Adam Boulton: With Michelle O’Neill becoming Northern Ireland’s first nationalist leader, is a united Ireland within ‘touching distance’?
The confirmation of Michelle O’Neill as first minister of Northern Ireland is historic.
She is the first representative of the nationalist community, committed to uniting Ireland, to become the leader of the Stormont Assembly, an integral part of the devolved United Kingdom.
Ms O’Neill is also complemented in the south by another woman, Mary Lou McDonald, the president of their party, Sinn Fein, and the leader of the opposition in the Irish parliament.
As polls stand Ms McDonald is on course to be the first woman prime minister of Ireland.
The two leaders often appear together and were pictured on newspaper front pages after the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) lifted its block on re-establishing the power-sharing government in Northern Ireland.
Asked about a united Ireland Ms McDonald sounded confident. “In historic terms, it is within touching distance,” she told reporters.
Is she right though? Not according to the Westminster government. The 76-page document enshrining the deal with the DUP which MPs endorsed is called Safeguarding the Union and is shot through with language affirming Northern Ireland’s constitutional status as part of the UK.
Ms O’Neill and Ms McDonald clearly have electoral appeal.
Both women grew up in the Catholic community in republican families. Ms O’Neill’s father, Brendan Doris, was interned as a provisional IRA prisoner and served as a Sinn Fein councillor.
Middle-class Ms McDonald’s credentials are more remote: her great uncle, James O’Connor, an IRA member, was executed by the British during the Irish Civil War. That is ancient history, Ms O’Neill and Ms McDonald would have us believe.
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Northern Ireland: What happens now?
Dispelling the shadow of the gunman
The rise in the popularity of Sinn Fein is attributed in part to attracting women, especially from Catholic backgrounds, to vote for them, precisely because they dispel the shadow of the gunman. The two mothers of two seem to many to be the embodiment of the republican movement’s switch to seek power via the ballot box rather than the bullet.
Unlike the previous generation of Sinn Fein leadership, typified by Martin McGuinness and Gerry Adams, neither were active during the so-called “armed struggle” of the Troubles. Ms O’Neill became a member of Sinn Fein at the age of 21 after the Belfast Agreement was signed on Good Friday 1998.
Around the same time, Ms McDonald, who is eight years older, briefly joined Fianna Fail, one of Ireland’s two mainstream parties. By 2002, she was running unsuccessfully for office as a Sinn Fein candidate. She served a term for Sinn Fein in the European Parliament from 2004 and has been a TD, a member of Dail Eireann, Ireland’s parliament, since 2011.
Pic: PA
McDonald favourite to be next taoiseach
Ireland is due to hold a general election in the next 12 months. Sinn Fein tops the opinion polls with 27%, ahead of the current coalition partners Fine Gael on 20% and Fianna Fail on 17%.
That makes Ms McDonald favourite to be the next taoiseach. If so, Ireland would be united at least in having female Irish republican political leaders in both the north and south.
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Of course, Ms McDonald may not be elected and Ms O’Neill may not actually be first minister for long.
Stormont could well be suspended again. Ms O’Neill has already twice lost the post of deputy first minister when her DUP counterparts as first minister, Arlene Foster and Paul Givan, each resigned.
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Sunak ‘will not evade me forever’
Communities have refused to share power
The Northern Ireland Assembly has not sat for nearly half its existence since 1998 because one of the two communities, unionist or nationalist, refused to share power in the executive with the other.
Under the Belfast Agreement, the first and deputy first ministers have equal authority. The symbolically important top job goes to the party which has the most members of the legislative assembly elected.
Sinn Fein had 27 MLAs at the last election. Ms O’Neill qualifies to be first minister because the unionist vote is split between parties, with the DUP on 25 MLAs and Ulster Unionists with nine.
The Troubles stuttered to an end in the 1990s because neither side could win the terrorist conflict, which claimed over 3,000 lives in some 30 years.
Pic: PA
Prime ministers have tried to appease Northern Irish public
Rapprochement between the Irish and British governments was facilitated by the two countries being members of the European Union, and by the consequent modernisation of Ireland.
The UK’s referendum vote in 2016 to leave the EU was especially problematic for Northern Ireland. A clear majority in the six counties voted to remain to no avail, while the then dominant DUP were fierce Brexiteers.
Since then, successive British prime ministers have tried to appease the Northern Irish public – and intermittently to honour the UK’s commitments under the Belfast agreement – by keeping Northern Ireland, uniquely, in both the EU and UK trading blocks.
Growing support for united Ireland
Support for a united Ireland grew, with 57% of the rising generation of 18-24-year-olds in Northern Ireland favouring it in opinion polls. By no means all Catholics want a united Ireland but in demographic terms they are overtaking Protestants.
