Tadhg 'Tehran' Hickey - The Antisemitic Hate Speech Ireland Allows To Blossom In Plain Sight
The weirder-than-life tale of how an Irish “comedian” came to endorse Israel’s obliteration, be feted by the ayatollahs, and endorse forced ‘de-Zionisation’ to redefine Judaism for Jews
Table of Contents
- Meet Tadhg Hickey: The “Comedian” Who Doesn’t Hate Jews…
- From “Comedy” to Endorsing Terror
- The Anti-Zionist’s Guide to Antisemitism
- A Symptom of a Wider Problem: Ireland’s Tolerance for Antisemitic Hate Speech
- Bonus: Questions For Tadhg
Meet Tadhg Hickey: The “Comedian” Who Doesn’t Hate Jews…
Tehran Tadhg?
There can’t be too many of them knocking about. Fortunately, like Khomeini, there only seems to be one in circulation.
Tadhg Hickey is an Irish “comedian” who has increasingly adopted fringe extremist anti-Israel rhetoric that has often (and increasingly) crossed the line into naked antisemitism.
Among Hickey’s best posts:
When he decided that the best way to fend off growing recognition of his antisemitism was to release an angry video in which he “explained” (to a Jewish audience?) exactly why he despised Zionist Jews but was fond of Jews so long as they were untainted by that ideology, which he has branded the most dangerous menace of our time?
I’m not sure who the target was here. Because if there’s nothing people enjoy better than being hated, it’s getting a detailed angry explanation as to why they’re so odious.
In an opening line that must have been plucked straight from the pages of How To Win Friends And Influence People, Hickey hit us with this bombshell:
“I don’t hate you [Israelis] because you’re Jewish”, he assured us, before adding forcefully (for just Israelis!?) “you ignorant duplicitous genocidal scumbags.”
One gets the feeling that Hickey missed out on How Not To Be A Terrible Human 101. But if he took some of the coursework, he might have learned some first principles in sound argument-building: you warm the audience up and then make your argument. You’re not going to assure Jews that you’re not a virulent antisemite by labelling every Zionist Jew a “genocidal scumbag” in the same breath.
But why invest this much effort in highlighting Tadhg’s hate speech, you may wonder?
Trust me, I didn’t do it for my health and certainly not for my sanity. He’s far from the only Irishman on X espousing a heartfelt desire to rid the planet of Jews. But Tadhg is unique for a few factors. One of which is that (to his credit) he’s not hiding behind a screen name. He’s in the open. And I believe in two things:
-
Extremist hate speech needs to be identified so that we know what it looks like (this is important, particularly, for providing a comparison against which mainstream anti-Israelism can be contrasted)
-
When it comes to doing anything whatsoever to ensure that anti-Israelism doesn’t morph into antisemitism, the Republic of Ireland is, and has long been, asleep at the wheel. Hence, I felt that, in this case, it was worth wading through the intellectual cesspool that is Hickey’s mind.
It’s also personal:
Like millions of Israelis, I’ve spent most of the past week sheltering from the rockets that Tadhg hopes will kill me and my compatriots so that he can jubilate in the destruction of the world’s only Jewish State (at which point we can only assume his perma-anger will vanish like a bomb shelter after Pikud HaOref gives the all-clear, although somehow I’m not counting on it. Speaking of which what would people like Tadhg even do if their fantasies were fulfilled?).
This is not an attempt to stifle free speech. Nor is it a plea to ask Tadhg to learn the words to hava nagila and see if a bottle of Tubi 60 can get him over his Jew hatred syndrome (JHS). Tadhg’s disposition towards Jews and Israel will remain forever as bleak as an LGBT parade in Tehran.
The story of Ireland’s anti-Israel hostility has been told and re-told over the past year with no shortage of speculation and curiosity going into what motivates such full-throated opposition. But why and how Ireland is managing to sidestep its EU obligations to prosecute hate speech, however, remains relatively mired in obscurity.
Which is a pity. Because the fact that it’s caught the attention of the EU - which is threatening to “sue” Ireland for failing to prosecute it - is quite telling. According to a recent report in the Irish Examiner:
“But it [the EU] said Ireland had still failed to implement provisions relating to “criminalising the public incitement to violence or hatred” or the “condoning, denial or gross trivialisation of international crimes and the Holocaust”.
Read that again: the EU is literally having to drag Ireland by its testicles to do slightly less than absolutely zero about letting jihadi zealots like Tadhg run the roost without consequence.
Another odious aspect of Tadhg’s particular brand of Jew-hatred that merits vigorous rebuttal: it tries desperately to sell the world on the great lie that Zionism is something like a malign movement which has coopted “authentic” Judaism. Nothing could be further from the truth. But as lies go, it’s a dangerous one: those urging it to be true are not only trying to redefine Judaism for Jews, but also trying to carve out an ideological refuge under which their hate can take safe cover.
From Comedy Sketches About Houseshares To Radicalisation By The IRGC- Hickey’s “Creative” Evolution
Hickey has travelled a great distance in his campaign of defamation against the Jewish State.
His original commentary tried - hilariously! - to compare the Israel-Palestine conflict to a houseshare in his native Cork.
The Jews - needless to say - were cast as the mendacious foreign invader, cutting “deals” with the Ottomans and the French.
Four years later, however, and here’s Tadhg sitting gloating in a Shahed 285 attack helicopter, in Tehran, bearing the insignia of the IRGC (Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps).
Hickey was invited to Tehran apparently by the regime. Sharing his holiday photo on X while the IRGC’s ballistic missile blitzes were ongoing, Hickey posted: “wish me luck, guys!”. You don’t need to guess what Tadhg wished his mission to be.
Of course, in Hickey’s mind, so long as it’s only Zionists that he’s joking about exterminating with gunfire it’s totally okay.
In language that could have been copy-and-pasted from Iran - actually, that’s almost everything he says - Hickey frequently rails about how the US and Israel are the head of an evil Western system of colonialism that is subjugating Muslims and other oppressed people globally.
