John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I advise members of the constitutional requirement that they must be physically present within the confines of the Leinster House complex in order to participate in public meetings. I will not permit a member to participate where they are not adhering to this constitutional requirement. Therefore, a member who attempts to participate from outside the precincts will be asked to leave the meeting. In this regard, I ask any member partaking via Microsoft Teams that prior to making their contributions to the meeting they confirm that they are on the grounds of the Leinster House campus.

Members are reminded of the long-standing parliamentary practice that they should not criticise or make charges against any person or entity by name or in such a way as to make her, him or it identifiable, or otherwise engage in speech that might be regarded as damaging to the good name of the person or entity. Therefore, if their statements are potentially defamatory in relation to an identifiable person or entity, they will be directed to discontinue their remarks. It is imperative that they comply with any such direction.

As the witnesses will probably be aware, the committee will publish their opening statements on its website following the meeting. The witnesses are also reminded of the long-standing parliamentary practice that they should not criticise or make charges against any person or entity by name or in such a way as to make her, him or it identifiable, or otherwise engage in speech that might be regarded as damaging to the good name of the person or entity. Therefore, if their statements are potentially defamatory in relation to an identifiable person or entity, they will be directed to discontinue their remarks. It is imperative that they comply with any such direction. I do not anticipate any issues today.

Today the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Foreign Affairs and Trade continues our engagement on peace building in the Middle East and reflecting on our own peace process in that context. I welcome Ms Bronagh Hinds, senior associate at DemocraShe, Professor Monica McWilliams, who will join us shortly, and Ms Kate Fearon, director of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe, OSCE, conflict prevention centre and deputy head of the OSCE secretariat. Their guests and friends in the Visitors Gallery are also welcome. I also welcome my colleagues.

The format of the meeting is that we will hear the opening statements, followed by a question-and-answer session with the members of the committee. I ask members to be concise in their questions to allow everyone the opportunity to participate. We generally allow seven minutes per member and the screens on display will show the seven minutes elapse. That includes time for the questions and the answers, and there is time for a second round. I am quite rigid about the seven minutes. I am a disciplinarian.

I now pass the floor over to our witnesses and we might start with Ms Hinds. She is very welcome and we are looking forward to her contribution.

Ms Bronagh Hinds:

Gabhaim buíochas leis an Chathaoirleach and members of the committee for today's invitation to reflect on our peace process and peace building in the Middle East. The Middle East conflict has been going on for too long. Every year without resolution deepens it. Injustice and violence are unconstrained. We see tens of thousands of dead and injured Palestinians; loss, fear and tensions within Israel; Gaza razed to the ground; and emboldened far-right settlers expanding occupation and persecuting Palestinian communities with impunity in the West Bank.

The conflict's expansion into other countries is bringing more deaths, ruining livelihoods and destabilising the region. It is impacting economies such as those of Lebanon and Jordan, which are mainstays for refugees in the region. Ending the conflict is urgent. There must be a fair and just political settlement that will deliver sustainable peace, grounded in international standards and the rule of law. The outcomes cannot be dictated by might but must be reached through inclusive dialogue, no matter how difficult.

Central to the success of the Good Friday Agreement was the inclusive nature of the multi-party talks. Rather than block access to negotiations, all stakeholders were at the table and party to the decisions. They covered traditional political parties, parties linked to armed groups and new parties bringing in women and civil society. Parties had to comply with ground rules that meant negotiating by democratic and exclusively peaceful means, renouncing the use of force to exert influence and abiding by the terms of the agreement, but no one was excluded on the grounds of being considered extreme.

The Irish experience demonstrates the benefit of designing inclusive peace negotiations rather than narrow processes with few protagonists. Inclusion brings in new and different voices and skills. For example, our Women's Coalition put energy into finding new ideas and solutions rather than defending traditional positions. We strove to be creative and innovative, explored all options, spotted difficulties in advance and offered alternatives, and reframed issues to assist agreement. We were prepared to live with ambiguity and experiment with various considerations until we reached consensus.

British and Irish relationships changed over time, as did how the Governments interacted with political parties and armed groups in Northern Ireland. The British Government signalled that it had no selfish or strategic interest in Ireland. As EU partners, the Governments constructed a building block of intergovernmental agreements. When multi-party talks progressed, both Governments stepped back from supporting one side over the other and worked together to persuade and convince.

In Ireland, the US Clinton Administration acted as a non-partisan broker, completely without self-interest. It provided a fair and honest independent mediator. President Clinton engaged respectfully and fairly with all conflict parties on an equal basis. The US Trump Administration's approach to the Middle East appears quite different from this and risks being wholly ineffective.

We in the Women's Coalition challenged inappropriate political behaviour, hateful rhetoric, militaristic language, belligerence and bullying that some party leaders used towards other parties. We exposed the demonisation because it was deliberately deployed to undermine confidence in parties to the talks and thus in the negotiations themselves and ultimately in the agreement. A party like ours had an eye to making the negotiation process work, building trust in relationships, facilitating a conducive negotiation atmosphere, challenging those throwing obstacles into the works and clearing miscommunications.

Abuse of power, discrimination and human rights abuses are conflict drivers. Instead of protecting all citizens equally, the Israeli Government has entrenched a two-tier legal system with the death penalty a default punishment for Palestinians, authority to increase annexation and settlement of Palestinian land and power to revoke citizenship and deport Palestinian citizens of Israel. This is contrary to the essentials for peace and stability, which are recognition and respect of equal citizenship, strong equality and human rights principles and institutions, and legislation that applies equally to all citizens. Our Good Friday Agreement expanded human rights and equality provisions. It established the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission, the Equality Commission and tools to mainstream equality. These operate in line with international standards and protections.

Equality and human rights also informed our approach to the contested area of policing and justice during negotiations and implementation. We transformed an unrepresentative police force, embedded human rights in policing and introduced community policing to win people over to the new police service. The Good Friday Agreement offered inclusive and balanced citizenship and representation. It enshrined the self-determination of the Irish people, including the right of people in Northern Ireland to give their consent on any future constitutional change or arrangements. It recognised that Northern Irish people could be British, Irish or both. The power sharing Executive demonstrates the structures and institutions that reflect the diversity of identities.

Ireland's conflict was cyclical. The Good Friday Agreement interrupted this and we hope has broken it forever. In the Middle East, the egregious level of violence and casualties perpetrated by Israel has expanded the war, drawing condemnation from across the world. On my most recent trip to the Middle East, I met Palestinians and Israelis in Palestine and in Israel and many of the Israelis, including some affected by 7 October, are opposed to the war. They want to live in peace and friendship with their Palestinian neighbours.

Our peace process is testament to the power of inclusive dialogue, based on respect and fairness. We in the Women's Coalition used principles of inclusion, equality and human rights to guide us in negotiations, which allowed us to take sound decisions on forging a new pathway to the future instead of being stuck in a zero-sum past. Negotiating peace is complex. It requires flexibility, pragmatism and the kind of ambiguity that helps steady the process in Northern Ireland. Women's Coalition members signed up to being willing to reach an accommodation, which shows it is possible to move from deeply held political beliefs to embrace compromise and accommodation for the prize of peace. As former Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern said when he addressed the committee on this very subject;

...real peace and reconciliation takes root when the leadership on both sides of a conflict accept that the only outcome that will be sustainable in the longer term is one involving compromise and accommodation ... [and] there must be an honourable outcome...

Otherwise, peace, masquerading as the absence of violence will be fleeting.

Ms Kate Fearon:

Is mór an onóir dom an cuireadh seo a fháil lena bheith anseo leis an gCathaoirleach, na Teachtaí Dála agus na Seanadóirí inniu le cur lena bplé ar chothú na síochána.

I speak to you today in my personal capacity. That said, I am mindful of my obligations as an international civil servant working for the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, OSCE, a regional organisation comprising 57 participating states under Chapter VIII of the United Nations Charter. My remarks will be made within this framework.

