CARMEN PROETTA – GIBRALTAR WITNESS TO IRA EXECUTIONS
appraisal of the glamour crowd. Kim Novak was a close pale copy, if character was anything to go by. Anyone meeting Carmen head on, knew what that meant. Her walkouts when unfairly challenged and misunderstood, paid tribute to a stubborness that only Thatcher would have identified with. The pity lies in Carmen´s lost opportunities as her future lay in potential ruin with sick cries of prostitution, Mafia connections and accusations of sly, behind the scenes payments, for standing against her national heritage. A long story which ended with the first of the realistic evaluations of the massacres by the Television analysis, “Shadow on the Rock”, was crowded with every attempt to dissuade her from standing up and being counted. If shame should every fall on the machinations of a State and a slur on democracy, then this botch up of a security measure, would hit the neon lights of international notoriety with calculated aim. There is no need to go into a minute study of the events leading up to the killings, to know that it was a politically motivated, vengeful act of hatred, of historic proportions. What must be understood however, that the resulting outcry from a very vulnerable, unaided housewife, came from a heart provoked by two distinct sources – her passionate love of her community and her disgust for people who took lives so mercilessly. An additional factor, was the clear indication that the gunned figures had surrendered to the challenge by the armed persons by putting their arms up and that shooting them down was obviously unnecessary. Carmen was then unaware of the nature and motivation behind the killings, but was to understand to her horror, very soon, when the packaged information, too slickly presented with an overdose of lined up information, flashed on the television screen so neatly. She knew then, that the victims included a young boy on holiday – that they were all Irish Catholics and that Gibraltar was in very grave danger of becoming a bloody battleground that could destroy hundreds if not thousands of innocent local lives. The fact that it was Thatcher, the British Prime Minister behind it, who was in the front line, did not mitigate a massacre of this scale, in a small, highly exposed community, incapable of defending itself.
A small community in a nightmare
The local fear was highlighted by denouncements of a critical few locally who were spurned by the rest and thought that the act had been a necessary step in the prevention of the explosion that would have taken place otherwise. Carmen like thousands of others who realised that the so called facts made little sense, had little choice, but to stand up and say, at least, what she saw. Who, why and wherefore, was not her concern and at the end of the day, what she did, helped to soften angry hearts determined to make every stone bleed in return, including those in the land where the lives had been taken. The chilling presence of the family of the slaughtered at the unreal petrol pumps of the station where the lives had been taken, made every local citizen experience an emotion never felt before. This lonely, brave citizen effectivley saved Gibraltar´s honour and unwittingly became an unsung hero much taken to by Irish Catholics who followed every step of her crucifiction culminating at the trial which took place in Gibraltar – a book, a song, a garland of lillies from a culture which took her straight to its heart. There is no doubt whatsoever in the full meaning of the events, that the ugly petrol station in which three people lost their lives at the hands of others would have been the first of the many centres of such depravities that would have taken place in the small tinder box of this British piece of territory. Crammed tight with local citizens, including descendants of the very Irish themselves and raw navies in every construction placement, this Catholic stronghold, would have suffered an unworthy fate. Whether or not Carmen had stood up, the ex Governor of Gibraltar shot down some time later, would have been hit in any case but the bomb that was apparently diffused in a Main Street shopping arcade and to which site the local authorites were guided, would have been the first of a great many that thankfully, never came.
An unexpected heroine.
Carmen, did not set out to be a heroine and certainly not a prophet in her own land, but it must be assumed that it takes guts, very strong guts to challenge the very State that feeds and protects you. That protection was removed. The status in which she is held by those who understand what she stood for, is however, worthy of one who shows us all up when it comes to deciding between creature comfort and principles supposedly bred into Christians and British citizens, on those laps for which the State pretends to be so responsible for. Whatever the bloody prelude to the event and the outrage that they produce in the