So beyond the endless hatred of America and the frequent derogatory references to Americans as ‘yanks’, were Hickey ever to decide that Las Vegas might be a fun place to visit, his assiduous efforts to document his own merrymaking with terrorists might cause a spot of bother should he ever be asked to fill out a TSA form that asks:
“Have you ever or do you intend to provide financial assistance or other support to terrorists or terrorist organizations?”
I know that these are far less appealing destinations for Tadhg than Semnan and Arak (the latter known for its heavy water facilities) but .. just thought I’d save a wasted trip to the airport and back.
The Anti-Zionist’s Guide to Antisemitism
Beyond ascribing virtually every possible ill in the world to Israel but galvanizing most of his rhetoric around the idea that Israel is the world’s greatest problem and needs to be eliminated, Tadhg’s favorite online pursuits include explaining to Jews how Zionism is actually totally different to Judaism and therefore denying self-determination to (only) Jews is therefore totally okay.
It’s not clear whether Tadhg knows that the vast majority of world Jewry endorses Zionism. If he did his soundbites wouldn’t be as snappy. To be honest, he’d have to say something like:
“Here are really good Jews called Neturei Karta. Disclaimer: They’re a tiny fraction of the Jewish world, considered traitors, and about as looney as me and most non-insane Jews connect with at least the idea that Jews should have a national homeland in Israel
Although Tadhg has clearly reached such a sophisticated understanding of Judaism that he feels comfortable teaching the world’s actual Jews how they should define their Judaism, recent propaganda indicates that his level of knowledge about Judaism may not be as deep as he likes to portray.
For one - and no, this isn’t a joke, I promise - Tadhg recently reposted a tweet which claimed that “the largest Jewish population outside Israel is in Iran.”
Has Tadhg actually met a real Jew beyond in the contrived context of anti-Palestine events, where tokenistic Jews who happen to share Tadhg’s destructionist worldview are treated like golddust so long as they renounce mainstream Judaism?
Has he ever attempted to engage one of the majority of Israeli citizens who support Zionism? Why is that the only Jews and Israelis he deigns to interact with all happen to be those who share his viewpoint?
Fact 1: His Comedic Repetoire Is Essentially Limited To Skits Which Are Actually Propaganda And Hate Speech
Hickey’s propaganda is packaged - weirdly - as comedy. Here we must acknowledge that Tadhg has pulled a good ruse. Like Irish comic Tommy Tiernan who once drew ire for “joking” that only six million Jews perished in the Holocaust (and were it up to him there would have been double that), Hickey - if absolutely needed - can turn around and claim that any of his gags were just a bit of “craic”.
“F------ six million? I would have got 10 or 12 million out of that… F------ two at a time, they would have gone. Hold hands, get in there. Leave us your teeth and your glasses.”
(Tommy Tiernan, Glastonbury Festival. As reported by The Jewish Chronicle)
The dissonance of tuning in for political satire and instead getting back content about how no Israelis were actually brutalised on October 7th creates something of a jarring dissonance, however. It’s like turning over a cereal box and on the other side of Tony The Tiger is an ode to the Ayatollah.
Even if you found the steady stream of race-bating and one-sided takes illuminating, I’m not sure how they’re supposed to be humorous in the conventional sense of the word. Like in the way that you might get a good laugh out of them after an exhausting day as an Israel-hating keyboard warrior.
But speaking of chutzpah: Tadhg - whose main contribution to comedy will probably be remembered as finding inventive ways to brand propaganda as it - finds time to critique the poor comedic skills of … you guessed it … those darned Israelis:
During a regular anti-Israel media trawl (conducted once every three minutes), Tadhg encountered a video imitating an Israeli airstrike on an Iranian broadcaster and uses the clip as evidence of how (all) Israelis suffer from “mass psychosis” and (thus) can’t understand why they are so reviled:
For what its worth: The Israeli kids’ videos aren’t my cup of tea either. But the charge of poor comedic taste is still a bit rich coming from a guy whose idea of comedy is comparing the butchering of Israeli civilians on October 7th to being … wait for it … “stung by a bee.” and who once paraded around his native Cork trying to goad passers-by into condemning Hamas. The latter was intended to discredit the fact that Israelis often ask their interlocutors to condemn Hamas.
For what it’s worth - you guessed it - Tadhg says that he himself doesn’t condone Hamas - he just refers to them as the “resistance” (muqawwama) engaging in “freedom fighting” and to feel very sympathetic for their tactics which he sees as the inevitable reactions to oppression. Which makes the two-faced act (the “comedy” to skirt around hate speech terms of conditions and the real Tadhg who does interviews) seem especially disingeuous.
But really, he does condone terror. He just finds weird imaginative workarounds to say that without saying that:
In an interview with 5 Pillars, Hickey stated:
“There’s an obsession here to condemn Hamas. Palestinans have been in some cases condemned to life in an open air prison. And yet when they fight back for their liberation and their independence .. we’re made to think in this part of the world that they don’t deserve freedom fighting and that they’re terrorists.”
The telling part of the remarks are highlighted in bold.
The classic cowardly double-speak parallels perfectly the tactic he uses to condone the rape of Israeli women on October 7th. He doesn’t endorse the rape. But the random rape of women has to be seen in its proper context. Sorry, what!?!
And you know … the “all Israelis” thing is a bit grating, Tadhg.
A reaction to Ireland’s prodigious efforts to isolate and criticise Israel is that, here in Israel, the image of Ireland has shifted from “idyllic place with friendly people” (Ireland once ranked as the most popular tourist destination for Israelis; attitudes have soured so much since that a route was shelved after less than a year) to “does travel insurance cover injury from a gang wielding pitchforks if they find out I’m from Israel!?”
An unfortunate extension of that - which I don’t condone - is reactionary anti-Irish racism. This I mean very sincerely. The way to combat bigotry is not to stoop to responding with bigotry. But it’s a dynamic.
Thus, I’ve seen plenty of responses along the lines of “well, the Irish are just a bunch of Jew haters.” I don’t make those comments because I know it’s not true: some may be, probably in reality a very small fringe, but not the totality. When you call all Israelis “psychotic”, “vermin”, and “genocidal scum” however … you’re doing just that.