The DUP considered threats to the union lay in measures which kept trade borders open, “north-south”, with the EU, but imposed them, “east-west”, with mainland Britain. That, and a largely unspoken objection to the idea of a Roman Catholic republican woman as the political leader of Northern Ireland, lay behind their refusal, now lifted, to take part in the devolved government.
For the time being re-establishing Stormont could be a smart move by the Unionists.
Pic: PA
Responsibilities of office have dampened separatist urge
A united Ireland remains the automatic Article One in any Sinn Fein manifesto. But interview Ms McDonald on the campaign trail and she is much more interested in housing and inequality.
Ms O’Neill has been calling for the return of Stormont so she can govern and sort out Northern Ireland’s problems. The Westminster government has made funding for public services conditional on a functioning assembly.
From Scotland to Catalonia, the responsibilities of office have dampened the separatist urge. Public enthusiasm for big constitutional changes fades when voters just want whoever is in power to deliver.
The Good Friday Agreement says a united Ireland will come about if there is a public desire on both sides of the border for a referendum and if both the people of Northern Ireland and Ireland both vote, separately, for it.
The Irish prime minister, Leo Varadkar, 45, says we are “on a path” to a united Ireland “in my lifetime”. Sir Keir Starmer, the British leader of the opposition, argues “it’s not even on the horizon”.
Ms McDonald is a politician to her fingertips and speaks as one. “Touching distance” sounds very close until you put it in the “historic context” of half a millennium’s disputation.
Michelle O’Neill is appearing on Sunday Morning With Trevor Phillips on Sky News from 8.30am this morning
Thousands of pro-Palestine demonstrators protested in Malmo, Sweden on Thursday against Israel’s competing in this year’s Eurovision Song Contest.
Protesters waving green, white, black and red Palestinian flags packed the historic Stortorget square near Malmo’s 16th-century town hall before a planned march through the city for a rally in a park several miles from the Eurovision venue.
Police estimated that between 10,000 and 12,000 people took part. Among those in the crowd was Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg.
The march took place at the same time as Israel’s entrant – 20-year-old Eden Golan – was taking part in the final dress rehearsal for the second Eurovision semi-finals, in the Malmo arena.
During the march – which included families with young children, and people with dogs and bicycles – smoke canisters in the colours of the Palestinian flag were set off, with some protesters carrying signs displaying images of Gaza civilians who have been injured amid the Hamas-Israel conflict.
There was also a banner done in the style of Eurovision with the word “genocide” on it – an accusation vigorously denied by Israel amid the war with Hamas.
Security in Malmo is high, and extra police have been drafted in from neighbouring Denmark and Norway.
During an earlier rehearsal on Tuesday, Golan was met with boos and cries of “Free Palestine,” and an audience member appeared to have a Palestinian flag removed from them in the auditorium.
The EBU has said only flags that represent countries taking part, and the rainbow flag, can be brought to the event.
They have said they will remove any other “flags, symbols, clothing, items and banners being used for the likely purpose of instrumentalising the TV shows”.
Israel’s Eden Golan with Hurricane for Israel. Pic: Sarah Louise Bennett/EBU
The 20-year-old singer performed her song Hurricane while flanked by five backing dancers and centred around a large wheel-like prop in the centre of the stage.
Earlier lyric changes
The song has been tweaked three times, after an initial version titled October Rain was ruled too political by the EBU who believed some lyrics referred to the 7 October Hamas attacks on Israel.
Some still believe that some lyrics in the current song – including “Dancin’ in the storm… I’m still broken from this hurricane,” still refer to attacks which killed over 1,000 people and resulted in hundreds of hostages being taken.
In the run-up to the competition – which is the world’s largest live music event – there have been calls for Israel to be banned over their ongoing ground offensive in Gaza.
However, the EBU – which says it is an apolitical organisation – has ruled that Israel can take part as they say it has not broken any broadcasting rules.
The EBU has also condemned harassment and abuse of artists competing in the show and said they form no part of the decision-making process. As it stands no performer has withdrawn from the contest.
Pic: Sarah Louise Bennett/EBU
More than 34,000 people have been killed, and over 77,000 have been injured in Gaza since the conflict began, according to Gaza’s Hamas-led health ministry.
The second-semi finals
The run-through came ahead of the second semi-final this evening, which will choose the final 10 acts to go into the Grand Final.
Other acts taking part in the semi-final tonight include Norway’s Gate, San Marino’s band Megara, Switzerland’s Nemo and Danish entrant Saba, – all of whom called for a ceasefire in Gaza and the “safe return” of Israeli hostages in a joint statement in March.