We were fortunate in the nineties to not be alone in peacemaking efforts. We had direct contact with the participants in the Israel-Palestine process and in the South African process and realised they had things to teach us. Thus, learn from others was our first lesson. I will outline the other lessons I draw from our process that have relevance for any peace process as follows:

First, have an agenda that is broader than just the division of power. Peace settlements should be comprehensive. Conflict ruptures the whole of society, not just the combatants. It ruptures relationships, social economies, politics, the exercise of the rule of law, the ability to speak to each other, the ability to forgive and the ability to reconcile. Even though it is perhaps not so fashionable these days to speak of comprehensive settlements, sooner or later all these things need to be addressed if the conflict is truly to be resolved. So, make the pie broader and deeper before splitting it up.

Pay attention to process. We prioritise process and building relationships between the actors inside the negotiations and between the process and those outside it. We practise an iterative process of drafting consulting internally and externally, refining and redrafting.

Do your homework. Do not rely on other actors, your electoral mandate or your stated positions to carry you through. The Women's Coalition was able to punch above its weight because we took the chairs at their word and produced high quality policy and position papers. This gives you time also to test your views and create space for generating options.

Keep the process inclusive. This is not as motherhood and apple pie as it might sound. For example, in the Women's Coalition, we argued against the exclusion of Sinn Féin and the Ulster Democratic Party when they were suspended due to ceasefire violations at various times and we were criticised for it. We supported the provisions in the agreement on prisoners and we were criticised for it. Equally, we advocated for an all-victims, not just our-victims, approach, meaning equal application to victims of paramilitary and State attacks alike. We were criticised for this also but I still believe they were the right calls.

If you can, practice radical inclusion. Everybody who is part of the problem, even if they may have committed crimes, even war crimes, need to be part of a comprehensive and just solution, including full application of the rule of law and international humanitarian law.

Include women in meaningful roles. Women will think of the same things as men but they also think of other things and these will be the things that will give your agreement legitimacy in your communities. They will ensure the agreement sticks, even when things get politically sticky.

Practice radical empathy. Do not just put yourself in the shoes of the other; walk a couple of miles in those shoes over rough terrain. You have to be able to see the problem from all sides before you can get to the solution.

Power holders should embrace minority accommodation. There is nothing to fear from it. That is what the core of any conflict is always about. One group is excluded from power and the other groups wish to be included.

Remember that you will have to work together after the agreement, both on the agreement but also on governing, and that these are two different things, with sometimes competing interests. Therefore, design an agreement that builds a firewall between post-agreement governance and agreement implementation. Have an implementation group, possibly with third party guarantors, whose sole task is agreement implementation, not governance. The Women's Coalition proposed this but it was not accepted and it remains a serious missing piece in our process.

Connect to the international framework. The Northern Ireland Women's Coalition was inspired in part by the outcome of the UN's Fourth World Conference on Women in 1995, the Beijing Platform for Action, in particular the conclusions on women and power and decision making. The international framework is much more developed today so utilise normative international frameworks like the European Convention on Human Rights, use the European Union, use the OSCE or the UN mediation support teams.

Use international mediation organisations like Conciliation Resources or the Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue. Finally, understand that peace takes time to embed and trust takes time to grow, and it needs to be nurtured daily. Peacemakers, and the governments supporting them, need to think in terms of decades of support, including financial support, at all levels in peacebuilding and peacebuilding-adjacent efforts. Go raibh míle maith agaibh.

John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

Before we go to Professor McWilliams, for a younger audience who might be watching, some of whom were not born at the time when the peace process was in its infancy and some who may have forgotten some of the details of the events, will Ms Hinds tell us how she came to be involved in the first place? How did she come to participate? What was her background? I will then come to Ms Fearon to answer the same questions.

Ms Bronagh Hinds:

My background was mainly in leading voluntary and campaigning organisations. I was a director of a one-parent family organisation, and then I was director of Oxfam and director of the radical Ulster People's College, which was working with grassroots communities in developing community leadership, working with paramilitaries and hosting behind-the-scenes negotiations between politicians. I chaired a number of women's organisations, including the Northern Ireland Women's European Platform, NIWEP, which had been engaging in the political process for some time and had sought to get more women involved in politics. When it came about, I was one of the co-founders of the Women's Coalition. I managed the election campaign and I was then in the negotiations for the two years supporting Professor McWilliams and Ms Sagar.

Ms Kate Fearon:

I was primarily called to the Women's Coalition because Ms Hinds asked me. I had been the president of Queen's University students union and the women's rights officer for the Union of Students in Ireland, USI, in the years running up to that. I had been active on fair employment issues in Northern Ireland and also on access to women's reproductive rights in Northern Ireland. I had been part of a think-tank funded by the Joseph Rowntree Trust, and I was, therefore, au fait with the civil society sector, the non-governmental sector and working with different community groups in the same milieu. Northern Ireland is a small place.

In the first instance, when the idea to promote women within the then existing political parties was put forward and then ignored, the motivation for taking a do-it-yourself approach was very compelling for me, so there was no hesitation when Ms Hinds invited me. I also had the honour of putting my name to the original letter calling people to the first meeting in the Ulster People's College.

John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

It sounds like you were tuned into something. What, in a sentence, were you tuned into?

Ms Bronagh Hinds:

We were tuned into the long history in Northern Ireland, which has one of the most active grassroots communities in the world. Perhaps Colombia has something similar, but most other places do not. There is civil society, voluntary activity, networking, campaigning and dialogue together, so actually the Women's Coalition is not about one or two people, but about networks of people from the grassroots communities, the trade union movement, academics, business people and people who were networking, looking for change and delivering on the ground when there was no political process indigenous to and operating in Northern Ireland.

John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

Last but by no means least, I call Professor Monica McWilliams. We are looking forward to her contribution. Again, she might start by informing us of exactly what motivated her or got her hooked into the whole process from the beginning, along with a little bit of her own background as well.

Professor Monica McWilliams:

I think that is an excellent question which should be put to anybody who goes from civil society into a political party. I suppose I cut my teeth in the civil rights movement. I was very young, 15, when I went with my family to a march at Magilligan Strand, where I watched, unfortunately, the repressive apparatus of the state at the time using CS gas and rubber bullets. I thought that was not going to go well. Bloody Sunday happened the following week. I lived for 30 years through that. I had thought the civil rights issue would be over in three years and everything would be resolved. How wrong we were. That is a lesson for other societies. I watched this in Syria, where Ms Hinds, Ms Fearon and I have been involved for many years. We told them not to expect that conflict to end in a year or two.

When I had the opportunity at university, I got out of Northern Ireland for a while and went to the United States. At that time, interestingly, given the current context in Iran, I joined the marches of the Persian students against the Shah. I say in my book that I wish I had learned a lesson from them, because they were wearing brown paper bags over their heads, with little slits for the eyes. We did not, so we could be easily identified, and look how that turned out. That says something about the current state of what happened. It was not what they wished for.

I came back from Michigan. I went there because I had to get away. I was probably traumatised, but did not know the meaning of the word, after a very good friend of mine had been murdered. I was totally in grief and got that opportunity on a scholarship. It was the best experience ever because I saw what was happening in other parts of the world. There was the anti-apartheid movement, which was very strong in the United States at that time. I had a thirst to come home. I could not bear being away and watching the country burn down every night. Every night at six o’clock, I was the first to go down to watch the news. It was a lovely place to be, but I decided that, no matter what, I was coming back to Northern Ireland to give something back. I did not know what.

I was an urban planner by that stage. I compared inner-city Detroit to inner-city Belfast, both of which were being redeveloped disastrously. One was because of what was happening and discrimination against African-Americans, and for us, it was in terms of what was happening in west Belfast, which was being divided by a motorway because the army thought that was the solution to containing the situation. I came home and got a job at the university, for which I was very grateful, and I stayed there for the next 40 years. I got the opportunity to start working in a voluntary capacity with Women's Aid on violence against women and girls. We started opening some refuges. Cathy Harkin coined the phrase, "We were living in an armed patriarchy". It was a silent form of terrorism. The women were terrified. There was huge coercive control - we now know this term - and I wrote a book on bringing it out in the open. I saw the number of homicides - femicides as we would now call them - occurring in the conflict because of the accessibility to weapons. I compared the deaths down in the Republic of Ireland to the homicides in Northern Ireland and to Yorkshire and Devon and Cornwall. We were huge in comparison.