That video (and commentary) ranks up there in absurdity with Tadhg’s other fascinating post October 7th insight: that Israeli civilians were killed by Israel because they were caught in crossfire between the “resistance” (Hamas) and the IDF. I mean, it’s not like Hamas openly documented themselves engaging in premeditated and well-planned slaughter, right!? It’s almost a … psychotic thing to believe.
“Some people have been saying it’s disproportionate,” says Hickey’s shrill personification of an Israeli (who bears the subtitle “still the victim” - that Jews are perpetually “playing the victim card”, a favorite allegation of antisemites, is a staple in Hickey’s repertoire).
He then explains Israel’s response in Gaza as “burning a house down with the occupants inside.”
It must have evaded Hickey’s bigoted attention yet again that Hamas actually did precisely that.
Fact 2: While Hickey Claims To Just Hate Zionism He Also Peddles In Just About Every Antisemitism Trope Out There
Before coming to the attention of the Jewish world as the pin-up Western radical leftist anti-Semite in anti-Zionist clothing (David Lange of Israelycool first did the public service of pointing out the danger and toxicity of Hickey’s propagandising Jew hatred), Hickey appears to have made a living sharing these comedic videos which - long before this controversy, long before he began urging Iran to not let up in their missile strikes about Israel - focused disproportionately on Israel and Jews.
If you take nothing else away from this piece take this: please remember that pattern the next time you recognise it.
In one particularly repugnant piece - entitled Hitler’s Arse - Hickey’s crass Jewish caricature explains that he has made a documentary on the niche topic of Hitler’s arse (backside):
Falling back on yet another lazy antisemitic trope (that Jews abuse the memory of the Holocaust to play a perpetual ‘victim’ card, a staple theme throughout his ‘work’ and video-making), Hickey explains that the documentary, while niche, is just another addition to the already bulging repertoire of documentaries about Hitler available on television. You know … because we talk too much about the Holocaust.
The crass American imitation embodies what Hickey imagines Americans to be long before he wrote it out a hundred times over: imperial colonists working at the behest of some malignant global Jewish cabal which - one only imagine - Hickey suspects is to blame for this perma-anger.
Fact 3: Though Easily Dismissed As Just Another Crazy, He’s Amassed A Sizeable Online Following
But Hickey’s penchant for radicalism and encouraging the extermination of Israel shouldn’t be dismissed too quickly.
Although Hickey lacks the commitment to hop on a failed flotilla, preferring to do his hate-mongering from dry land, apparently, he still has as reach of 164K followers (on X alone) - in addition to Tik Tok and YouTube.
Like most rabid antisemites, Hickey is periodically deplatformed which has led him to open a sideline of … soliciting donations. But his cover story creates some good plausible deniability that his messages were not intended seriously. Although it’s very clear that they are.
So although he may lack the mainstream cache of somebody like, say, Greta, Hickey’s vitriol still reaches far and wide.
And while a sizeable amount of his following seem to be scattered throughout the Muslim world, his adherents can also be found, in number, right at home.
Besides offering a warped version of world events, Hickey also platforms a motley and ever-rotating crew of fringe haters whom he eagerly platforms.
It would not be accurate to say that Hickey is bringing these voices into the mainstream - for he himself does not enjoy that position. But he can be “credited” with importing hate speech from the Muslim world into Europe that might otherwise not have found footing there.
These include conspiracy theorists, a carefully curated cast of Jews who just all happen to share precisely his view that Israel is committing a genocide, and … the odd Iranian who also happens to adulate the Iranian Guards (dissident Iranians, for what it’s worth, are usually dismissed out of hand as paid Zionist shills, part of the global cabal.)
So this reshare emblazoning the star of David on the American flag - an antisemitic motif unquestionably alleging Jewish dominance over the country - is another of those little mask-slips.
But How Does A Cork “Comic” Become An Iranian Propagandist, Anyway?
Hickey’s meteoric rise through the ranks of professional Israel haters, however, is quite the perplexing phenomenon. ’ Reading Hickey’s X feed, you might forget for a moment that he’s not the online alias of the military wing of Hamas. Rather, he’s .. a white Irishman who just decided, one day, that he was happy to devote the remainder of his life (literally) to taking one giant (and seemingly never-ending) internet crap on Israel.
But can you imagine being so full of hate that that is what you strive to achieve before you kick it? I mean at least Dan Bilzerian (also a rabid Israel hater) seems to be having a good time while doing the hating. Hickey is just perma-angry.
Daragh, an Irishman living in Tel Aviv, summed up the sheer strangeness of the phenomenon quite aptly:
It’s hard to offer an explanation that doesn’t sound a bit like something pulled from a low budget spy movie or one of those Netflix docuseries that inexplicaby gets dragged out into four parts as you’re left wondering whether this is a really fringe case or society is just much weirder than you realised (“The Leeman And The Ayatollah” anyone?). But it’s also kind of strange that people in Iran are trying to exterminate us right now.
Anti-Israel radicalism in Ireland has long been hiding just beneath the surface.
Growing up in Cork, I’d often see flyers affixed to lamposts inviting the general public to a forum decrying Israel’s latest perceived wrongdoing.
As I got older, I’d sometimes Google the participants: doing so, you might find out that the esteemed speaker visiting from ‘Palestine’ had in fact served time in Israeli prisons for participation in terrorism that maimed or killed. This was before the contents of these closed-doors events were occasionally posted on the internet for all to gawk at.
So it was easy to buy into the myth - I’m sorry to say often propagated by Irish Jews themselves - that the fervent pro-Palestinianism in Ireland was nothing more than a misguided parallel with Ireland’s experience of colonialism (and how can that even be an excuse? That denies Jews’ connection to Israel!?) In many cases, I think it’s far more sinister.
I can recall, too, being taken aback by the overt antisemitism in Irish online spaces discussing Israel when … laptops still came with CD trays and having broadband internet was like gaining access to another universe.
So in a sense, Tadhg has broken some very important ground - if it can be leveraged to do something constructive like draw red lines to distinguish legitimate criticism of Israel from espousing terror. He’s brought something into the open that badly needed to be seen.
Why might the Iranians have taken such a shine to Tadhg that they gave him exclusive access to the Cosplay Being A Martyr Tent at Tehran’s airport (hey, not everyone gets chosen)?
