Why do some Irish people hate Israel so much?

It was a quiet lunch shift at the pub in Oxford where I work, the kind of day when the bar feels more like a confessional than a business. A lone customer, a woman with a light accent I took for Dutch, had just finished her meal and approached to pay. Playing the host, I made small talk.

“Where are you from?” I asked, expecting the usual tourist’s reply. Her face tightened, her voice dropped to a near-whisper. “Israel,” she said, bracing herself as if I might leap over the bar and chase her out into the street. I reassured her – I support Israel, I said, and I’m ashamed of how Jews are being treated in Britain today. The look of relief on her face was almost comical, tinged with a gratitude that felt, in its own way, deeply sad. Christ, I thought, how bad have things become for Israelis here?

She lingered, and we spoke for the next 20 minutes, the empty pub giving us space to talk freely.