpart, Paschal Donohoe, since this coalition was formed. Indeed, they have shown the more undisciplined government ministers how they should behave.

The late Brian Lenihan was the last Fianna Fáil Minister of Finance before McGrath. Lenihan is now regarded as a noble but tragic figure, who died long before his time due to illness. His valiant endeavours couldn’t save Ireland from losing its economic sovereignty.

It is with Lenihan’s predecessors that McGrath will want to avoid any comparison. Few, including in the media and even the opposition, shouted stop during the early years of this century but the actions of the 2002-07 FF/PD coalition government sent the nation hurtling towards the economic crash.

McGrath has a reputation as a politician who can be trusted with the nation’s finances, basically a mirror-image of his FG counterpart Donohoe. Nonetheless, this is his big moment and how McGrath performs will impact on his own, and his party’s, political future.

The era of corporation tax bonanzas appears to be coming to an end. McGrath will not want to be accused of over-heating (one of the great buzz-words of economists) the economy while also making sure voters are aware of benefitting from the budget.

Few will bet against Social Protection Minister Heather Humphreys doing as well for her department as she did last year. Humphreys is a wily and capable minister; another wily minister, Simon Harris, will be keeping an eye on Humphreys in any future FG leadership race.