My inkling is that even the Iranians may have been astounded at the naivete with which Hickey swallowed Soviet style state propaganda hook, line, and sinker and proved willing to regurgitate it with seeming indifference to who might be paying attention.
It takes a rather serious level of commitment - or stupidity - to be willing to argue both that October 7th was a mostly peaceful act of resistance and defy all scientific evidence suggesting Iran’s determination to obtain a nuclear weapon.
But whatever the cause, it’s a fitting explanation.
Tadhg delivers a superlative level of conspiracy theory pushing and animosity that isn’t easy to find among Western anti-Israel leftists. His cocktail of rable-rousing conspiracy theory endorsement and classic but highly reliable Israel villification offers a ready made formula to offset reason and stimulate anti-Isreal ire.
Is Hickey On The Iranian Payroll Or Does He Just Have A Lot Of Time For This Stuff?
Whether Tadhg Joon has received monetary recompense for his tireless efforts on behalf of the Iranian regime is impossible to know.
Although that doesn’t stop it from being the subject of lively speculation and debate.
Elliot Nazar, writing in United Against Nuclear Iran penned an interesting entry exploring how there often really is more than meets the eye when it comes to collusion between radical elements in the Republic of Ireland and Middle Eastern terrorists.
Politically, Hickey affiliates with Sinn Fein - a group known both, of course, for its affiliation with the IRA, as well as their training and arms exchanges with the PFLP. So in a sense this is just a modern incarnation of a bizarre love affair that streches back some fifty years. But in another it represents a push by Irish radicals into the arms of a new group of strange co-revolutionaries: the Iranians.
Why Ireland appears to be cultivating a relationship with Iran is unclear. But there does seem to be some substance to the idea that it is, indeed, happening.
Irish President Michael D Higgins wrote a letter of congratulations to Masoud Pezeshkian upon his election as President of the Islamic Republic. And in late 2023, Ireland decided to reopen an embassy in Tehran.
Writing before the Iranians launched one of two major batches of missiles to Israel in 2024, Higgins informed his Iranian counterpart about the embassy (then being built) and offered the fairytale hope that Iran “would play a crucial role in helping build peace across the Middle East.” Wait, was he just joking too!?
After the letter “leaked,” Higgins was quick to blame Israel before it became clear that the source of the leak was … you know… the fact that the Iranian mission in Dublin itself posting the letter to X/Twitter. Wikileaks 2 it was not.
Whatever very strange moral compass has led Ireland to fervently believe that Israel is a devil state and Iran is its antithesis was also on full show last summer when Ireland’s leading coalition parties chose to publicly snub Israel’s ambassador, Dana Erlich, by “disinviting” them from the parties’ annual conference. It was shared - one gets the feeling very deliberately - that the Iranian envoy, however, had made the guest list.
Hickey Routinely Goes Where Other Antisemites Are Too Smart To Venture
So if there’s any truth to the idea that Hickey’s support from Iran may be more than coincidental, it’s probably got something to do with the fact that he reliably spouts the kind of propaganda that can usually only be found on Press TV (who he often retweets with zeal).
Were Iran to try to establish a Dublin bureau for Press TV it might (emphasis on ‘might’) fall foul of a media watchdog. So a clever strategy, instead, is to bolster influencers who may have a more effective reach.
Of course, this strategy is not in itself malevolent. Israel too and countless world governments can be shown to engage in this kind of public diplomacy. But might, at least, provide a modicum of explanation for the otherwise strange story.
Above: Hickey, having fun with the IRGC, posts a tweet of himself about to engage in a popular tradition among extreme fringes in the Muslim world: ritually defacing the American and Israeli flags by walking on them.
Tadhg As A Bellweather Of The ‘Unmasking’ Phenomenon
Another reason that I find it interesting to watch Tadhg when there’s virtually no other Israel-hater I would bother with: I’ve come to regard him as a useful bellweather for the broader phenomenon of what I and many in the pro-Israel camp have come to call the phenomenon of “unmasking” - by which individuals whose animus of Israel was motivated by anti-Semitism (and I underscore - I do not suggest that that is all or even most of that group) eventually reveals itself to be frank antisemitism.
At the time of writing, Hickey has authored 44,000 tweets, countless of which have gone to denouncing US “imperialism”, the West, Israel, and Jews.
In the process, he has created one of the internet’s most fertile self-documented archives showing how a random Westener went from being just another guy at the protest rally to a willing parrot for the Iranian axis.
This has import far beyond the narrow context of Hickey and Ireland and is a matter of major interest to the Jewish world at large.
And I’ll be honest. While I know that Hickey is an extreme case of disguised antisemitism, I also don’t think that he’s quite as fringe as many would like to believe (his sizeable social media influence, for one, suggests otherwise). The failure of the mainstream pro-Palestinian movement in Ireland to distance itself from Hickey’s rhetoric is telling.
The phenomenon by which anti-semites masquerading as anti-Israel campaigners reveal their true colors is also not a linear one. When they sense that Israel and the Jewish people are on the ropes, they feel emboldened to step out of the woodwork and give up the subterfuge, which must be tiring to maintain.
In fact, this is more or less the whole reason I wrote this blog: we’re nearing a point of evolution with Hickey’s rhetoric that we longed sense we were moving towards. In recent days he has:
- Openly encouraged Iran to “destroy” Israel (the tweet was posted at the height of the Iranian missile barrages)
- Chosen the same timing precisely to insist that Israel must be forcibly removed of its nuclear capability
He even got impatient when Iran stopped firing for a while. Writing just hours after Israeli civilians had been killed by successfull Iranian rocket attacks, Hickey urged the regime to “get its shit together” and keep hitting Tel Aviv:
He Also Enjoys VIP Access to Terror Networks, Showing Up At “Star Studded” Events Like Nasrallah’s Funeral…
Just one more chapter in the telling of this decidedly odd tale:
The world of anti-Israel extremism must be a pretty close-knit community given that many of those at its pinnacle are routinely shifted out of their positions.
But perhaps thanks to a friendly letter of commendation from Iran, Tadhg found himself at another all-star anti-Israel event: the funeral of Nasrallah (or maybe Hizbullah was just impressed with the footage of Hickey chanting ‘Death to Israel’ that received widespread attention).