It was a hidden form of violence that nobody was talking about, and that gave me the desire to form a women's studies course. These were topics that were never being talked about, so putting gender on the agenda became important. We brought in a lot of community leaders into the certificate course and, for the first time in their lives, they got accreditation to go back into their communities and become community leaders. That is the pre-existing network that Ms Hinds just spoke about.

When we stood for election in 1996, and the question was asked about where these women had come from, as if we had fallen out of the sky, we had probably been involved in every social movement in Northern Ireland, including the anti-apartheid movement, the campaign for nuclear disarmament, etc. The time was ripe. Believe it or not, it was the Conservatives, under Baroness Denton and Sir Patrick Mayhew's wife, Lady Jane Mayhew, who invited me and a community worker to Hillsborough Castle to discuss the Downing Street Declaration and the Framework Document, why women were not responding to them and why people on the ground were not being heard from. We ran a conference in a rural area because most of them happened in Belfast, and the women flocked to it. We knew then there was an appetite. We asked whether, should there be peace talks, women should be involved.

We look down to the South to this Parliament and we saw something called the Women's Political Association where all the parties were coming together and we thought it would be remarkable if that could ever happen. It did not happen in Northern Ireland because when we first went into the talks, Unionists would not speak to Sinn Féin, but it did happen in that many members of those parties came to our meetings. That was the start of us talking about whether we should become political, and then Ms Hinds, through the European women's platform, Ms Fearon and many of those activists and women leaders in the community came together and we held public meetings. We put a public advertisement in the newspaper through the wonderful May Blood, and again the meetings were packed. It was like an evangelical meeting where women stood up, put their names on the flip charts and we asked them whether they would be prepared to enter politics and whether we should form a coalition. It was a frightening prospect. Would you have blood on your hands if you entered this fray? A quiet woman in the back said that it was time to wave goodbye to dinosaurs. We had the two opposites: those who were frightened of becoming involved, putting their heads above the parapet and getting their woman's centres burned down, and those who were completely frustrated at the fact that there might have been peace talks and they might fail yet again, after 12 rounds of failed negotiations. So it took a bit of courage and risk taking, which are the ingredients of what you need to do. The creativity, innovation and brilliant co-ordination of the women involved led us into the peace talks. We had six weeks with no money or phones. We did not even have an office but we got everything together and we got elected.

John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

Professor McWilliams might take us through her statement now.

Professor Monica McWilliams:

Having heard from Ms Fearon, it very similar. I might add a few different things. The role of civil society is really important in terms of inclusion. Who normally gets to peace talks? It is normally the armed groups and the pre-existing traditional constitutional parties. What was different about the Northern Ireland peace process? It actually had those, and it is important that if you are party to the problem, you should be party to the solution, but it had a civil society group and that was us. That inclusion really helped. It was pluralist. I wish it had stayed that way after the agreement was signed. The parties went back to the old status quo. It was a list system and it was a party that did not get one person elected. We came in on the list system and there were also constituency-based representatives, but it was a very innovative and creative system to which the Irish and British governments paid attention. Ms Hinds, myself and others fed into that and asked why they did not extend it rather than just having the pre-existing parties. We asked why they did not throw it open to any party and so there were maybe 20 parties stood-----

Ms Kate Fearon:

Twenty-six.

Professor Monica McWilliams:

-----and we ended up coming ninth. It was creative. When you take that big step towards peace talks, it really important to think differently and to think outside of the box. It was more pluralist and, as a result, it was more nuanced. When civil society is involved, things are put on the table that would not necessarily be there.

I also think that, as women, we need to say that war has the face of a woman, things happen to us as women during war, as we have seen in other conflicts, and it is really important that the women get to put those issues on the table. Otherwise, they would not be there, and if you are going to resource an agreement, there will not be resources for those issues. It is probably more important today that issues of violence against women and girls and extensive sexual abuse as a weapon of war can be talked about but it was the case in our situation. When we talked about decommissioning of weapons, we talked about the decommissioning of attitudes, that you can take weapons away but you cannot change the attitudes as quickly. We now know that in terms of the rate of femicide in Northern Ireland. We are still a very dangerous place and the home can be as dangerous, so we said we wanted these addressed, but also other issues.

In my opening statement, I said that had we not been at the table, the section in the chapter on the reconciliation needs of victims would not have been there along with resources for young people, integrated education and shared housing. We were also pushing for human rights and equality issues alongside negotiating for prisoner releases and an independent international commission for reform of policing. We had all of those interests at heart but we widened the agenda. So that would be the second point I would make, to broaden the agenda, because there are issues that you cannot touch at the start of negotiation because they just too hot for parties. Most of the parties around the table had somebody killed or injured. I remember on the first day looking around and every one of the people I was looking at had been shot at or in a bomb, and they said it. For the first year, there was a lot of venting about who was to blame.

When there are conflicting narratives about the causes, it is very hard to get to a solution that is going to accommodate everyone, but inclusion was really important and the comprehensive agenda was really important. As we have seen in other countries, particularly in Gaza and in the Middle East with the targeting of hospitals, schools, infrastructure and the facilities, those everyday peace indicators are also important with regard to ceasefires because, as we now know, the violations extend far beyond combatants on either side.

The other issue is to keep the momentum going. When we reached the agreement, it was really important that the signatories should stay together. Sad to say we did not and, after the agreement, some of the parties were not included and there was an attempt to just fix the problem between Sinn Féin and the Ulster Unionists. I remember at one stage, someone whose name will be very familiar to the committee - Peter Mandelson - saying to us, "You're not the problem", and I said, "Well we'll go out and buy some guns if that means we can get included in your discussions", so his attempt to fix it was not what we would have seen as being the way forward.

Ms Fearon has referred to what I would call responsible ones in Colombia. All three of us have worked at different times in Colombia over the past 30 years and I am very taken by the fact that they refer to people as the responsible ones. It is much more extensive than our binary in Northern Ireland as who is responsible. They talk about that in every everyday language and I think it is a really good description of how they are working through victim reparations. I met the judges. We put them together with our commissions and judges from Northern Ireland and we learned a lot from each other on how to handle the legacy, which is much better handled there than with us. So, there are lessons from other places. We did make our mistakes. If we had carried the spirit of the agreement forward, we might have dealt with the issue of victims much sooner rather than coming at it now with the Troubles Bill going through Westminster and creating another binary in terms of which side thinks it has the right to demand of victims what should be the way forward.

I have just come from a meeting this morning with Israelis and Palestinians in Stormont. There were 30 of them and four of us - Peter Robinson from the DUP, David Kerr from the UUP, Pat Sheehan from Sinn Féin and myself. It is incredible how far we have come. All of them were talking about the importance of relationships and the importance of face-to-face negotiations rather than through proxies. That takes a lot of time, as we knew. Dehumanising the other and not recognising the legitimacy of the parties that have a mandate or the legitimacy of your opponent, who has been through a terrible conflict, did not help us and it will not help with any other conflict. I try to think that we do not do that because the violence of the tongue led to the violence of the gun, but only the gun was spoken about and very rarely the hate speech. The language at the peace talks was horrific for much of the two years, with a lot of discussions of terrorists, criminals and people at the table and people not speaking to each other. It is remarkable that we got up on Good Friday and signed off on the agreement without people saying "hello" to each other.

I will stop there. The logistics are important and people often do not think of that.

We were seated alphabetically. That was really important. I was seated against one of the loyalist parties who had actually been responsible for the murder of my very good friend but that is what happens. You do not get to pick who you negotiate with. As the years went by, because you were seated next to people as I was to David Ervine of the Progressive Unionist Party, I got to know what he needed and he got to know what we needed. That is because we were facilitating and mediating during those talks with others. That exchange was important.

Taking people out of the country is one of the most important things to do when you are in danger in your own country, you are in front of cameras and people are calling you traitors and saying you are going too far. The South Africans provided us with a quiet and safe place outside of the country. Those three days changed our lives and I would say all the parties would reflect on that. When President Mandela spoke to us, he said we did not have to do what they had done, but to just listen. I think we did. We took lessons back on the sufficiency of consensus. Our decision-making came from there, as did many other ideas.

There were also the visits to the United States through Beyond Conflict, as it is now known. TDs and MPs from Westminster went, as did we from Northern Ireland. We exchanged ideas and talked about how we might see a way forward. You learn from those experiences. I suggest this Parliament and this foreign affairs committee might give some thought to how Members could be useful in that context and to how Ireland is now viewed for having an agreement that still stands despite all its flaws.

