The picture of Sinn Fein leader and Northern Ireland Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness shaking hands with Queen Elizabeth displays the last great symbolic act of the peace process.
The fact that Democratic Unionist leader Peter Robinson made the introductions further accentuated the historic handshake.
That the queen wore green further accentuated the importance of the moment. It was an extraordinary moment in the history of Ireland and Britain in recent times.
There have been so many, Queen Elizabeth at the Garden of Remembrance in Dublin; US President Bill Clinton on the Falls Road and Shankill Road; Ian Paisley pictured with Martin McGuinness as he agreed to share power.
Memories and peace processes are made of such Kodak moments. The pictures tell a thousand words and enter the popular imagination as well as the history books.
The symbolic value of the McGuinness/Queen Elizabeth handshake will occupy a major place in that pantheon of unique moments.
Northern Ireland was always as much about symbols as it was about realities. The neighborhoods in Belfast, Derry and elsewhere were designated by flags of Britain or the Irish Republic.
Even the curbstones, painted in red white and blue or green and orange marked territories like two rutting tribes.
Those who failed to appreciate the power of symbols in Northern Ireland failed to understand the very engine of daily life there.
You were what your symbols said you were, and you were intensely proud of them.
The clashes were usually over those symbols, a Loyalist march through a nationalist neighborhood, a tricolor flying where unionists demanded it had no right to do so.
Thus the queen meeting McGuinness is far beyond the physical act.
Nothing speaks to the Protestant identity in Northern Ireland like the Queen and all she represents. At any gathering of the tribe her picture is omnipresent and sacrosanct.
In the same way, Martin McGuinness has embodied so much of the Sinn Fein rise throughout The Troubles.
Once a leading IRA member, his part from revolutionary to politician has charted the march of Irish nationalism as it cast off its second class status in Northern Ireland and became a powerful and soon to be equal force.
No one embodies that struggle like Martin McGuinness and his colleague Gerry Adams, so it is fitting that he was be the standard bearer.
What they say and what they do, the queen and the Republican is far less important than the fact that they are both there together.
In the history of the fight for Irish self-determination there is perhaps no other moment like it, a singular moment when a Republican meets a queen, not in any inferior posture but rather the equal.
This queen partook in one of the last great acts of her long reign we suspect. She has given every indication that she treasures this opportunity to make history, the naysayers aside.
It is a credit to both sides that this amazing moment has passed and that future generations will look back and see yet another moment when the British and Irish tribes proclaimed loudly yes we can actually get
along.
20 Comments
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Switch to the desktop site to post a comment.DanOLoingsigh | Jul 02, 2012, 04:32 AM EDT
Thanks for putting me straight...here was I thinking they were fighting for UI, and all the time they just wanted to ge their a***es onto those cosy Stormont chairs...well who would have thunked that!!!
seanomelb | Jul 01, 2012, 07:21 PM EDT
They were waiting outside Stormont to take part in peace talks and prevented from entering by your Orange Bigots and their bullyboys(RUC)and you have the temerity to talk about Neanderthals.
DanOLoingsigh | Jul 01, 2012, 06:45 AM EDT
The real reason SF could not engage earlier was their need to get their own Neanderthals on board…The leaders deserve credit for eventually coming to the table…but to pretend they were there waiting for others is to distort recent history…even GA and MM don’t make that claim….
seanomelb | Jun 30, 2012, 08:24 PM EDT
Only in your mind Dano. For people to sit down there has to be common ground.Every time Sinn Fein wanted to sit and talk the Brits wanted to make all the rules.How many lives would've been saved if they bit the bullet.In fact Dano the Brits had 70yrs. to "fix" the problem but they'd rather back your bigoted orange pals in Belfast and allow injustice to fester. Your high horse is on very slippery high moral(immoral) ground.
DanOLoingsigh | Jun 30, 2012, 08:15 AM EDT
Seano continues to peddle the nonsense that his ‘heroes’ had to continue their attacks on fellow Irish citizens in order to force others to the negotiating table…if that’s true they would have immediately supported the Downing St declaration with an indefinite truce…now wouldn’t they?
seanomelb | Jun 29, 2012, 08:10 PM EDT
You're full of crap bythebay we dragged you bigots kicking and screaming to the negotiating table with a the barrel of gun weep and learn you sad person.
seanomelb | Jun 28, 2012, 02:23 PM EDT
There you go wrong again Ciara he also said "maidin maith agat". Your nephew is lucky living south of the border, tell that story on the falls road to the mothers of the children murdered by your British friends.The have moved on but they have not forgotten,you would consign them to the trash bin so as not to upset your sensibilities and your lack of respect for Irish history.Their will be no more fighting as the IRA campaign dragged the bigoted unionists and your British friends to negotiate,thereby giving the children of the Fall the peace of mind your nephew has. Your typical of some in your generation "it's all about me" and if any one else suffers you don't give a damn.
