Five Peace People - Mairead Maguire, Ann Patterson, Barbara Faibish, Kevin Cassidy and Justin Morahan - were outside Ashkelon prison in southern Israel when Mordechai Vanunu walked to freedom on Wednesday 21st April. Here is a vivid account from Justin of his trip. And yes - he was the person spotted on SKY News with the Irish language banner .

"On Wednesday, we started in the early hours, again by coach, to Ashkelon. Now the media presence was immense. During our vigil, hundreds of Vanunu objectors crowded into the space between us and the prison gates, many of them walked in front of our lines with Israeli flags shouting angrily at us in Hebrew, some tearing posters or throwing liquid. A few made their displeasure known to us through the medium of English. Some of these engaged in friendly dialogue. One of them told me I would be welcome at any time into his home. A young girl suddenly appeared beside me and asked where I came from. She held a poster in Hebrew. It read "Betrayed", she said. We exchanged ideas quietly.

Meanwhile, car drivers made rude gestures, there were two anti-Vanunu dances on the open road. In all cases where anyone interfered with any of us the police intervened, sometimes, we felt, too much. The angry shouts around the prison gates increased as Israeli banners multiplied by the minute. The largest was a yellow one saying "SUSANNAH YORK IS A HYPOCRITE". All the while, Ben the trumpet player drowned out the angry invective with his uplifting music. Then eighteen doves floated into the air. When the gates opened - (you may have seen the prisoner emerge. We didn't) - we saw the angry mob and a few placards of a bodyguard that had been chosen to accompany him. Our chant arose "VANUNU IS FREE". He was driven away. Our chants drowned out the angry ones. Then several dozens of eggs were thrown at us from behind by supermarket workers still in their red SPAR-like uniforms. Several hit their targets. We saw crates of eggs being carried from the supermarket. After ten minutes of this we got directions to return to our coach where we closed all windows and drove home."

More Terrorism by (English) Tabloid
I'm impressed. Yesterday's Irish Times had a story which included the fact that the army NBC teams would be on standby and today two tabloids run the hysterical versions (chemical and nuclear espectively). Chances of the Sunday Star having a Anarchist Bioterror Threat story? It's nice to see that they're at least having to put some proper effort into spreading this nonsense now.

Is Pot Kennedy an Agent Provocateur?
Dear Pat, - I watched with great interest your show this Friday and was very surprised when i discovered that neither you, nor your security expert Guest, appeared to be aware what the description, Agent Provocateur, actually means, this is despite your lengthy discussion on this subject. Contrary to your discussion, Agent Provocateurs are universally agents of the state who are there with the specific purpose of inciting criminal activity from those who would otherwise remain peaceful.

Gardai Want to Restrict Right to March on Mayday
"The hype around the Mayday protests smacks of the methods of George Bush. This is beginning to look like the deception of Weapons of Mass Destruction – a ficitional threat was used to justify a murderous war in Iraq and now we have the Irish Government and the Police creating a fictional threat as a way of curbing the right to protest and undermining basic civil liberties. We believe that the main aim of the hysteria that has been generated by the Gardai around the Mayday protests, is to justify draconian police methods around the visit of George Bush and to discourage the public form participating in those protests."

Street Hassle: Gardai Stalk Activists Distributing leaflets (1) (2)

Bring The Noise Bloc
We want to march to Farmleigh House to express our dissent. We have the right to protest in our own city. If we are stopped by police lines it is our intention to find ways around them.

Is the Hype an Excuse to Arm the Gardai Permanently?
Rory Hearne, convenor of the May Day march and Carnival said "the call by Mr P J Stone from the GRA for front line Gardai to be armed on May Day is completely irresponsible and inflammatory. The reality is that all protests planned for May Day are peaceful. This talk of riots and police being injured is unnecessary and is being hyped up out of all context and perspective. We really have to begin to question the motives for all this. Are these the first steps towards an armed police force and a police state?

All the Mayday News that Fits – Mayday IMC Filter

Independent Media Festival Calendar

An article submitted by indymedia.ie user Dermot Connolly lays out an insiders perspective on the Anti-Bin Tax Campaign and the part played in it by the Socialist Party. Dermot Connolly was one of the central organisers of the Dublin City Campaign for the Socialist Party as was his partner Joan Collins. His piece explains why neither of them are members of the Socialist Party any more and why Joan Collins is standing as an independent Bin Tax candidate. This article is one of the longest and most detailed perspectives published to date on this pivotal struggle against the imposition of privatisation by stealth - a privatisation agenda driven by the unspoken neo-liberal creed being pursued by the FF/PD Government. The article has caused a significant degree of controversy as the comments below it reveal and has led directly to attacks on the indymedia.ie site by persons unknown aimed at making the article unreadable.

Extract: "Some problems in a campaign of this type could be expected when the pressures came on. What was needed was a leadership who understood the need for maximum unity in action, and were prepared to compromise on secondary issues to achieve that. In reality what opened up was a struggle by different political groups to try and grab the leadership of the struggle."