Who apparently plied the Corkman not only with ideology. But also with lots and lots of cake.
Turning to camera at the funeral (a few minutes before railing at the IAF flyover) Hickey took a moment o record his gratitude at the exquisite bakery skills of those in attendance, remarking how he was “blown away” (not literally, of course) by:
“Absolute mobs of people handing me water … and cake.”
In recent days Tadhg lamented the assassination of the late Nasrallah’s personal bodyguard whom he met on his propaganda tour of Iran. Hickey described “Abu Ali” as a harmless human being who wouldn’t hurt a fly. He did not divulge whether Ali was also a talented and determined baker. But one gets the sense that the guy just was.
Here, again, one wonders the degree to which it’s actually plausible for a human with the faculty of thought to believe this kind of stuff.
Hussein al-Khalil (whose kunya was Abu Abi Jawwad) was described by a Jordanian news website as “playing a key role in military coordination and planning” (for Hizb’Allah). More specifically, al-Khalil was instrumental in the foundation of Hizbullah’s unit 910 which is responsible for overseas terrorism and black ops, among other functions.
There are countless people in Lebanon, no doubt, who would either burst out laughing at the claim that Jawwad was “gentle” or demonstrate, to Tadhg, the methods Hizbullah employed which were not very gentle - like disappearing opposition into torture chambers.
Speaking of people who burst out laughing at the absurdity of Hickey’s delusional love affair with Middle Eastern terrorists, Emily Schrader, debating Hickey on Al Arabiyye English, was forced to do that when Hickey alleged that organisations like ISIS, Hamas and the IRGC treat women with respect:
“Emily talks about the mandatory conscription in Israel … [incidentally] so-called terrorist organisations like Hamas … they never have mandatory conscription … you know all these “evil” terrorist organisations … they never compel anybody, least of all women, they treat women with an awful lot more respect and consideration [than Israel] without compelling them to be part of the movement. I don’t think that’s necessarily a black mark against the terrorist organisations.”
This is the same Hizbullah, it’s worth remembering, which killed an Irish soldier on duty with the UN in late 2022. And Hickey is lauding the treatment of women in Iran where women require their husbands’ permission to leave the country - arguing that these women are less oppressed than in Israel.
But much like Israelis who aren’t demonic and Iranians who aren’t mouthpieces of the regime, these inconvenient populations simply don’t exist in Hickey’s toybox version of the Middle East.
Much like on Twitter/X, Hickey, while long on insults, misinformation and fake news, is remarkably short on the power of rebuttal.
Much as his reaction to this post consisted of calling me a “ZioNerd”, his other tactics, when debating Jews, consist of the grown up version of name-slurring on playgrounds.
Attempting to deny Jews the right to reply to his noxious racism by asserting over and over again that the world has “had enough” of “Zionist talking points” is his main rhetorical weapon.
As frightening as hate like this is to witness - the emboldening of the ayatollahs actually does the world a great favor, in this sense: we get to see the hatred for what it is and what it’s always been. It may be defy reason, but it’s there with correct labelling.
It also forces people to pick sides and own the consequences of their decision.
But at least we got something actionable out of this spectating. Note to Israeli embassies: make less infographics; bake more cakes.
Hickey Plans A Life Of Full-Time Anti-Israelism, Yet Apparently Hasn’t … You Know … Ever … Visited Israel
Besides the US, one border that is unlikely to ever open up for Hickey is that of Israel, the state he variously labels a “cancer” and a “stain on humanity” that must be (variously) “destroyed” or “excised”.
Notably, Hickey has gone on record as stating that he is happy to “dedicate” the rest of his life to doing whatever he can to “help bring down” this dreadful country.
But one thing is very curious:
Good-faith actors who decide that they want to dedicate all their energy to a moral crusade targeting a country thousands of miles away usually have the motivation to - at least - hop on a flight there and visit it.
Here we find more delightful proof of the total absurdity of the kind of West-meets-Jihadi totalitarianism that Hickey represents. Hickey’s information about Israel, it seems, comes entirely from books, the internet, and the safe harbor of online workshops about the evils of Zionism.
While another famous Irish anti-Israel hater Richard Boyd Barrett at least put in a few months on a kibbutz (where he saw exactly what he wanted to see and then spent the next two decades referencing), Hickey, seemingly, never even bothered to visit before engaging on his never-ending moral crusade. Why try to get both perspectives when you have the internet, right!?
So I ask again:
Do you want to take your advice about Judaism from a guy who thinks Iran houses the world’s largest Jewish population; or predicate your understanding of the conflict on the deranged musings of a guy who’s never actually stepped foot in the land he professes to be an expert about?
(While Israel has no business in allowing hostile foreign agents like Hickey into their territory it does have a double edged effect. Hickey is clearly unaware how bomb shelter doors work in Israel - the places Israelis have to run to when his friends send over missiles. Although I’m not sure that knowing that fact would have prevented him from spreading more fake news propaganda)
Hickey Is Convinced That Everybody Besides Evil Zionists Thinks Exactly Like Him
Behold the ugly end result of a fascinating combination of profound self-delusion (Zionism is not Jewish! It’s okay to demand the elimination of .. just Zionism!), a cosy echo chamber, and the kind of warped impression of the parameters of the Israel-Palestine debate that you’ll get if your sole sources of information are Irish news and Iranian state propaganda.
Enveloped in this strange mental space, Tadhg asks, he hopes rhetorically - how Israelis (if they survive, as he hopes they won’t) plan on living in a world where (to quote verbatim) “every decent person with a soul and a beating heart fucking despises you and everything you stand for?”:
Ireland isn’t just an EU outlier for the extent of its sheer animosity towards Israel. It’s also unusually determined to pretend that anti-Semitic hate speech simply can’t, or doesn’t, exist.
Why Is Ireland Acting As A Safe Harbor For Radical Anti-Israelism & Anti-Jewish Hate Speech?
As interesting as the unusual meandering of Hickey’s career is to witness, why Ireland has proven steadfastly unwilling to do anything whatsoever to combat extremist anti-Israel rhetoric is a much more important topic of enquiry.