Bythebay | Jun 28, 2012, 11:28 AM EDT
seanomelb, the 6 counties Northern Ireland UK Governmetn would most certainly have progressed substantially more if Sinn Fein hadn't brought the previous government down. Stormontgate involved the alleged Provo IRA spy-ring and intelligence gathering operation based in Stormont, the parliament building of Northern Ireland. No wonder the current Government hesitated on devolution of Peace and Justice! Sinn Fein is slowing the process, probably to generate more US funding for the so-called peace process which ended in 1998.
Bythebay | Jun 28, 2012, 11:07 AM EDT
The peace process concluded with the Good Friday Agreement 14 years ago. Sinn Fein refused to meet the Queen last year when she was in Ireland. They have been avoiding it, not the Queen. She wore green in Ireland last year as well as for her meetings with Presidents Mary McAleese and Mary Robinson. Sinn Fein needs to fulfill the Good Friday Agreement.
ciaradexy | Jun 28, 2012, 08:22 AM EDT
Seano, he said 'Slán agus Beannacht' to her when she was leaving. Nothing more. I have no interest in the 6 counties, I just dont want to have anymore fighting. I have a 9 year old and 10 month old nephew and Im glad that they will never know of the violence in NI. It will be consigned to the history books and they wont be angry about NI unlike yourself. Nothing that happens on this Island concerns or affects you except the Queen is a figure head in the 6 counties and the head of your country, the one you chose to move to.
IrelandNorth | Jun 28, 2012, 07:29 AM EDT
Autonomy isn't independence. Theorefore an 'independent' (sic) Ireland can't be said to have failed. The Government of Ireland Act, 1920 (ie partition), (like the Act of Union, 1800/'01 (annexation)) was designed by Great Britain (GB) to weaken a competitor by divide and conquer! allan07 is 48. Average life expectancy is 70. That leaves 22 years to a United Ireland (UI), if the birth of a nation is dependent on the impedence of one individual. (My wife is from an Ulster-Scot Protestant background. Every times she returns to home to Dublin from visiting her folks in the north, she tells me there's increasing resignation to the inevitability of a UI.) Is EIIR monarch to 500,000 northern Irish nationalists/republicans. (Was an ex-Ugandan dictator really the Last King of Scotland.) Common travel area between GB and Ireland is an imperial device to deny the independence of Ireland. There are as many Irish residents of GB as there are British residents in Ireland (c1.1m). Population of Ireland is c6m, (except to those with a partitionist education). Martin forgives Bloody Sunday as much as She forgives Mullaghmore. Is one royal life worth 14 Derry nationalists/republicans. Reactionary violence to neo-colonialism may never achieve a UI, any more than British State violence could have foisted a UK on unwilling Irish subjects.
seanomelb | Jun 27, 2012, 07:56 PM EDT
Tell me Ciara who is the foreign minister for the six counties or how many embassies do they have overseas??BTW you were wrong again he did greet her in Irish/Gaelic how disappointing for you.
ciaradexy | Jun 27, 2012, 02:37 PM EDT
Pike, there are about 398,000 Irish in the UK in the last UK census and 4.5 million of us in Ireland so your point is kinda incorrect!
ciaradexy | Jun 27, 2012, 02:24 PM EDT
Graydon, the English government is not in Northern Ireland, NI has its own government.
GraydonWilson | Jun 27, 2012, 12:05 PM EDT
ciaradexy, there is nothing wrong with England. It's simply that English government belongs in England and not in Ireland. England's presence in Ireland should be limited to commercial transaction, tourism, cultural exchanges and an embassy in Dublin (with maybe a consulate in Belfast).
citizen69 | Jun 27, 2012, 11:48 AM EDT
A decent, observant and balanced editorial... I take it it's not by Niall O'Dowd!
YoungPike | Jun 27, 2012, 10:52 AM EDT
ciaradexy is right; The Irish and the British get along very well and have done for years. In fact, there are more Irish people in England than in the whole of Ireland. I just hope the intransigence and prejudices of many Irish-Americans doesn't cause antipathy to linger.
ciaradexy | Jun 27, 2012, 10:36 AM EDT
This is brilliant! I dont know 1 Irish person who doesnt have British friends or family. We get on very well so its nice to see our heads of state and elected leaders finally shaking hands. Kilsally, everyone is aware of the point you are making. Some of us have lived in Ireland 35 years. Please stop patronising us. Religion doesnt come into this anymore.
Kilsally | Jun 27, 2012, 10:08 AM EDT
You seem to misunderstand the constitutional position of the Monarchy. The Queen serves the country, she is not `better than` anybody and doesnt claim to be. You also omit the fact that Ireland was partitioned due to Protestants fearing being second class citizens under Dublin / Catholic rule.
CelticQueenUSA | Jun 27, 2012, 09:46 AM EDT
Wonderful to be alive to see this historic happening. My ancestors would never believe this could happen. God be with us all in peace!!