There is a visa issue in trying to get people in from Dublin Airport to Belfast. A number of visits have had to be cancelled recently because of that issue. It is very expensive to change everything at the last moment, as we did with the Kosovo experience two weeks ago and with Afghan women, whose visit had to be cancelled. I would like this committee to give some thought to how it could facilitate those exchanges because we are constantly asked, even this morning from Ukraine, about how we could facilitate those processes.

Women, peace and security is very important. I will finish on this point. All three of us predominantly work with women and building capacity. Women have the capacity now so we should ask why they are kept out of talks. I was in Rome two weeks ago with Mothers Call from Israel and Palestine. There were also representatives of Women of the Sun, from the West Bank, and Women Wage Peace, from Israel. They had a barefoot walk through the streets of Rome and they met the Pope the next day. They raised the issues that are staring them in the face. It is a small, incremental step but it shows they are reaching out to each other. The most important thing is that in a time of despair and the appalling situation in the Middle East, they had some hope. We were told we were dreamers. We were told we were naive. We were told that an intractable conflict could never end. It did. That is the hope we will hold out, even if it is only a glimmer.

John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I have broken all my rules on timing for Professor McWilliams. I am going to reinforce them. It was worth it. Each of the members now has seven minutes. That includes their questions and their answers. It is already very compelling.

Cathy Bennett (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I welcome the three witnesses and thank them for all the work they have done from the very start. It is amazing. I could listen to them all day. They are fantastic role models for any woman coming up in politics. I want to thank them so much for everything they have done.

In the context of the genocide in Gaza, do the witnesses think there is hope? Could a women's coalition there do what the witnesses have done here and in the North? Is there any hope? What are each of the witnesses' feelings on that?

Ms Bronagh Hinds:

I thank Deputy Bennett for the question. It gives me the opportunity to say I chair Ireland's women, peace and security oversight group. I am not sure whether the committee is aware, but Ireland has an unrivalled international reputation on inclusive processes, particularly championing women, peace and security, civil society engagement and youth, peace and security. In this world we have extremely bad role models, with due respect to the men here. Members will know who I am talking about when I say extremely bad male role models. It is really important we are all pushing that agenda. I am not for one moment saying that there are not men who think differently - of course there are - but the women, peace and security agenda is absolutely central to how we handle conflict. Not only were we doing it in advance of any UN resolution on women, peace and security, but we know now from the way that conflict is evolving that actually changing the culture is so important. That means bringing in new and different voices to that process. It means that on the issue of violence against women, women being empowered and bringing different aspects to the solution is absolutely central.

The last time I was in Palestine and Israel, when the Department of foreign affairs asked me to go there, I had a number of meetings. One of them was with 30 women from different organisations in Tel Aviv who were all aching to do something. Similarly, I met Palestinian women in the West Bank as well as the government minister. I think there is the possibility. There are lots of very active groups and very active women on the ground. I do not know what is preventing them from collaborating to co-ordinate in the way that we did. When the opportunity came, people said we must do it. You either create the opportunity or seize an opportunity. However, now the situation is so bad that the opportunity needs to be seized and run with by women. We should be supporting them to do that.

Professor Monica McWilliams:

The question is really important. I am asked it often. The context is different. There was a window of opportunity that opened up for us, and as an academic I could have gone on writing about how important it was to involve women and left it at that. It is a big jump to go from that to inside the system, but I think you need to do both. I have met the women often. I have been to Gaza and to Israel. I monitored the elections in 2005 and 2006. There are groups there because we have worked with them. They have come to Belfast. Two summers ago, Palestinian women came, one of whom was from Gaza. As a result, one of them is now here studying at Maynooth University. She is trying to get relationships built between Fatah and Hamas. To me, that is where we need to be looking. The same is true of the Israeli side. This morning, for instance, that large group that came from the Middle East to Northern Ireland are working hard at reaching out to either side. They are strangers and we were too. It does need a bit of facilitation and mediation. Who would do that? We were lucky we had third-party, impartial, external actors. In my opening statement, I talked about the warrior mode of conflict resolution as opposed to the peace builder mode. I am watching high-level negotiations through proxies, and you will not see many women at the table when it is outside the country, as I saw with Rwanda, or when it is at that level between so many other players.

I will provide an interesting example from Syria. When we were involved in the talks in Geneva through the UN and Staffan de Mistura, he had parallel committees going. One was called the civil society advisory committee and another was the women's advisory committee. There were women from both sides. That was at the height of their terrible war. Out of that, those women peace builders went back.

The women I am working with are on the side of the opposition. We visited Gaziantep in southern Türkiye many times and the woman who led that was called Hind Kabawat. Where is she now? She is the minister of social affairs and labour in the transitional Government in Syria. She is the only woman, a Christian, in a 23-member Islamic cabinet. Her appointment is a little glimmer of hope but she needs a critical mass.

Ms Kate Fearon:

The Deputy mentioned Israel and Palestine and, to me, the overriding trajectory is one of despair. In that context it is very important that the people on the ground have an understanding that they are not alone. I would not underestimate the power of solidarity, whether on an individual level as a Deputy or through this committee or the Government reaching out and demonstrating its support to various organisations and individuals. That is really important to help people get through what is a really dark time.

In our process we saw that optimism is almost a political commodity in negotiations and that negotiations should be viewed that way. I do not mean optimism in the sense of approaching everything with rose-tinted glasses or adopting a Pollyanna approach to negotiations. It was really important for us to say that this is possible and that we would be able to do that. Maybe we are not quite there in terms of this negotiation in respect of the Israel-Palestine context but we will be at a certain stage.

The Government can contribute when the negotiation process design is being discussed. As Professor McWilliams and Ms Hinds noted, both of them were at the stage where they could make an intervention with both the British and Irish Governments and, indeed, the civil servants in the Northern Ireland office around process design. This is where the Government can insert itself by lobbying the geopolitical actors who will design the process and who at the moment seem to be doing it in a very transactional way. This committee and the Government can learn lessons from the Northern Ireland and Irish peace process and say that when we do broaden the design, and when it is a more inclusive process, it will be a stronger process, it will endure for longer and it will have greater buy-in on the ground. Those are the kinds of things that the Government could do in this context, which is very bleak right now.

Cathy Bennett (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I thank everyone for their responses. The Irish Government could do more, lead by example and design a peace process. We need to lead by example and pay it forward by helping another country. We in Ireland could do so much to help people in Gaza if we stepped forward and stood out from the crowd.

Ms Bronagh Hinds:

Ireland is about to commence the EU Presidency, which is an enormous international stage, and it would good if even our own peace process could form part of that. Obviously, we are looking at Ukraine, Kosovo and other countries, and the Middle East is key. It is a very difficult and sensitive topic. As can be seen from the Eurovision Song Contest, which will take place tonight, there has been fallout even in Northern Ireland over that but it is still important to take steps. It would be good for the six months from July to December for Ireland to have this focus during the EU Presidency because otherwise the war will go on and on.

Cathy Bennett (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

It would be an opportune period.

John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

The Government has its own intergovernmental conferences. The Parliament has at least two conferences, one of which will be co-chaired by this committee and the Oireachtas committee on defence. The theme of one of the conferences that we are hosting is Ireland's experience of peace building.

I am interested in learning more about the hosting of Palestinian and Israeli women in Belfast. Will Professor McWilliams give an example of the conversations that took place between those two sets of women? I would like to get a flavour of what those conversations on both sides involved.

Professor Monica McWilliams:

It would be good to invite Ms Avila Kilmurray, the organiser, to appear before the committee. The women spend a week in Belfast and difficult conversations take place. The other person is Ms Debbie Watters from Northern Ireland Alternatives, which is works in restorative justice. Again, through the same group from earlier that I mentioned, the Rev. Gary Mason has had them over every six months through, I think, the Carter Center in Atlanta.