To the righteous fury of Hickey and his comrades, the UK is currently prosecuting an Irish band - Kneecap - under anti-terror legislation for displaying the Hizbullah flag.
But both in this case and others (like when a sitting member of parliament similarly called for the elimination of Israel and the globalising of the intifada) Dublin has proven resolutely mute. And not for lack of … source material.
In recent days, Hickey has declared Zionism to be the “greatest cancer” facing humanity (which must be excised, etc; the metaphor is a long time Iranian favorite):
He endorses the harassment of those being evacuated from Israel by boat and endorses the perverse idea that they should be subject to North Korean style “re-education” (‘de-Zionisation’) upon arrival at their country of destination for the crime of not subscribing to his hate-filled ideology:
He openly jubilates as ballistic missile impacts targeting scientific research facilities in Israel:
He reshares naked assassination threats against Israel’s Prime Minister:
And the just-anti-Zionist comedian also likes 911 style conspiracy theories (Hickey never met a conspiracy theory or Jew-hater that he didn’t instantly love, especially when they come in one package):
And (another nothing-against-Jews slip moment) decides that the most fitting way to rub salt into the wounds of rocket attacks on Israeli civilians is to butcher a Jewish expression of mutual solidarity (Am Yisrael Chai) rebranding it “Am Israel Cry”.
Speaking of the IHRA definition, Hickey compares Israel to Nazi Germany almost every day of the week:
Ireland’s Strange Landscape Of Israel Hatred
Hickey’s vigorous campaign against Israel occurs against the backdrop of Ireland’s obsessive desire to not only attack Israel on every front possible (diplomatic, political, economic), but to also rid the country of any and all residual attachment to the Jewish state.
Like a Jewish family hunting down morsels of leavened bread on the eve of Pesah, Ireland is on a frenzied mission to clean out every residual drop of Israeli presence from its little Island.
Thus Tadhg often echoes the rallying call of the Ireland pro-Palestinian movement which is echoed at just about every protest they organise: the government must do more to pressure Israel.
Thus not only does the pro-Palestinian movement in Ireland really hate Israel, they reflect some of that hate inwards too - hating their own government for not being more hateful towards Israel.
Although sometimes put into the specific (like demanding that the Israeli embassy be shut down; ultimately successful) in other instances it’s left as a sort of nebulous wish, hanging poisonously in the air, suffused with whatever supreme indignant moral righteousness must smell like.
This is a rather strange fixation because Ireland - a small Ireland on the edge of Europe - already does an awful lot to persecute Israel in just about every way that it can.
In fact one could aruge with some credibility that on a per-capita basis, no other nation devotes more of its parliamentary time, media coverage and diplomatic activity to taking a partisan position about a conflict on the other side of the world which it has literally nothing to do with. Certainly no other nation which maintains that it is steadfastly “neutral.”
Among Ireland’s achievements during a very busy 2024 for anti-Israel fervor:
It succeeded in creating an environment so hostile that Israel closed its diplomatic mission (a move unprecedented in Europe); it advanced the first selective boycott bill targeting the Jewish state in Europe; it rallied nations behind the idea of kicking Israel out of the EU; and, of course, it joined South Africa’s lawfare at the ICC.
Ireland does not have a significant armed force. The one that it has has anyway decided that on principle it will no longer be buying military equipment from Israel.
The rallying cry to “do more” presumably, therefore, does not include an urging to engage in military intervention. So instead those making the call are forced to engage in a bizarre sort of witch hunt attempting to hone in on any of the ever-decreasing number of ways in which Ireland and Israel are intertwined.
Thus did Cork City engage in the rather strange spectacle of formally “banning” Netanyahu and the Israeli government from setting foot in Cork.
And when not thwarting things that would never happen anyway, the pro-Palestinian movement enjoys reading a “news” website (The Ditch) whose entire reason for existence appears to be writing journalistic “exposes” revealing how 5KG of weapon parts may have overflown Ireland for 10 minutes at 40,000 feet on a DHL flight - thereby sullying the pristine neutrality of Irish skies momentarily and forcing Tadhg to take time away from writing one anti-Israel post to sharing one of their articles.
The head of Ireland’s Central Bank was dragged before parliament recently to answer angry questions as to why they are fulfilling their obligation to facilitate the sale of Israel government bonds.
Trinity College Dublin became the first mainstream academic institution to completely sever ties with Israeli institutions, bowing to student pressure.
And Irish newspapers carry pieces like these probing into the scandalous state of affairs whereby Ireland and Israel engage in doing business:
How Does An Antisemitic Comic Land Irish Government Funding? By Asking For It!
This is why, maybe, Ireland has proven itself unable or unwilling to do anything about anti-Israelism that is really about Jews:
When the background noise against Israel is so vitriolic that when somebody pops up and says: “great! Fire more rockets at Tel Aviv” it sounds like just another take on morningtime television.
Even after sharing a post in which he appeared to defend rape on October 7th (and endorsing a conspiracy theory claiming that Israeli deaths were due to ‘friendly fire’) he was platformed at an Irish arts center and his work on overcoming alcoholism “Gatman” is listed as having received funding from the Irish Arts Council:
Cork City Council chipped in too, apparently. Although that’s not surprising given that the municipality has effectively declared itself an Israel Free Zone:
Lest is not be clear from the name, the Irish Arts Council is in fact an organ of the Irish Governmenmt:
…the national government agency for funding, developing and promoting the arts in Ireland.
Sophie Motley - the Artistic Director of the Project Arts Centre - described Hickey as a “national treasure.”
Being a rabid Jew-hater and conspiracy theorist isn’t an impediment to receiving state commissions for theatrical productions in today’s Ireland (I could point to Hickey’s weird fasincation with 9/11 but at this point citing examples seems redundant. There are a lot of them.)
This remarkable tolerance of anti-Jewish bigotry in Ireland permeates other arenas of public life - including politics and, of course, the media.
The Irish Times is Ireland’s newspaper of record. Mary Leland reviewed Hickey’s performance for the paper last August.
The last lines of Leland’s review contains this observation - the most polite kind of saying this possible that - you know - if you’re going to throw adorn yourself in the hallowed flag of Palestine … you might want to throw in there that there’s a wee bit of political grandstanding here (or disclose that you’re not actually a comedian but rather a professional Jew hater).
