FROM OUR REPORTERS IN BELFAST

IT IS AN ODD feature of the conflict in the North of Ireland that Irish Nationalists fly Palestinian flags in their neighborhoods while Ulster Loyalists fly Israeli flags in theirs.

Now the UK’s Security Service MI5 has asked that the Israeli flags come down for fear they will attract the wrath of Hamas.

“It’s an awkward business,” said a Security Service officer based in its large establishment in the Eastern suburbs of Belfast, “but just in case, it might be better to perhaps fly a few LGBT+ Pride flags instead. For the moment. Until the Israelis have done what they intend doing. No sense in aggravating the Arabs. Like the Irish, they have a low boiling point. Oh, sorry, did I say that? Can we cut that?”

Loyalist community leader John Never says that instead of taking down the Israeli flags and replacing them with what he calls “the symbols of sodomy”, the British should be giving the Nationalist community in Belfast a taste of what the Israelis are giving the Palestinians in Gaza. “Send the bombers in. Blow them to hell!”