On the other side of the divide, many Spanish nationalists become apoplectic if one simply refers to Basques and Spaniards as though they were different nationalities. Come to that, many Spanish nationalists would deny that Spanish nationalism exists at all. They argue that all Spaniards, of whom the Basques are just a regional sub-division, are simply citizens of a modern democracy. All decent citizens are threatened by a gang of terrorist mafiosi motivated by ethnic hatred and a psychopathic addiction to violence. After all, the Basque Country enjoys more powers of self-government, granted by the Spanish Constitution, than any other region in the EU. What more could these people possibly want?
What Herri Batasuna and the other radical nationalists grouped around ETA want is full independence for the Basque Country. That is nothing new. What has changed the picture since the ETA ceasefire in 1998 is that it now seems that many moderate nationalists want independence too. The Basque Country, as understood by the nationalists, would include the three French provinces, and the Spanish province of Navarre, though nationalists form a small minority - less than 10 and 20 per cent respectively - in both regions. In the three provinces which currently form the Basque Autonomous Community, moderate and radical nationalists together enjoy a once substantial but declining majority over the centre-right Partido Popular, currently governing in Madrid, and the centre-left Socialist Party.
The moderate Basque Nationalist Party (PNV) was the only major democratic party to refuse to support the Spanish post-Franco constitution in 1978, on the grounds that it did not sufficiently recognise Basque rights and identity. But it subsequently supported an autonomy statute based on that constitution, and has administered it, usually in coalition with the Socialists, ever since. For most of this period, the PNV seemed to be in direct confrontation with ETA and its supporters.
In the year before the ceasefire, however, the PNV engaged in conversations with the radicals, directly modelled on John Hume's once controversial discussions with Gerry Adams. They did a deal whereby the moderate nationalists would explicitly commit themselves to disengaging from Spanish institutions, and collaborate in building a sovereign Basque Country. In exchange, ETA would abandon armed struggle. Interestingly, this arrangement drew down a torrent of invective from the Madrid media and political establishment. It often seemed as though the peaceful pursuit of Basque sovereignty was perceived as a greater threat to Spain than a terrorist campaign.
THE creation of a "pan-nationalist front" in opposition to Madrid was regarded by ETA supporters as a historic advance. They seemed to be able to live with the Partido Popular's decidedly lukewarm response to the ceasefire in terms of prisoner issues and direct negotiations with ETA. But they became angrily disillusioned with the PNV's perceived foot-dragging on the creation of a parallel Basque administration. Largely blaming their moderate nationalist partners for the impasse, ETA returned to the bomb and gun in late 1999. The PNV has energetically condemned the new violence, but refused to abandon its own newfound commitment to Basque sovereignty. The party has twisted in the wind ever since, abused from Madrid for having a love affair with terrorists and "separatism", and by ETA supporters for failing to file final divorce papers on Spain.
The Basque Country is now made up of communities divided by distorting mirrors. Walk into an herriko taberna, one of the ubiquitous bars controlled by ETA supporters, and you find perspectives which look upside-down and back-to-front to an outsider, but seem self-evident and normal to those who espouse them. Words such as "democracy", "violence", and "victim" take on meanings which may seem perverse, but which are shared and accepted by many tens of thousands of ordinary Basques from diverse backgrounds. What you do not find is much evidence of ethnic hatred; indeed, the radical nationalist movement has been remarkably successful in absorbing immigrants of Spanish ethnic origin. Nor will you find many mafiosi or psychopaths, though every terrorist movement must have dealings with both. The caricatures with which the Madrid media portrays the radicals masks a conflict with much more complex roots.
WHAT you do find is ordinary people with extraordinary views. "ETA is the thermometer which tells us we have a disease," says Loren Arkotxa the avuncular and dynamic Herri Batasuna mayor of Ondarroa, a deeply nationalist fishing village. "If we had full democracy here, ETA would have no place." The Spanish constitution, he argues, prevents Basques constructing their own political project, independently of Spain, and this makes violence inevitable. He regrets the attacks on journalists and academics but - there is always a but: "If you take sides in a war, you have to expect that that war will bite you".
He claims to have excellent personal relations with the sole Partido Popular councillor in the village, who has to attend meetings with his bodyguard. "We used to sing together," he says. How would he feel, then, if ETA killed him? "If anyone ever suggested such a course of action to me, I would fight with life and limb to defend him." What about ETA's other victims? He pauses, and then says simply: "I would have to say that I don't know them."
Arkotxa represents the generation which aligned itself with ETA in the Franco period, when Basque nationalism and the Basque language suffered obvious and ferocious repression. Egoitz Urrutikoetxea is only 25, and is convinced, against any and all evidence presented to him, that things are as bad, or worse, today. The son of a former ETA chief of staff, he has known violence since the age of two, when mercenaries linked to the Spanish security forces tried to bomb the car in which he was travelling with his father. He is a leader of Abertzaleen Batasuna, the Basque nationalist movement close to the thinking of ETA in the French Basque Country.
"The conflict is a question of existence or non-existence," he insisted when we met in Bayonne. "We need an institutional arrangement which defines us as Basques. That has been the historical role of ETA. With the truce, we proposed that new institutions, forged with the PNV, could take the place of armed struggle. But peace without political content means nothing."
Did he have no ethical doubts about an organisation which was capable of the Zarautz cemetery attack?
"We should not get into this macabre game as to whether one death is more regrettable than another. What I find much more shocking," he continues rapidly, "is that we have not been able to find a political solution to the conflict which causes these violent actions."
There are those who argue that the explicit recognition of a Basque right to self-determination by Spain could defuse this conflict. Such a move would fit well in a Europe where the so-called "peripheral nationalities" are finding a new place in the sun. Others insist - and you now need a bodyguard to defend this view publicly in the Basque Country - that any concession while ETA keeps killing will only make things worse.
We know the intractability of this kind of debate only too well in Ireland. For the present, in any case, there is no sign of any flexibility in Madrid, nor any indication that ETA is running out of recruits or true believers. It is hard to avoid the pessimistic conclusion that clocks in Basque cemeteries will be striking last hours early for some time to come.
Paddy Woodworth's book on the Basque conflict, Dirty War, Clean Hands, is published by Cork University Press in April.
E-mail: woodworth@ireland.com