The UK’s act, Olly Alexander, and Ireland’s Bambie Thug were also part of the joint statement. Both performed in the first semi-final on Tuesday and will be performing in the final.
The artists rejected calls from Palestinian groups to boycott the music contest, saying they “firmly believe in the unifying power of music”.
Golan, who has been performing since she was nine years old, left Israel when she was six to live in Russia with her family, but returned when she was 18.
She told ITV News she could not have asked “for a better year to be representing my country” earlier this week.
The Grand Final will see 26 countries battle it out on Saturday night.
Sky News will be in Malmo with updates, a live blog, and all the biggest news from the contest as it happens.
World
Club World Cup: FIFA threatened with legal action by players and leagues over new men’s competition
FIFA has been warned of a threatened mass revolt and legal action by the world’s footballers and leagues over its new men’s Club World Cup amid welfare concerns.
A letter has been sent by global players’ union FIFPRO and the World Leagues Forum to FIFA president Gianni Infantino demanding the 32-team competition is not played as planned in June and July next year.
Chelsea and Manchester City have qualified for the event, lined up for the United States as part of Mr Infantino’s expansion of FIFA competitions. The union fears this has congested the calendar and endangered the health of players.
Sky News revealed in December concerns from players in England that they are being asked to play too many games with a threat of legal action against football authorities.
Manchester City’s Kevin De Bruyne and Chelsea’s Enzo Fernandez. Both teams have already qualified for the Club World Cup. Pic: Reuters
That has now been stepped up to the global level ahead of key FIFA meetings in Bangkok, Thailand, next week.
FIFPRO Acting General Secretary Stephane Burchkalter and WLA counterpart Jerome Perlemuter wrote to Mr Infantino last week to warn legal advice has been commissioned ahead of potential action against FIFA to force them to resolve concerns.
In a letter obtained by Sky News, they wrote: “We shall be compelled to advise our members on the options available to them, both individually and collectively, to proactively safeguard their interests.”
FIFA, the governing body for world football, has also expanded the World Cup for national teams – growing from 32 to 48 teams for the 2026 edition in North America.
The FIFPRO and WLF letter added: “FIFA has continually and consistently made unilateral decisions that benefit its own competitions and commercial interests, while negatively affecting national leagues and players.
“Over a significant period, FIFA has ignored repeated attempts by leagues and unions to engage on this issue.
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Analysis: ‘Packed’ football calendar
They added: “As a result of FIFA’s recent strategy of expanding its own competitions, the calendar is now beyond saturation, to the point that national leagues are unable to properly organise their competitions, resulting in economic harm, whereas players are being pushed beyond their limits, with significant injury risks and impacts on their welfare and fundamental rights.
“Leagues and players cannot simply be expected to ‘adapt’ to FIFA’s decisions, which are driven by FIFA’s business strategy.
“We have reached the point where this situation must immediately be addressed both from a procedural and substantive perspective.”
Read more:
Sky Sports to show all EFL opening weekend matches for first time
Union threatens legal action over increasing number of matches
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The Club World Cup is set to be staged every four years, replacing the little-regarded annual seven-team event that City won the final version of in December.
After a three-team group stage, there will be another four matches up to the final.
The competition is taking the quadrennial slot used up to 2017 for the now-defunct, eight-country Confederations Cup that served as a World Cup test event.
Sky News has contacted FIFA for comment.
World
Israel-Hamas war: Netanyahu vows his country will ‘stand alone’ if it has to after Biden’s weapons supply threat
Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed Israel will “stand alone” if it has to, after the US threatened to stop sending some weapons to its ally.
The Israeli prime minister said “we shall fight with our fingernails” if needed “but we have much more than fingernails”.
“And with that strength of spirit, with God’s help, together we shall be victorious,” he added.
His remarks in a video statement came after US President Joe Biden vowed to halt offensive weapons supplies to Israel if it attacks the southern Gaza city of Rafah.
Follow latest:
Updates on Israel-Hamas war
An unnamed Israeli operation earlier said Israel will press ahead with its operation in Rafah and elsewhere in the Gaza Strip, Reuters reported.
And chief armed forces spokesperson Rear Admiral Daniel Hagari said Israel’s military has the munitions it requires for the operations.
Palestinian witnesses said Israeli tanks and warplanes have bombarded areas of Rafah on Thursday, according to the same news agency.
Palestinian militant groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad also said their fighters fired anti-tank rockets and mortars at Israeli tanks gathered on the eastern outskirts of the city.
Israel claims four battalions of Hamas fighters are hiding in Rafah, where the population has been swelled by hundreds of thousands of people seeking refuge from bombardments elsewhere in the Palestinian territory.
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