Seán Crowe (Dublin South West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

I welcome the group. I am aware of some of the work the witnesses are involved in and I am impressed by the group's pro-human rights and international law philosophy. The group does not take sides and also has a philosophy of non-violence. It is putting itself and its volunteers out there in the work it is doing. I have no doubt they comes across some difficult stories and they bring those images back home. That is part of the difficulty but there are also friendships and other things.

One of the difficulties we have as a committee is that people will want to look at the slides of Palestine and what has happened over the years. It is unfortunate that people watching proceedings at home cannot see the slides. At some stage we need to come up with mechanism through which viewers at home can see the presentations. Many people follow these meetings and it is difficult to do so because if one is not looking at the slides, one does not see the information contained in them. I do not know if that is something we can do.

The witnesses suggested a number of points for the committee to propose. It is probably unusual that they have asked the committee to do something. I support the group. What do the witnesses think the EU can do? We had the Commissioner in and one of the questions I wanted to ask was about Israel's favourable trading status with the EU. At the same time, EU property and taxpayers' money is being destroyed by this. One of the speakers said they do not understand how the world can agree to this. I do not think anyone agrees to it. I do not think people are aware of what is happening and what the Israeli army is doing on the ground. That is part of it. In some countries the difficulty is that as a result of war guilt, people do not want to be seen to raise this issue. A country might be progressive on certain issues but will not raise what is happening to Palestine and will not make any criticism of what the Israelis are doing. That is a difficulty. That must be part of the discussion in the future. How do we convince these people that these things are going on? They are not going on in our name but they are going on and we are allowing these things to happen.

I am aware there is a worrying crackdown by Israeli Government on NGOs and civil society groups. Have EAPPI and its volunteers been affected by this crackdown? Has it become more difficult for EAPPI to operate? Will the witnesses walk us through their own experience of demolition? What actually happens? What happens if there is an illegal Israeli settlement established in an area? If it is established in a city, for example, in a block of flats or one apartment, what happens after that? What does the Israeli army do to protect the settlers? Does it make the area around it sterile and so on? There are certain roads that Palestinians can travel which others cannot. Were the witnesses allowed to travel on the international roads? The witnesses are there to observe but they are not Palestinians and are not suffering the way Palestinians are so they probably would not go through the same difficulties such as checkpoints and so on. That does not take away from the work they are doing.

Last year, the UN reported that many structures, funded partly or fully by international donors, were demolished in the West Bank in 2016. The witnesses said there was a 96% increase. Why is that? Do the witnesses have a view on why that happened in 2016? The witnesses must have a view on that even if it is not their group's official view. In June 2016, the Israeli military demolished €74 million-worth of EU-funded structures and projects in the West Bank. How do we recoup those funds? They are taxpayers' funds. That money could do a lot of good. People look at this and ask why we are sending more money. How can that be recouped? Is it a case of court cases? How do we do it? Will it happen through the trade sanctions that some people will suggest? I have asked a question about what specific actions the witnesses would like to see coming from the EU.