I made the point to them this morning to take the opportunity, when they are out of the country, to have the conversations they cannot usually have. What I noticed was that there is a lot of sensitivity and tension. Very similar to our own situation, there are a lot of rumours and allegations about who is doing what. I took some heart from the barefoot walk of Mothers' Call in that both sides had suffered and the mothers were there for a reason, because they had lost people. They reached out through their grief. I mentioned that Ireland is an important player. The Israeli women said some of their folk were concerned about going to Ireland because it has become antisemitic. The Palestinian women could see that Ireland was a friend because they had watched coverage of the protests and were aware of the issues of boycotting and disinvestment. Those conversations are tough. There is no symmetry in the Middle East between the Israeli situation and the Palestinian situation. That goes without saying and it makes for difficult conversations.

Centring negotiations on human rights is a good place to start, as we did in our peace agreement. The foundation of negotiations should be human rights and equality. We used the term "parity of esteem", which is now being used elsewhere. Some people now prefer to use the words "due recognition" and I think that is where you start. Earlier I mentioned the dehumanisation of human beings, but if due recognition is given to the people who need to be at the table and need to be in those conversations, then that is the start.

Ms Bronagh Hinds:

In addition, one of the critical things, particularly on the Palestinian side, was a difference of opinion about networking because it is about accepting a sense of normalisation of what is going on. That is an active debate on that side of the community. If we are doing that liaison, then it is an acceptance of the normalisation of our status and the way we are being treated. That is an active debate within the Palestinian community, whereas some Palestinians continue to network.

On the point that Professor McWilliams made about human rights, it is important for the Israeli side to accept what is happening to the Palestinians, accept the position that they are being put in and recognise that in order to create a basis on which that collaboration can happen. It is strange how often that aspect is overlooked. I remember a conversation that happened the first time I travelled to the Middle East. There were four of us from Northern Ireland and we decided to write a short paper about it afterwards because clearly, as we had experienced, there were first- and second-class citizens within the State of Israel at that time. We said that issue needed to be addressed and that that would also help with the issue of Palestine and Israel, but it was quite clear there was a difference in opinion. We were having an active debate about the Northern Ireland situation and a pair of men who had worked together in partnership - a Palestinian and an Israeli - started to talk. They were very supportive of one another but the Israeli was completely shocked when, in the process of our conversation, he heard the Palestinian say with frustration that he was glad of their friendship and of their working together but that the Israeli did not quite understand how Palestinians feel or the position they were in.

That was a real shock for people who had been working together for many years. It is about creating those new opportunities and, as Ms Fearon said, about the governments outside investing in that to enable it to happen.

It is also about working with people who have had a reputation for working together across the divide for many years. In a sense, that is how we were able to form the Women's Coalition. There are groups like the Parents Circle and groups of Israelis and Palestinians living together within Israel. When they went to the government and said they wanted to educate their children together, the government said it did not have any provision for that, but they said that they were doing it. These are people who are challenging the system to build something that begins to work. It is difficult, but it is about finding those little bits.

An important point made by Ms Fearon is that some people have more stamina than others. Some people just have it. They are fighters. It does not mean that other people are not, but they bring a different skill. The ability to keep optimism alive and to maintain hope when everything is down is so important. We met it in our process. I met it when somebody spoke to me about one or two other people. They said that if we were down, things must really be going badly. If you have that stamina and ability to ride through it, you have a responsibility to make sure that, as far as possible, you are pragmatic and realistic. You are not pretending that things are going well, but it actually keeps that hope alive. It is essential. It is essential for other people who find it more difficult to do that when things are very depressing.

Joe O'Reilly (Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I welcome our guests. I thank them for the wonderful work they have done and continue to do. To pick up on one of the last remarks, we need hope. Hope is probably the most absent element in the Middle East at the moment, as well as optimism, sadly. I will ask a sequence of questions and the witnesses can answer them separately.

Within the Netanyahu Government and the entire political establishment in Israel there is a hardening of attitudes against the two-state solution, with efforts to make sure it cannot happen through the settlement process. There is no willingness to compromise at all. Yet, Israel will have to be a key part of a solution. How do we reconcile that? How would the witnesses suggest we should start to deal with that? That is the first question, how to recognise the need for compromise despite the hardening that is going on.

Ms Kate Fearon:

I would go back to draw lessons from our process. What we saw in colleagues from the unionist and loyalist side of the house was a fear of change and a fear of sharing power. They were wondering how that would impact them, and they had also had the fear of living with an armed insurrection against them for 30 years, as they saw it. This is what I was saying earlier about having empathy and being able to be empathetic, which in the context of the Israel-Palestine process is very difficult. That is why I talk about radical empathy, because you really need to put yourself in the shoes of the Israeli Government and what they are thinking, not just what is driving their position but what are the interests behind that. It is about having a negotiating platform or a process that is designed to unpack that and address their hurts and fears, even though we see that both sides are hurting each other.

When we go back to 2023, it creates a difficulty. Continuing to respond by not engaging, even though engaging is very difficult, is not going to move the process forward. That is not to say there is any incentive for the current Israeli Government to move forward. However, as Ms Hinds has just noted, there are interventions that the Irish Government and other governments can make to ensure that those who are interested in peace have some form of space to engage, both inside their own community and between the two communities. The internal community space is also important. If there is a process of holding or creating that space and enabling them to generate options, when they have the larger political process, there will be people at the ready who will have generated some options. That may create an incentive. It is not A + B = C. It is not a mathematical formula, but you have to try to create that incentive.

Ms Bronagh Hinds:

It is also indirect. We are really talking about power and the most militarised and nuclear-powered state in the Middle East. It is very difficult to contend with that. There is no equality and no balance of power in any shape or form in that region, certainly not with the Palestinians.

It is about unleashing other voices, finding back channels and finding proxies. Unfortunately, the opinion polls show a high degree of support, in one sense, for the government and for the war. People have been traumatised by 7 October, but a lot of stuff has been built on that in terms of propaganda. There are other voices. One of the things I do every year is speak to a young Jewish group from England. They asked me to come and speak, and we have had challenging conversations. We all know about the diaspora, just as in our situation, where the diaspora in the United States was very important in our conflict. These are young people in universities who feel like fish out of water. They cannot even talk about it at home because their view is very different. However, there are people within communities, in Israel and other places, and it is about giving them hope and support.

When I was there last year, two things were very helpful. First, I had a big public meeting. It was on 18 March, the day that Netanyahu broke the ceasefire. The Irish embassy did not know if there would be a big turnout, but there was a big turnout. It was helpful to have that external intervention and to have what the Irish Government did to keep communications open with people and have alternative discourses. The next day, there was a big march, and on that march, people were hearing feedback about the public meeting. It was reported back to them how energising it had been and how their spirits had been lifted and all of that.

The second thing is that, on those trips, you can also do public events. I did a podcast with Harretz, which then went around. It is about finding those ways to help to broaden and change opinions and move things on, which is important.

Joe O'Reilly (Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

My next question neatly fits into that last one. The United States is clearly not an independent broker and it is clearly pro-Israel. Norway was traditionally an independent broker, but the relationship has soured. The Irish Government is one in the context of the EU Presidency. What other states and actors would the witnesses see as potentially being able to unlock things or to intervene in a mediation sense or in subsequent negotiations?

Professor Monica McWilliams:

I have been giving a lot of thought to that, given that we were fortunate and, of course, the US constantly refers to Northern Ireland as one of its rare foreign policy successes.

We should have continued to build on that. It is a question of looking to see how countries could get involved. It was strange that Pakistan came in. It is not the one we would have thought of. I recently returned from Japan and made the point to the Sasakawa Peace Foundation that Japan should give more consideration to being an intermediary. We have been invited by the Norwegians and the Finns. The Scandinavians generally have been the accepted third party, albeit probably not in the Middle East because Norway has recognised Palestine, as have Spain and Ireland. It would be very hard to satisfy Netanyahu in terms of who he would consider an acceptable third party. It might be worth having a combination. We had a combination of Finland, Canada and the United States.

Joe O'Reilly (Fine Gael)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

Drawing on the Northern Ireland experience-----

John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

Sorry, Senator, we will come to you in the next round.

