Sally Rooney has Zionists rattled again

Hard-right Telegraph hack Brendan O’Neill is at it again; the Israel and Trump fan’s long fixation with best-selling Irish author and Israel boycotter Sally Rooney has again reared its very ugly head. This time, dressed up as an(other) attack on Rooney’s commitment to Palestinian freedom and an end to the genocide. One that, typically, is saturated with an impression of O’Neill’s obsessive fervour for his own imagined wit and writing skill. High on his own supply, he also (of course) derides Rooney’s hugely-popular books.

Blech. Rooney is a frequent theme for O’Neill. Here, here and here, for example. In the latter, he dismisses her objection to the mass slaughter of Palestinian civilians as a “luxury belief”. Right.

Sally Rooney is principled – unlike O’Neill

O’Neill has taken offence (again) at Rooney’s vocal support for the Palestinian people and her opposition to Israel’s crimes. He claims, falsely, that she shows no interest in Sudan and only cares about Gaza because, we’re meant to believe, in Gaza it’s Jews killing Muslims and not other Muslims doing it. This commitment to the Palestinian cause is, he proposes, evidence of a god-complex on Rooney’s part.

His ‘hook‘ for this claim is that Rooney didn’t talk about Sudan, but about Gaza. She was at an event specifically about Gaza, but hey damn the woman for not talking about Sudan. But to O’Neill, nothing should be about Gaza – unless it’s an excuse to lionise Israel. Or Trump. Either will do.

We’ll spare the reader an exposure to examples of O’Neill’s anti-Palestinian bile. Instead, let’s look at who endorses O’Neill’s recent ‘clash of civilisations’ spew, his book “After the pogrom: 7 October, Israel and the crisis of civilisation”. The book, according to the blurb, decries the:

twisted ideology of atrocity denial, as the activist class accused the Jewish State of exaggerating or even inventing the events of 7 October.

And look who loves it, positively gushing with praise for an ‘honesty’ they would struggle to be on nodding acquaintance with:

“A bruising blow in the cause of liberty, tolerance and good sense. Thank God he is on our side” – Jake Wallis Simons, editor, Jewish Chronicle.

“A brutally honest analysis of how the world failed the test of Hamas’s brutality” – Eylon Levy, former Israeli government spokesman.

Grim characters

Genocide-denier Eylon Levy got sacked from his job as a pro-slaughter mouthpiece because he went too far even for his boss Benjamin Netanyahu. O’Neill’s fellow Telegraph hack Jake Wallis Simons is a former editor of hard-right libel rag The Jewish Chronicle and of his own piece of farcical anti-Palestinian propaganda, his book “Israelophobia”. Wallis Simons considers the idea of Israel’s genocide as “narrative” to be “quashed”.

Brendan appears not to read too widely. Every atrocity-propaganda claim by Israel about 7 October fell apart faster than a cheap suit. Rapes, beheaded babies, all of it. Not just in the eyes of the “activist class” he despises, but according to United Nations investigators, human rights groups and even Israel’s chief prosecutor, who couldn’t find evidence to support a single rape case.

Oh, and Israel’s military, its media and its then-defence minister Yoav Gallant. Gallant admitted that Israel spent all day on 7 October 2023, from the early hours until late at night, killing hundreds of its own citizens under the so-called ‘Hannibal directive‘. But that wasn’t all.

The chances of ol’ Brendan sticking that in his pipe and smoking it are very slim. But it would definitely be a better way to spend his time than fixating on Sally Rooney and his imagined skill as a writer.

As for Rooney, well an Irishman who actually had wit and writing skill famously said “You can always judge a man by the quality of his enemies”. That goes for women too – and a glance at O’Neill and his fixations means Rooney is definitely on the right track.

Featured image via the Canary