Leland writes:
It must be added that the itinerary omits any notable reference to Palestine, yet during the closure’s inevitable standing ovation there it is: the flag unfurled against Hickey’s chest like an emblem, but of what? Have we been thinking of Palestine throughout this performance? The thought itself unfurls like an accusation, casting the play in an altogether different debate.
Like most online personalities who devote themselves to propagating hate speech, Hickey plays a game of cat and mouse with tech platforms, which he invariably decries as being (somehow) in cahoots with the evil Zionist overlords who saturate his worldview.
In this sense, Hickey is to be congratulated for the audacity but ingenuity of this self-fulfilling prophecy: if you create anti-Semitic hate speech, you will be deplatformed by platforms which object to hate speech.
You can then weaponise that as further evidence of the Zionist cabal and leverage that to lap up an unending supply of more crazies:
Patent Pending: The Invisibility Cloak Called ‘Just Anti Zionist’
It’s impossible not to draw some observations about the kind of anti-Semitism that Tadhg embodies and which has succeeded in making it into the mainstream in Ireland. If it could be captured with a description, it would be something like:
“We’re just anti-Zionist! We have absolutely nothing against Jews! Call me anti-Semitic? There you go ahead - you Jews are always playing the anti-Semitism card. Oh shit! I meant typical Israeli. Or is it Zionist? Whatever we’re going with, I don’t like you. But it has absolutely nothing whatsover to do with you being Jewish, this I can assure you. Actually, you’re being quite anti-Semitic yourself. You are trivialising actual antisemitism, you know”
(Okay, that was more than a flavor)
The self-assuredness of those who don the anti-Zionism invisibility cloak is also quite something to witness. I wonder, too, does it ever occur to them how unconvincing an act it is.
As a Jew, few things are stranger than somebody who isn’t Jewish and who appears to know rather little about your faith try to lecture you on your religion.
The centrality of “good Jews” to this strategem can scracely be understated. They are absolutely vital: the ideological cover needed to “prove” the theory.
So in a desperate grasp to grab whatever Jews he can find for ideological cover and to deflect against accurate charges of anti-Semitism, Tadhg latches onto … True Torah Jews, Neturei Karta, and whoever else he can dredge up on the internet.
Unlike Tadhg I suspect, I’ve read some of their literature. It’s nothing even close to the hatefulness of Tadhg’s perma-anger. What seems lost on Tadhg, and while it’s a small point, it’s a telling one: arguing that Judaism does not support Zionism does not automatically mean endorsing the view that other Jews who think otherwise should be annihilated by missile-fire. It is not necessarily a plain endorsement of terror.
These “good Jews” are beckoned from the far corners of the internet - which creates the impression that they’re both far more numerous and mainstream in the Jewish world than they actually are.
So much as Press TV pumps out a 24/7 stream of fake news, disinformation and lies, Tadhg deludes his equally misinformed followers into believing in a fictional version of the Jewish world that suits their desire to not be anti-Semitic but which, sadly, doesn’t actually exist.
This is, I reckon, why the “just anti-Zionist” thing seems to have first taken root in Ireland before propagating, as a great idea, to other parts of the world. If you don’t know any Jews in real life, it’s much easier to belief random facts about them - including that Max Blumenthal carries weight as a legitimate commentator or that your average pulpit rabbi in the Diaspora conducts Shabbat services hot off the back of an interfaith dialogue and shares your rejection of Zionism as “anti-Semitic” (oh, please!)
But even here we find that the swiss cheese of Tadhg’s unconvincing act is littered with holes.
He often takes aim at the “chosen people” and espouses messaging about Jewish supremacy (as well as control of the media, government, and much more). That doesn’t sound much like opposition to Israeli policies. That reeks of plain old anti-Semitism.
To illustrate the extent of the mental gymnastics anti-Semites demand that “good Jews” pass through to avoid being hated or worse, it’s worth pausing for a moment to think them through:
So you’re okay with Jews so long as they repudiate Zionism. But you still hate Jews for “Jewish supremacy?” So do they need to go another hurdle to gain your hallowed stamp of acceptability?
For the vast majority of Jews either: live in Israel (more than half of them), have family in Israel (another significant percentage) or live in the Diaspora but support Zionism, all Tadhg has to offer is one bilious tweet after the other:
Tadhg is also, of course, a fervent proponent of the idea that Jews are to blame for their own hatred:
Accusing Jews of being “demonic” is another favorite part of Tadhg’s rhetoric, too.
And he relishes in making fun of the appearance of Jews he dislikes (or supporters of them) - making “jokes” that they look “inbred.” So beyond being a Jew-hater and a guy who despises Israel … Tadhg is kind of just … generally a pretty ugly human being.
And it’s a trite response, in a sense, but equally, it merits repetition as it’s another good yardstick by which the authenticity of anti-Israelism can be assessed: while Tadhg wants to devote his life to railing against Israel, there is no evidence that he has taken even a vague interest in any other geopolitical conflict currently taking place in the world.
The Soundtrack To Tadhg’s Wedding Will Be: Boom, Boom, Tel Aviv
Call me naive, but I still have a hard time wrapping my head around how profoundly hate-filled a single person can be that they wish to open their wedding with a soundtrack about a (literal) missile attack on a city more than one thousand miles away.
Much like Hamasniks foist AK-47s into the hands of toddlers on public stages in Gaza, Tadhg’s wedding, apparently, will get started with an orgy. Not of that kind, maybe, but of hate:
If you don’t feel like watching the video, I can give you the quick summary. To a backdrop of footage of Iranian ballistic missiles atacking Tel Aviv, the lyrics are:
“Boom Boom Tel Aviv / This is what you get for all your evil deeds / You brought this upon yourself it’s your time to bleed”
I don’t know. Maybe that tweet was in jest. Is that the comedy I’ve been missing all this time? I’m in stitches!
Full Tolerance For Hate Speech And Zero Commitment To IHRA
What Tadhg Hickey also represents - beyond the vulgarity of irrational hatred - is the complete and utter failure of the Republic of Ireland to take any meaningful action to ensure that the country doesn’t become a hotbed of persecution for its tiny Jewish population.
