Shooting and killing was the norm for us too. It has a huge effect
CROSSMAGLEN ACE SEES SIMILARITIES WITH TROUBLES IN PLIGHT OF GAZA KIDS
IT’S not that Oisin Mcconville took it all in his stride when he travelled to Gaza and the West Bank, but he wasn’t exactly bowled over by what he saw either.
The former Armagh star isn’t so crude as to draw nothing but straight lines between what he saw on last week’s trip with Trocaire and what he grew up with in Crossmaglen, but there are no walking away from the parallels either.
“I suppose it might be unfair to make a direct comparison to what was going on in Cross but there’s loads of similarities,” he said.
“I would feel that growing up in the era I grew up in, it was just the norm. I suppose the norm was bombs and shootings and killings, the windows being blown in, all that sort of stuff. “I didn’t realise that wasn’t the norm until I was 11. I definitely think it had a profound effect on me at stages.”
So, he was braced better than most when travelling to the region.
“It was what I expected and maybe just another little layer on top of it. Some of the things that were actually quite nice about it, the kids are so happy, they don’t know any different. “I remember we were driving to a family that had lost seven members in an attack. When we pulled up outside, there were four, five, six kids playing marbles on the street and honestly they were oblivious to the cars. The cars had to avoid them.
“I remember playing football in the road and when the traffic came you pull back and the car goes past.
“But there’s something very innocent about the way they were going on. Those kids seemed to be, on the face of it, very, very happy but the reality for a lot of them is much worse than that.”
He continued: “I’ve probably come back feeling a lot more politically about it than I had done. These guys can hardly walk 100 metres and there’s somebody harassing them.
“We went up into the hills, there was a Palestinian family who had got their land back through a lawyer that is being helped by Trocaire.
“But they were all going up to show us that there was settlements there, and there was an outpost – so basically they were putting down caravans or tents or whatever so that the next thing is to start building on it.”
The harassment that the locals are subjected to reminded him of his own experiences when travelling to Armagh training in the 90s, with myriad checkpoints en route.
“Everyone was collected at Cross at half six, and we would have been in Lurgan at half seven. One day we were stopped six times on the way because they knew what the route was.
“When they took the bags out of the car, they threw on the ground what was [in them], they didn’t put the stuff back in the car.
“We arrived at quarter to 10, we had a cup of tea and we went home again.”
Those days, thankfully, are long gone, but even the hint of a flavour of it returning as the Brexit impasses drags on fills Mcconville with dread.
“When you look at Brexit and most people talk about it economically and economically I’m sure there’s going to be consequences but when I look at Brexit, I just look at – is there a hard border?
“There is a possibility, that might only be a small possibility but there’s a possibility that it could lead to further trouble.
“And for somebody to put us back into that situation, the first thing I’d do is bail out. I’d take the kids and I’d bail out, because I wouldn’t bring my kids up in that scenario.
“There’s no way I would bring my kids up in that now. No chance.”
Oisín Mcconville travelled to the Occupied Palestinian Territories with Trócaire to highlight their Christmas Appeal, which will help to support families who are living in conflict zones around the world. Donate at: www.trocaire.org/christmas-appeal
For somebody to put us back in that situation, the first thing I’d do is bail out. I wouldn’t bring my kids up in that