Professor Monica McWilliams:

On the leadership question, when Mandela was President, we went to South Africa for three days in despair in the middle of the first year of the peace talks in 1997. We thought we were going nowhere. There had not been a second IRA ceasefire and Sinn Féin was outside the process but Sinn Féin was in South Africa with us, so there was two of everything. We brought apartheid to South Africa, as President Mandela said to us. We were saying something about leadership, which goes to the Senator's point. I am sure that the Israelis are asking themselves that question, as are Palestinians. President Mandela looked at us and told us to go home and grow leadership. We had to think very deeply about that. That is what needs to happen in Israel. With the standing down of the judiciary and the rule of law and extending the death penalty to people in detention, one clearly has to ask about the leadership. The despair is about the United Nations and its standing now in the world. The Israelis and Palestinians are asking why their leaders have let them so badly down.

Patricia Stephenson (Social Democrats)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I thank the witnesses. It is interesting to hear from three incredible experts on women, peace and security. We do not often get their depth of knowledge in these areas.

In the context of Palestine and Israel, everything feels so intractable. The witnesses all reflected that it felt intractable in the mid-1990s in the North as well but we do not have the same international buy-in to peace now. People talk about their desire for peace in the Middle East but they do not follow through in any active way. We still see European Union member states supplying weapons to the Israel Defense Forces, IDF, and so on, so there is no real credibility behind that. In the written statement, Professor McWilliams wrote about being able to "see, feel and taste peace" but we have not given them any pathway to that as an international community or any way to demonstrate to them that real pathway. On the everyday peace indicators, when all of the basic services, every metric of safety for a mother, for example, her kids getting to school safely and her house not being raided in the middle of the night, and every other metric is on fire or alarm bells are ringing, it is hard to imagine getting to that space of negotiation. I think Professor McWilliams also said there was no symmetry. There is no symmetry in any conflict but there might be more of it. It is about how to create conditions to bring people together. I do not know if the witnesses watched the "No Other Land" documentary about the West Bank. The Israeli guy in that can go home at night. As the documentary progresses, you see the tension between the Palestinian man who cannot leave the West Bank and the man who can. What role can we play in creating the conditions, whether bringing people to places like the North or different parts of the world? It is about creating that understanding when everyone is not starting from the same position when negotiating. People might feel they have suffered the same amount from their own perspective but that may not be true in reality. In Palestine, the scale of suffering is weighed so heavily. How can we create the conditions for that equality of dialogue? There are great organisations such as B'Tselem, with which I am sure the witnesses are familiar, that are the voice of peace in Israel. What can we do to facilitate developing that leadership and the peace voices more in Israel? How can we foster those voices in a non-partisan way? That is the role people like the witnesses have played over the years but could continue to play.

Ms Bronagh Hinds:

We are in a situation where the framing for the Israeli Government is that it has been given absolute carte blanche and permission and has not been contained. That will have to come from world governments. Everyone is saying that it is the US and we have to wait for change in the US Administration because even though the US has always been very much supportive of Israel, it has gone over the top at this point. There is also an opportunity, given the leadership by Prime Minister Mark Carney in Canada in saying that it is time to reimagine the UN. The UN is important and we must not let it go the way of the League of Nations and let it fail. When people criticise the UN, it is really member states not holding up the responsibilities they ought to. Either it is resurrected and protected - people have been questioning for ages the role of the UN Security Council being held hostage by the vetoes of larger powers and permanent members - or perhaps countries should move with Mark Carney's suggestion of middle-range states that together can be quite powerful. In the past, that has been done. There are networks of smaller states in the UN that could be joined up. Something needs to happen to change the balance of power in how international and regional powers operate, or do not operate, by backing one side or another and not living up to what is expected of them, having been signatories of the UN Charter. Ireland could foster the voice of peace in Israel and invest in that, creating opportunities for people to meet and dialogue.

In terms of the equality of dialogue, I would go back to the point I made earlier. I have said this to Israelis and Palestinians - 7 October was a massacre. What has gone on in Gaza is beyond an ordinary massacre. It is absolutely, outrageously criminal what has gone on and continues to go on. There is a lot of trauma on both sides but it requires putting equality, human rights, inclusion and respect for citizenship at the centre and the right to belong and to be in that contested region. The Palestinians are by far in a worse position than Israelis because of the balance of power. Israelis trying to make a movement need to acknowledge that - I think those I have met do - in order to create the basis on which people can at least try to have dialogue and admit there is complete asymmetry in power and relationships. It was the same in Northern Ireland. It is more extreme in the Middle East and Northern Ireland does not happen to be the world fulcrum of superpowers in the way the Middle East is.

It is possible but it depends. It is very hard for somebody in the majority and in power to say, "We understand we are overpowering you and we need to step back". That needs to happen and is happening among those on the Jewish side who really want to live in partnership with their Palestinian neighbours.

Professor Monica McWilliams:

If is very lonely when you are in a conflict. It is hard, as we found, to find champions who are interested in you. I guess that was because we were such a small party. Then, suddenly, we got a lot of international attention because we were coming forward with different ideas and were prepared to speak out when violations were happening on both sides. We found champions. Hilary Clinton started Vital Voices and then she started it internationally. It was women who were coming together. They have come to Northern Ireland frequently and they were the ones who organised the Mothers' Call in Rome. The Palestinians and Israelis need to find champions who understand their context and do not continue this conflicting narrative.

There is a mutuality of fear and we also had a mutuality of fear. Unionists feared being a minority in a united Ireland and nationalists feared being the minority in Northern Ireland. Has that changed? We still face a constitutional referendum. It is a fear we still have to dispel. That is done through relationship building, constitutional building and preparation. I constantly say and said this morning that we need to prepare for what is coming. The dynamics of an agreement change. I do not want the unintended consequences of changing our peace agreement. We can see with the Conservative Party deciding to throw out the European Convention on Human Rights that it has no idea what the unintended consequences of that would be for our peace agreement. There is also the fact we have never had a bill of rights. My commission at the time was responsible for drafting one and it is sitting gathering dust, as is the charter of rights which sits in the Irish Parliament through the speaker because we presented it.

I mention all of these things because Senator O'Reilly mentioned hope, and fear is the opposite. I think Mary Robinson said it is hope that energises you and fear that creates intransigence. I remember Senator George Mitchell constantly saying to us - I think I put it in my opening statement - that violence takes away your lives but intransigence takes away your hope. What we have in the Middle East is intransigence, as well as massive violence. They and we need to find champions. I am glad the Chair mentioned the committee that he and this Parliament are involved with during the Presidency. They may find champions during those six months who can create a little glimmer of what needs to happen in the current stalemate.

Ms Kate Fearon:

Senator Stephenson asked about how to create the conditions for equality of dialogue. It seems to me we are not at that stage of this process. We are very much in the humanitarian stage. Right now it is about standing up and speaking for ICRC and UNRWA, and making sure, where it is in the gift of the Irish Government and Irish representatives, not to reduce the funding for those organisations that are supporting keeping people alive so they are able at some stage to engage in dialogue.

My colleagues have mentioned the asymmetry of the process. When we get past this humanitarian stage and have representatives engaged in a process, we will look to our experience of process design. When we went into the negotiating room as ten parties, we had two seats at the table. The larger parties had three seats each so there was more a balance of power than the number of electoral votes would suggest. That gave us confidence that our voice was recognised by the chair in the same way as the others around the table. The Government has an opportunity, because of its experience in process design, to put that forward at the right time and in the right place.

Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

One of the things I worry about when I look at the Middle East is the very negative approach being taken. That approach is so different from what we know to be the elements of a peace process yet they are so ostentatiously there, things like the Board of Peace and the direct challenge to the United Nations. It is not simply the wrong approach to delivering peace in the Middle East, but it damages humanity's collective learning from the Second World War and centuries of colonialism, which led to the kinds of instruments we created in the UN. As well as thinking of who are the individuals who can find the ground and who will come into the process, I worry the picture of what a peace process is is getting eroded by the warrior frame or a return to a bullying approach based on extraction, one that is interests based rather than values based. There does not seem to be a strong international push-back on that idea of peace. Professor McWilliams has spoken of Ireland's neutrality in the past. How could Ireland as a neutral country with its experience of the peace process not only say "learn from us" but also be willing to challenge that framework? It is being applied most egregiously in the Board of Peace-type frame, but is similar to what we are seeing in terms of Russia and Ukraine.

