> A better analogy would be if the Republic of Ireland settled its citizens there en masse and provided them with weapons,
This did actually happen, but the other way around. The British settled citizens en masse in Ireland and provided them with weapons. This was called the Ulster Plantation. Even today many people in the North of Ireland speak with a dialect derived from the Scots language.
Interestingly, Ronald Storrs, the first British military governor in Jerusalem, was recorded to have said that the Balfour Declaration’s purpose was to form a “little loyal Jewish Ulster in a sea of potentially hostile Arabism.” [0]
> Obviosly, Republic of Ireland doesn't employ this tactic
No, and I think the comparison is a little unfair. It's true that these things can be abused tactically but it's not always the case.
0: https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/books/winston-churchill-s...
Interestingly, while in some western/highland parts of Britain, Celts kept their language, but adopted Anglicanism as a religion, in most of the Ireland they kept their Catholic religion, but adopted English language, and only in some western parts of Ireland kept both.
Anyway, if we go back to medieval times, then we can also talk about Arab and Ottoman colonization of Israel.
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[1]. Israel condemns London's Ulster plantation project after private colonisation contract was awarded by the Queen
And to further this, historical and current Israeli restrictions on West Bank Palestinians and authorization and promotion of Israeli settlers seem like exactly the playbook one would run for crypto-annexation.
no need to point obvious things
> not only Catholics were targeted
In case everyone were targets, and not just separatists - then it's closer to civil war. It only shows how cruel Brittish were (or still are), and all the double standards with regards to Israel.
> while citizens of Northern Ireland are British by birth they were also entitled by birth to Irish citizenship after 1956.
Granting citizenship to people in breakaway separatists regions is the strategy employed by Putin. Russia first grant them citizenship, and then uses this as a pretext for military invasion in order to protect their newly acquired "citizens".
Obviosly, Republic of Ireland doesn't employ this tactic, but granting citizenship to foreign people in confict areas is still problematic.