I hated the Iraq war, but like the rest of the nation admired the courage of our young, brave soldiers who took up arms when ordered to do so to fight a crazed desert enemy 3,500 miles away.
The UK was divided, but I felt, as Editor of the Sun (it was selling 4million a day and probably read by 12 million), that Blair didn’t need our support but our boys did, so we took the whole front of the paper at the start of the war on January 16 in 1991 and gave it up to the Union flag.
The headline simply read; ‘’Support our boys and put this flag in your window.’’ And the readers did. In their tens of thousands. That flag brought them closer to those lads, 170 of whom were going to sacrifice their lives so that Blair could receive highly-paid speaking engagements in America.
Contrast that with the thoughts of Gary Neville. Mr Neville claimed in a video that ‘’ angry, middle-aged men’’ were trying to divide Britain by displaying the Union Jack.
Absurd. Only a Labour supporter would believe that the national flag would cause division. Not even Sir Keir Starmer follows that line.
Around my way Morrisons use the flag as a marketing tool on their adverts. Would a national supermarket chain use an image that would split its customer base?
A ridiculous notion.
Personally, I like seeing the flag on tradesmen’s vans. But that’s me. The ire of Mr Neville, who says he actually took down a flag on a building site he runs in Manchester, seems to have been sparked off by the number of Union flags he saw in the Jewish area where the son of a Syrian migrant, indoctrinated by ISIS videos, launched a murderous attack on a local synagogue.
Jewish residents are right to wrap themselves in the flag. Had Neville read the Sunday Times article by the columnist Matthew Syed, he would have known that the Jewish population in the country need to feel protected.
An angry white man knows exactly what he's doing with our flag. His name is Gary Neville - Kelvin MacKenzie | Getty Images
Syed had gone to the Trafalgar Square demonstration for Palestine Action. He spoke to at least two dozen people, and with only two exceptions, he said the reason the protestors were there was ‘’obvious, potent and implacable". They hated Jews.
So, if Jews feel they need extra police, fine. If they need to lay on their own security patrols, that’s fine too. And if they get comfort by putting up the flag in their front garden, that’s fine too. Neville should butt out of their fears.
He can walk down the road without the fear of a physical attack. That is currently not the position of the Jewish population.
Only a Socialist like Neville would believe that the flag is divisive. His party have a long history of not embracing the flag. In fact, when it comes to the England flag, they are openly hostile.
Nobody will ever forget how, when shadow Attorney General Dame Emily Thornberry shared a post in 2014 during the Rochester and Strood by-elections showing a terraced house draped with England flags and a white van parked outside.
She was looking down on that family. That snobbery wasn’t just in her; it was in the whole Labour movement. They associate any flag with the Right.
The good news is that she was forced to resign. That is unlikely to happen to Neville. He’s paid £1.1million by Sky Sports for his football punditry, but since Sky wouldn’t even fire Jamie Carragher for spitting at somebody, I can’t imagine they will dump Neville.
There has been a massive change in the population make-up since my front page 34 years ago, and it would be out of the question that the flag would be used that way. More’s the pity.
The sale of The Sun is a tenth of what it was, but I could see boycotts being organised by religious groups if The Sun decided to place the flag right across the front page or do the same online.
It’s Neville who is the middle-aged, angry man. As was the Muslim killer at the synagogue. Strange that he didn’t mention that.
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