Linked to that is a challenge that seems to be intensified. Maybe it is not; maybe it was already there. Professor McWilliams mentioned people being scared of their community centre being burned down. Those who are the voices now seem to be such a target. One of the voices coming out of Iran that was most likely to negotiate was directly targeted in an attack. The consultant on the Oscar-winning Palestinian film "No Other Land" was killed. There is targeting of peacemakers.

Civil society is where the grounds might be for beginning the modelling of meaningful peace talks and protecting international law. It was notable it was said peacemaking sometimes gets framed as not wanting to upset people. That is not what Ireland's strength is. Will the witnesses comment on that? It is not about trying to find language no one takes offence to. It is actually about finding language which is consistent in what it draws on. Pushing for the application of international law may have a dual effect of helping maintain international legal instruments which could contribute to peace building down the line, while contributing to creating the pressure which is missing at the moment, in terms of one of the sides feeling they need to act.

I am sorry. I know there are a few points. I am trying to imagine coming at it slightly outside-in, in that regard.

John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

The Senator might attempt to summarise that into a question.

Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I think the witnesses have seen the questions are around the need to actually speak up on peace processes and protecting and fighting for the UN. I am a little bit nervous on Carney. Carney is fine, but as long as it is not just the middle powers.

The UN instruments are so crucial, as is asserting the rights aspect.

Inez McCormack and others contributed on UN Security Council Resolution 1325 and the role of women. Should Ireland be a very vocal demander on the principles of peacebuilding, even if it is on the outside? Does that help?

Ms Bronagh Hinds:

Yes, but let me say this. I am not speaking for the Department of foreign affairs or its officials, but anybody who negotiates at the UN on behalf of one's Government - Ms Fearon will know this even better from her work at the OSCE - knows one does not get everything one wants. We all remember the Istanbul Convention. At one point, it was about holding the line so things did not get worse. What governments were at – for example, at the recent Commission on the Status of Women and in various negotiations – was holding the line and saying "No" to certain things, including proposals on trans people and others, to ensure no slide backwards. Sometimes, it is not always a matter of pushing forward. I did not mean to suggest that it is all about middle powers. What I am suggesting is that all sorts of reimaginings and all sorts of strategies need to take place. Part of it is about being clever in negotiations and sometimes it is simply about speaking up and saying "No".

This is where the UN was so important. Professor McWilliams referred to the Syrian process in which we have all been involved. I was appointed by the UN to assist in developing the network of women to develop a Syrian women's initiative for peace and democracy. Out of that, they were negotiating for access to the negotiations. They were being blocked by regional and international powers, including international powers that were otherwise supportive of them. When someone says a conflict is very difficult and intractable, as Ms Fearon pointed out, there is a tendency to say that the main actors should be brought into the room to hammer out the matter. Certain superpowers and regional powers do not want anyone else in the room. That is why it is so important that Ireland and others maintain the line on keeping processes inclusive and open.

This is where the UN was important. When anything other than the main parties was blocked, and there was disagreement among Syrian women on this, the UN said it would set up a women's advisory board to the UN special envoy who was co-ordinating and mediating the negotiations. The envoy said that if he was in the room, his women's advisory board was coming with him. You can see tactics at certain times. Some people said that was not right of access as of right, while others said they needed to get a foot in the door because they were not going to get in any other way. Interestingly, in that process, which is a good example as referred to by Professor McWilliams, that group, which was mainly composed of people who were opposed to the regime, agreed among themselves to leave places for women from the regime side on the Syrian women's advisory board when it came to setting it up. How difficult that was in an ongoing conflict involving mass deaths, chemical bombings, starvation and everything else that was going on. Those women took the first step.

In the room during the first six or eight months, there were blood-on-the-carpet discussions, difficulties, challenges, tears, fallings-out, and comings-back-together in negotiations, and they made it. Their contribution to the process was to bring input from different parts of the conflict and their understanding of the various parties, to suggest where some of the blockages might be and come up with solutions. That is important in maintaining and supporting the UN. Therefore, governments such as those of Ireland, Canada and African countries, which are leading on national action plans on women, peace and security, are the ones that need to defend and lead the challenge of keeping all of those avenues open.

Professor Monica McWilliams:

The Senator has answered her own question on values and principles. We were fortunate that we had the seven principles. I had to put up my hand and swear I would stick by them. What was interesting about that, as I said in my opening statement, was that it was not just one party that was responsible for any one of those, including the principle of resolving our differences by exclusively peaceful means, rather, it was all the parties. That responsibility fell to everybody. That was a good principle.

As I also said in my opening statement, it was not just about what violence meant because people were pointing the finger at each other and asking who was creating the circumstances for it. The phrase used is "Polish the bullet and get somebody else to fire it". That was a really difficult problem we faced, but the principle was that we should allow for an extension. People were put out of the talks twice. Sinn Féin was put out during the second part in Dublin Castle and the loyalist Ulster Democratic Party was put out. We disagreed with them being put out because we said it was spoilers outside who were making it difficult for them to stay at the table. All we were doing was putting them out for six weeks. We were the only party that made that point. On both occasions, we did back-channelling with those two parties when they were outside and when they came back in they stayed in, and all of us stayed for Good Friday. The principles are important. It was hard to stand for those principles when people were accusing everyone else of breaching them.

I make a point on the principle of including things that would not have been taken that seriously in relation to paramilitary-style attacks. In this regard, kneecapping has become famous. I was quite shocked this week to read in Haaretz that the head of the Israel Defense Forces, a major general, was saying that any Palestinians trying to cross the barrier were shot in the legs and knees and were known as "limping monuments". All I could think of was the image of that in our own situation, with the numbers we know of. The major general also boasted that the Israel Defense Forces had killed 1,500 in the past year in the West Bank alone. It is not a boast that any general of any army should make. The point I am making is that it was useful for us to argue against kneecapping and paramilitary-style attacks. The number has gone down, but we were still dealing with the problem after the agreement because it was coming from people on their own side and from the internecine feuding that was occurring. Unfortunately, that is often the case, as we saw in our situation. It is also the case in the Middle East. It is good that we extended it to that.

I say that because it is only one of the seven principles. Good minds need to be put together at some stage. We had talks about talks about talks before we had the peace talks in 1996. If the same principles had been designed, they would have comprised a really good platform to start with and for holding everybody accountable and responsible for ensuring those principles are enforced.

Shay Brennan (Dublin Rathdown, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

My apologies; I missed a good portion of the initial part of the meeting. If I touch on any area that has already been covered, rather than waste the committee's time I can watch that back later. The Chair might advise me of it so we can move on.

Reference was made to the lower mandate threshold that specifically allowed the Women's Coalition to enter multi-party talks. I know this was deliberate as opposed to something that happened accidentally. In the context of the Middle East, where the primary focus seems to be on armed groups or constitutional parties, who is being left out of the room? What would an equivalent design to a lower mandate threshold look like in that context?

I will go through the points together and maybe I can get one answer rather than going back and forth. It was stated that a lot of the progress on reconciliation was driven by community-based organisations that were building bridges between divided communities.

That was central. A civil society dimension such as that was obviously central. Was that planned or did it just emerge and evolve organically? Did the whole civil society dimension evolve organically rather than being planned by anybody centrally or from the outset?

There was reference to the use of the concept of sufficient consensus rather than requiring full unanimity. In the Northern Ireland case, the outline of a compromise settlement emerged quite early. In the witnesses' view, what made it possible to move forward on that basis rather than bringing everyone together from the outset?

Ms Kate Fearon:

I thank the Deputy. On the lower mandate, I am not competent to speak in detail about the electoral system in the Knesset at the moment. There is a general principle to enable a new group or a marginalised group to collect votes across a larger constituency and not within a smaller constituency - more like the European Parliament than the Dáil constituencies. The principle is that a larger constituency enables people to attract votes from a wider geographical and socioeconomic sphere and works to include marginalised groups. That is the principle that needs to be adhered to. That said, it is important to have all groups around the table who are part of the problem. That was an issue for us.

On the issue of reconciliation and civil society, and the Deputy's question as to whether this evolved organically, on the one hand, the answer is "No". It was very deliberate, this issue of victims' rights, and not even reconciliation, I would say, in the Good Friday Agreement. There were discussions at the time about having something like a truth commission à la South Africa or Guatemala or similar. However, at the time I do not think that we were ready and I am not sure we are ready now. What we have seen in recent years is a process that is not led by state. We see it bubbling up in the arts and literature. There is much more discussion about it now. Ms Hinds and Professor McWilliams can probably speak to that issue in better detail than me, but I think that civil society was developed in Northern Ireland because there was a democratic deficit, as we said. There was no ability for ordinary people who wanted to have their views heard in the way there is in these Houses. That was why there was a displacement of democracy for us.