• Read the Complete Article and the Many Reactions Here
• Indymedia Ireland 'Bin Tax' Archive
• Socialist Party Account of 'Bin Wars'

Irish Times Chief Executive asks British Government for help in stamping out "unauthorised" material appearing in the paper. "Secret and personal" letter from the British Ambassador details contacts and refers to then Irish Times Editor Douglas Gageby, a Protestant like Major McDowell, as a "renegade white nigger".

Strange things have a habit of appearing on the IMC Ireland newswire late in the evenings and are a sometimes meagre reward for weary unpaid hacks trawling through the daily deletions. This one exceptionally is a stone-cold classic and the image copy of the letter a downright exclusive as far as we can tell. Let us know if somebody else got there first. We now hand you over to 'Captain White'.

For Captain White's full commentary on the letter, a full size cut out and keep version of the letter and a fistful of interesting and provocative letters to the Irish Times Editor on surrounding issues which have remained unpublished just hit the 'feature continues' link below

Update: Jack Lane Slams Irish Times

Update 2: Revealed: Jack Lane's 10 Jan 2003 letter to Geraldine Kennedy

INDYMEDIA CENTRE NOW OPEN: Independent Media Festival Details
"The Indymedia Ireland collective and Community Media Network invite you to a Festival rich with events including: screenings of independent media from around the world; workshops on video and audio editing; talks by independent media producers; workshops on Free Software and exhibitions of photography by Indymedia contributors. There will also be fora on topics including the role of the media in Ireland, the Mayday protests, what's really going on in the EU, and much more. You are invited to learn and do and teach, to hang out at the new Indymedia Center cafe and more importantly, in keeping with the ethos of Indymedia, you are requested and urged to come down and help out between 12 and 6pm from today onwards. We are also asking people to send us Printed Material for the Exhibition." "Virtual warriors hit the street eh?’ sez one wag: ‘probably sick of tearing down walls in cyberspace."

Can't Hit the Street on Mayday? Join the EuroMayday Netparade
'A virtual demo that runs thru a heavily guarded and branded city put under siege by insurgent legions of brain+chain+temp workers and assorted anarchists, commies, queers and greens. The marching avatars are digital simulacra of today's exploited masses of neoliberalism: précaires, precari@s, precari, cognitarie, contingent knowledge and service workers'

MAYDAY, MAYDAY!! Why precari@s, intermittents, cognitari/e are rebelling across NEUROPA...
We are convinced that at the core of the process of neoliberal accumulation lies flexible and contingent labor by the young, women, migrants and casualized employees, in crucial reproductive and distribution services, and in the knowledge, culture, and media industries that provide the raw material on which the system functions: information >>>

MayDAY ViDeoBLOg; Film reLEase dAte - ENd of MAy;
'A Garda Spokesperrson said they were Powerless to stop the Video' (Examiner, 3/4/04) *1* *2* *3*

Dublin Council of Trade Unions by 11-10 (The narrowest of margins) vote down ATGWU Motion calling on The DCTU to have their May Day March as normal on May 1ST this year (2004)
"Some of the stuff said by some of the DCTU Delegates was absolutely appalling, and they were following the black media propaganda of "thousands of armed anarchists going to reign terror on the law abiding citizens of Dublin on May Day" (I kid you not! This load of bollocks was repeated several times by a number of the Delegates last night, and not matter how many times we rebutted their lies, they kept repeating them)".

2 + 2 = 15,000! Mainstream Media Mayday Maths Mix-up! How many people are ACTUALLY coming?
"Of course, the number is invented, for various reasons. It helps to create a climate of fear and tension if the public is led to believe that a "tidal wave" of "hate-filled" anarchists are arriving on Irish shores (similar to the methods used by the media to create hysteria surrounding asylum seekers and refugees). . . But the real reason, I suspect, is that the Special Branch and the Detective Unit are worried that some day soon, they will sit down at their desks to a P45 (they really shouldn't worry with a law & order jackboot thug like McDowell at the helm)."

Padded Bloc - get your a foam on!
"With all the unjustified media hype and furore, unfortunately the potential for many Gardai to be anxious, over-excited, and ultimately violent towards protesters over the course of the weekend exists. The advance scaremongering measures used by certain childish sections of the media, and the Gardai, mean that infringements of our civil liberties may well go unchallenged. We have to protect ourselves against a Government that may well try use its military and police force to physically injure its own citizens and others, i.e. us, the ordinary people."

Dublin masked rioters inspired by Iraq's 'Comical Ali'
Members all wear distinctive 'Dublin City Riot' gang colours and arm themselves with long sticks.

Mayday Hype Print Edition
Print out and Share with your friends of keep it yourself

Special Ongoing Special mayday Mayday Edition
of Indymedia Free with this hastily typed feature . . . . is available here - :-|'

Poetry Corner
"dont believe the hype it's a sequel
imc irl has got no equal
when it comes to the speed of the moves
we move faster than the hooves
of those horses
for policemens courses"
'Ya Boy0z show 'em what ya got - keep on spinning the wheels of steel': sez another Wag.