The Irish approach can be best described as an extreme case of selective laissez-faire.
While legislation exists that would arguably make Hickey’s posts criminal offences (see, for example, the Prohibition Of Incitement To Hatred Act 1989), and while Ireland has even recently discussed revising its outdated hate speech laws, this legislation never seems to be used to actually prosecute Jew hatred.
The Irish position instead seems to be that so long as Israel is the target (and not explicitly Jews), anything is fair game: like anti-Israel demos parading through Dublin featuring mock rockets and the flags of terrorist movements. So long as you back your just-anti-Zionist cloak when you go to protest you’ll be A-OK.
For Irish-born Zionist Jews like me (yes, this is probably the most contradictory and ill-fitting ethnic identity possible; yes, I’ve been in therapy) this creates a strange kind of cognitive dissonance. Which might explain, in part, why The Matrix is one of my all-time favorite movies.
Official Ireland has long told its small Jewish population that they are a “treasured” minority. I always found this kind of curious.
While it’s heartening in an abstract sort of way to know that Ireland once elected a Jewish lord mayor (and all that) Jewish communities who live in the diaspora generally set their sights simply on peaceful coexistence rather than in being museum exhibits or held up as evidence of a makebelieve coexistence dictated on somebody else’s terms.
To hear Zionism described as an ideology of hate and likened to Nazism makes any supposed tolerance ring very hollow. You cannot graft your own idea of national identity on any people. Accepting Jews only when they conform to a fringe stream of anti-Zionism Judaism is not vastly differently than just deeming Jews and Judaism unpalatable in your society altogether.
Within the laughably small microcosm of Irish-born Jews (who could probably all pack into a generously sized pub at a push) my voice may be a hawkish one. But I’m aware that others - especially those living in Ireland - pursue a more conciliatory tone and seek, endlessly, to find some sort of “better path.”
As much as I think that they are well-intentioned but hopelessly misguided, I recognise that there are other opinions in the room. But in pursuing some kind of reconciliation, I hope that they can protect collective interests:
When it comes to anti-semitism, judge Ireland not by what it says, or what it says it will do, but what it actually does.
Alarmed at the rise in anti-Semitism carrying on the back of the country’s longstanding and fierce opposition to Israel, Irish ministers, earlier this year, held two rounds of dialogue with Jewish leaders both in Ireland and in the US (the latter preceding a traditional annual audience with the US president).
Foreseeing that the second Trump administration could blow a chilly breeze over Ireland’s economy - massively dependent upon multinational corporations, many of whom are based in the US - Ireland engaged in a brief round of what might be called deceptive pacification.
Importantly, the IHRA definition was finally endorsed.
But the very first Holocaust Remembrance event after its adoption was marred by the presence of a virulently anti-Israel president who, like Hickey, peddles in conspiracy theories, and who used the platform to criticise Israel’s conduct in Gaza. You may well wonder what point there is in adopting a definition if your (actual) head of state is going go make a joke of it a few months later?
So perhaps this is the resolution to the dissonance I perceive between the Ireland I once knew and what I witness from afar today: the rot emanates from the top even if many are at least kind of ambivalent about the whole conflict.
The chart of Irish-Israel relations has been in freefall for some time now. But alongside the Irish basketball’s decision to refuse to shake hands with their Israelis opponent, this will be remembered as another moment when the Jewish world awoke to the realisation of how bizarrely strenuous Ireland’s dislike for Israel truly is.
This was followed by a more significant blow to reconciliation that I do not believe there is any way back from: Israel’s decision to shutter its embassy in Dublin which was followed by the Irish Government’s miraculous abandoment of its long-term opposition to a bill which will criminalise trade with Israeli businesses over the green line.
Like discovering that yes, Tadhg Hickey actually wants all of us Israelis to die in a ballistic missile strike, however, it’s probably for the better that things map out this way.
Compared to the hazy world that Hickey inhabits, when true colors are finally shown, the reality we’ve been navigating becomes only more vivid.
Bonus: Questions For Tadhg
Combatting bigotry is a team sport. You don’t need to be Jewish to take part. If you’re not, know that your support will be appreciated.
Here are a few ready-to-go interview questions:
1: Why Israel, Man?
You’ve written that you would like to dedicate the rest of your life to seeing Israel eradicated and seem to devote most of your waking hours to defaming the country.
You say that you do so out of a sense of monumental justice.
There are many humans rights issues in the world, but you seem to have shown no interest in them, ever.
Why is that?
2: How Do You Deal With Facts?
The majority of Jews are Zionists. Normative Judaism places the connection to our ancestral homeland - for which Zion is a metaphor - at the center of our faith.
You insist, however, that Zionism has nothing to do with Judaism.
As a non-Jew, you are effectively telling the majority of the world’s Jews that they are defining their identity incorrectly.
If I told you that as an Irishman you are bound to love Israel, you would tell me that it’s not my place to define your Irishness.
So why do you deny that right selectively to Jews?
3: Why do you engage in antisemitism tropes?
If you only have a problem with “Zionists,” why do you tweet about things like “Jewish supremacy?” Why is all your commentary about Zionists - and Israel - laced with classic antisemitism?
4: How do you plan to destroy Israel if words aren’t enough?
So you’ve mentioned that you want defeating Israel to be your lifelong battle.
But tweeting from Cork doesn’t seem to be making much of a dent in our success.
Do you have a plan B? Does it involve joining a military movement? If so, have you given thought to which and where you might undergo combat training?
5: What kind of Hamas fighter would you be if October 7th Happened Again?
You love ‘resistance’, right? And you were happy to see Iran throwing ballistic missiles at Israel. So presumably you’re fine with indisciminately killing Israels.
That being the case, let’s indulge in some roleplay.
October 7th happens again but this time you’re on the ground.
It’s your moment to liberate Palestine, Tadhg, and you’ve got your dear friends for company!
A fellow resistance member hands you a gun, some matches, and a torch. He screams “Jews - over there!” and points to a family of terrified Israelis (which you call ‘settlers’) cowering for safety.
What’s your next move?
Further Reading
For more information about Tadhg Hickey and his activities, check out these resources:
By: Daniel Rosehill
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License