Editorial: President Higgins of Ireland tries to help to lead the EU turn against Israel

​The president of Ireland, Michael D Higgins, has been political in the post.

As head of state, he has often stated his views, most of which reveal unreconstructed socialist or ultra-liberal view of the world.

It is a matter for the people of the Republic of Ireland whether they tolerate this in their head of state, but it is interesting to note that all of President Higgins’s predecessors observed a stance of neutrality in office. They largely suppressed their previously expressed political views, some of which were forthright, when they moved into Áras an Uachtaráin, the presidential residence.

When it comes to Northern Ireland, President Higgins has styled himself as a reconciliatory figure yet in fact he has shown a singularly critical understanding of Britain and its role on this island: he turned down an invite to an RIC memorial; he instructed unionists to be generous over 1916; he actually criticised the lack of integrated education in NI when he presides over a country in which the Catholic church still has a key role in schooling; he said Britain must face up to its history of reprisals; he accused Britain of amnesia over imperialism; of not treating the Irish as equals; over the famine; for its handling of an Indian mutiny.

And even when Northern Ireland was denied a centenary celebration, to placate nationalists, instead having a 1921 church service that merely marked the events on the island a century before, it was too much for the president who spurned his invite.

It is no surprise that President Higgins has led criticism of the EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen for her unequivocal defence of Israel, insisting she wasn’t “speaking for Ireland". The Hamas mass slaughter of Jewish civilians was only 11 days ago. With Leo Varadkar echoing President Higgins, it is Ireland – hardly a friendly country to Israel – that is at the helm of the turn against against the Jewish state.