Price of chivalry on the front line too high for Israeli army

How strange a stance to take when more than 500 children were murdered in Gaza last year by Israel. For shame.
Robert Sullivan
Bantry, Co Cork

DEPENDS ON ITS FRIENDS

Without the financial, military and diplomatic support of America and the EU, Israel would be an unexceptional, small Middle Eastern state, not the regional superpower it is.

Even with foreign backing, Israel scores only Pyrrhic victories, judging by its failure to enhance its strategic and political position. It pays lip service to the two-state solution, while vowing to hold onto most of its archipelago of settlements and all of Jerusalem. If severely pressed, the most it will concede is a cramped pseudo-state with minimal sovereignty to the Palestinians.
Daniel Teegan
Union Hall, Co Cork

PUTIN IS SYRIA’S ONLY HOPE

Having read Max Hastings’ and Hala Jaber’s articles (“We must parley with Putin’s power grab”, Focus; and “Russian bombs trigger jubilation in loyalist Syria”, Foreign News, last week) I am more convinced than ever that Vladimir Putin’s involvement in Syria is the only hope for the war-ravaged country.

The West should be glad that he is helping the Assad regime to bring some stability to the quagmire, even as President Barack Obama goes on about a coalition of 60 countries fighting Isis. Should the Assad regime fall, the murder and throat cutting by Isis of the Syrian people would make the murderous Vlad the Impaler look like a boy scout.
Tom Winters
Drogheda, Co Louth

LET RUSSIA FINISH THE JOB

Russia was invited by a sovereign nation — Syria — to help to defeat terrorist “rebels” (many of whom are not even Syrian citizens but are mercenaries) who have been supplied and trained by the West with the objective of removing a dictator: Bashar al-Assad. The western coalition supporting the anti-Assad rebels was not invited.

In the interests of ending this costly and deadly fiasco, it is high time to let the Russians finish the job that was started by the West and end the Isis terror once and for all.
Dr Michael Pravica
Nevada, USA

Safety comes first in Irish American football

FURTHER to your article concerning the Irish American Football Association’s (IAFA) interactions with the Department of Transport, Tourism and Sport (“Gridiron chiefs in clash with sports ministry”, News, last week), we would like to clarify some of the issues raised.

We are the governing body for the sport in Ireland, which is growing rapidly. We are actively promoting Ireland as a destination for major American football events. We do not have any entitlement to run such events and would never seek to have it. Our policy is to assist the organisers, and help them connect with the local American football community. This was our role in the Croke Park classic last year.

As you report, there is a difference of opinion with the department over our policy of not sanctioning or participating in third party
events which do not comply with the safety
and welfare requirements adhered to by association members.

The Irish Sports Council supports this policy, the department does not agree. It wanted us to drop the requirements for small-scale private operators, and even force our members to participate in their activities. We refused to do so.

We believe Maurice Quinn, a civil servant, wrote the correspondence you quote after being contacted by a visiting promoter who had been refused sanction for a small event in Ireland due to serious health and safety concerns. The IAFA is seeking an investigation into the matter.
Cillian Smith, Commissioner,
Irish American Football Association

These developers are two of a kind

I AGREE with Justine McCarthy’s comments about builders and in particular two developers she mentioned (“It’s back to business as usual for the builders — thanks to the Dail”, Comment, last week). Mick Wallace TD was supposedly flabbergasted when a dress code was proposed for Dail Eireann but then had to apologise for calling another deputy “Miss Piggy”. This had shades of the pot calling the kettle black.

He is also supposed to have spent more time in the Dail that any other deputy but he went to Brazil during last year’s World Cup while it was sitting. Now he has claimed that representatives of Cerberus threatened he would be “sorted”. This is more kettle-pot-black stuff from Wallace who previously admitted he threatened to hire a hitman to recover an outstanding debt from a building contractor.

As for Bernard McNamara, he boasted in an interview in January 2010 about his projects being built to extremely high standards. Now people living in some of those buildings are discovering they don’t comply with fire and safety regulations. McNamara also said he was not running anywhere. Two years later he moved to England for bankruptcy reasons.
J Lynch
Cork

Camilla Long shoots a verbal ‘tommy-gun’ from the hip to roundly kill off any potential interest in the newly released Suffragette (Film, Culture, last week). However, she would nearly make one want to go and see it, given the excoriating nature of her review of “this contrived dross”. Long says it was “conceived, packaged and produced entirely to manipulate and fleece a female audience”. With such invective, I’d say there’ll be many a female joining the queue to view.

Long nobly aspires to see an unadulterated and authentic take on the suffragettes’ actual (brutalised) experiences, rather than a honeyed Downton Abbey version. More power to her, but perhaps she could take a softer aim from above the hips next time. That way we could approach films with some curiosity and make our own informed assessment. Pass the popcorn please.

Jim Cosgrove

Lismore, Co. Waterford

Lucey’s comments on Renua tax plan fall flat

IT is unfortunate that your columnist Cormac Lucey has adopted ready, shoot, aim principles in commenting on Renua’s flat-tax proposals (“Renua’s tax plan is bound to fall flat”, Business Comment, last week).

As part of our commitment to open politics, we welcome considered and well-researched criticism of our proposals. It is therefore surprising Lucey’s comments were made without analysing our taxation model. The one he trumpets as being more “progressive” is closest to that of Greenland, an autonomous region of 56,000 people, which has only had this model since 2013.

Lucey then compared our flat tax model for a country of 4.5m people to the federal system of taxation in the world’s largest economy. A small open economy such as Hong Kong or Estonia would have been more appropriate.

Our model allows for the significant dynamic effects a flat tax would ignite in the Irish economy. It should be viewed in conjunction with our capital gains tax proposals. That the two proposals together have transformative potential was ignored entirely.

In a week when watchdogs have been slapped down by the establishment while the substance of their argument is ignored, Lucey would appear to be closing down a debate on flat tax within days of his own think tank proposing one.

That is a puzzle only Schrodinger’s cat might be able to understand.
Lucinda Creighton
TD, Renua Ireland

Animal Farm ‘equality’

The budget has been applauded for finally giving equal treatment to the self-employed. If by equal we mean “a little bit equal” then bravo. The reality is that corporation tax breaks for start-ups are of little value because often there isn’t much profit in the first few years of business. The new earned-income tax credit is to be welcomed but €550 is not €1,650. And so it continues . . . the self-employed will pay more income tax and PRSI (with no guarantee of the dole) than those in employment.

This ingrained discrimination in the tax code is based on a myth; that self-employed people are high-flyers. The truth is that lots of new owner-operators scrape by and would be better off in employment.

Dismantling the discrimination may well take a bit of time, but if the government is really serious about SMEs being the engine of job growth, then surely we ought to hurry up?
Alison McGinley
Director, TaxAssist Accountants, Dublin 4