On the issue of sufficient consensus, that was a strong principle for us. There were, if I recall correctly, a number of different locks. There was a triple lock. The principle had to lock in or had to be accepted by all the parties, but the principle was not addressing that fear of being overruled or overridden, and being able to have the minority perspective count for something.

Ms Bronagh Hinds:

There is an interesting Women's Coalition link directly to that triple lock sufficient consensus. Even before entering the negotiations, on reading the rules of procedure, we realised that once they had held the election to have ten parties in the room, all of us could go home except the Ulster Unionist Party and the SDLP because it was originally only a double lock. In our very first meeting with Senator Mitchell, we presented this as a problem and he asked for a solution by the following week, which we provided. The rules of procedure referred to a majority of the electorate in Northern Ireland, on either side of the community divide. The simple addition to that was a reference to a majority of the parties in the negotiations. Otherwise, as I said, only the Ulster unionists and the SDLP needed to be there at that time.

I will speak particularly on reconciliation on a community basis and organic evolution. We said earlier, when the Deputy was running in and out of the Dáil, that what was absolutely brilliant on the island and particularly in Northern Ireland was the growth of community groups and community development during the conflict, and cross-community networking. I am not saying it was perfect because, like every society, there were people who got on and people who did not. There was sectarianism and all sorts of things. However, there was quite a base of people who had worked together and learned to work together. I will give some specific examples. As the state did not provide sufficiently for the minority community, the minority community, the nationalist community, first organised themselves through community organisations and the voluntary sector. I do not mean the big voluntary sector but more a grassroots level. It was well spotted by some people early on that it was to going to be asymmetrical and if we were going to make stuff across the divide, there was quite a lot of similarity in grassroots working class communities who were being misled by elites. Some work needed to be done on community development in that context. A group calling itself Community Development in Protestant Areas did that. It had that basic name. There was investment in it from some strategic and far-seeing people.

The women's sector, in particular, was a marginalised group. If we raise women's issues, we can take a whole lot of groups that are discriminated against with us. Women were networking across the divide, finding common cause and engaging with local councils and the Government together, and working on the Falls Road, the Shankill Road, etc.

There were also organisations such as the Ulster People's College. We ran programmes on community development, community reconciliation, community relations and all of those areas, including history, culture and identity. We designed all of our programmes to develop community leaders and to address things at the heart of the conflict. When we recruited people, you would have people who were absolute enemies and wanted to leave the course, former paramilitaries on both sides who wanted to leave the programme, but by the end of the year, they were working together and collaborating. Some of them were deliberate steps. Programmes can seem innocuous. They are empowering, but also have all sorts of elements to them.

The people who are leading on community relations are the community. The people who detract from community relations are frequently political leaders. There is not a great example in the power-sharing Executive when people are fighting instead of collaborating in governing for the whole of Northern Ireland. It happens less frequently now, but particular issues that we, for example, identified as central to our future, such as human rights and equality, the legacy of the past, cultural issues that are inclusive, as well as the experiences of victims, were used in a hierarchical time and weaponised, instead of creating some kind of basis for reconciliation. We are partly there. I am not saying it is perfect, but the community is leading the way. We could do with better political leadership.

Fiona O'Loughlin (Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I thank Professor McWilliams, Ms Hinds and Ms Fearon. It is lovely to see Ms Fearon again after all these years. I have also had the great opportunity to work a few times with Professor McWilliams. I saw the agenda when I knew I had already committed to an hour in the Seanad and I really regretted it because the witnesses are mighty women and the work they continue to do is important. I was listening to the witnesses as I was coming down.

It is one thing to read what they have to say but I have listened to the witnesses speak about their passion, compassion and drive to have peace where they all live and which they represent, in an unelected way at this point, and to have a more peaceful world. We need more women and people like the witnesses.

When the Women's Coalition started, one of the things I was surprised about at the time, and I was wrong, was it coming together as a group for women. I thought it would have been better if it brought together women from all of the different political persuasions because there would have been an enduring body of work. I recognise what the witnesses have brought to the table, including the needs of victims, integrated education, which, sadly, we have not moved on enough, shared housing and resources for young people. They would never have been brought to the table if the Women's Coalition had not been there. It was unusual to see it finishing as a political force but wonderful to see the continued work so many years later in different forums, and the fact it can be brought across the world at so many different levels.

When the Cathaoirleach suggested the committee look at this, we felt, because our history has been so bloody and so difficult, there had to be something in the difficult legacy so many years later. There are also the continuing challenges. There is no doubt about the contribution. Now, so many years after the Good Friday Agreement, is there anything from that time on which the witnesses would change their approach or change the way they dealt with things at that point in time?

Professor Monica McWilliams:

There are probably lots of things if we had to go back to the table. Retrospect is a great person to have in the chair when looking back. We got a lot in and we were fortunate in that we kept preparing every night around the kitchen table for what we called Senator Mitchell's homework. In Belfast last week, a couple of things that we did not get in were highlighted in a play called "Cuckoo Land". We wanted the electoral system to be changed to the one that brought us into the peace talks. That was a combined list and constituency-based system. It is in place in Scotland and the elections there last week showed the benefit of it. We did not get it and we were extremely disappointed. We did not have a lot of support for it. What happens in most conflicts is that people go back to what they know best and people went back to the system they had been used to. We do not have a combination of the list and constituency-based systems.

As Ms Fearon said earlier, the list provides for a party across the whole of the country which may not do well in any one constituency. I say this because we were more worried about the UDP, which was affiliated to the UDA, the paramilitary loyalist group, losing and indeed it did. People thought it was about getting ourselves back in. We were not at all focused on being Members of that first Northern Ireland Assembly.

Issues such as the bill of rights, which I mentioned earlier, fell off the table. We did get a civic forum in. In response to an earlier question, it is a terrible indictment of Northern Ireland that it does not have a civic forum and that we do not have a North-South civic forum. They are in the Good Friday Agreement. In answer to the question on who is not at the table, it is the people who would be in that civic forum.

Ms Bronagh Hinds:

I will respond to the point on women of different political persuasions. We put three things to the women who came regarding what we would do about the talks. These were a voter education campaign, putting pressure on political parties to select women for the negotiations or starting a women's party, and 95% of respondents wanted to start a women's party. Since then I started DemocraShe, negotiated with the leader of every political party and, over three election cycles, trained women in every party in Northern Ireland, not only unionist and nationalist but anti-agreement as well as pro-agreement, some of whom are in senior positions. I moved on and worked with women in the Local Government Staff Commission, and we changed the complexion of women in local government, working with women politicians and women officers. Until then, all of the heads and senior leadership in local councils were male. They were networking with male politicians and women were not progressing as officials or as politicians. We worked through this.

Fiona O'Loughlin (Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

That is great work. Well done.

Ms Bronagh Hinds:

We did both.

Ms Kate Fearon:

There are three things. One is the electoral system. If we were not going to get one constituency, we wanted at least to stick with six-seater constituencies because then we would have had an opportunity to remain on board. We also wanted an implementation group for the agreement, to maintain the sense of being custodians of the peace that was negotiated and that this did not end when the agreement was signed. The third was a sunset clause or transition clause in order, in a structured way, to enable the agreement to evolve over time and not always be locked into the multi-party government system, which I am not sure assists our governance so much.

Cathy Bennett (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

With regard to the peace agreement and the proposed referendum, which is still in discussion and still has not happened, the witnesses spoke about the diaspora in the US being a great support for the peace agreement at the time. Where do they feel this is at now, moving forward into this era? Do we still need support from Americans to get the referendum over the line? What is the stance of the witnesses on that?

Donnchadh Ó Laoghaire (Cork South-Central, Sinn Fein)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I apologise for popping in and out so much but I had a speaking slot at another meeting. I thank the witnesses for their testimony. The primary focus is what we can learn from the conflict in the North and how a peace process was established. I would not say how a peace process was addressed because there are still issues that need to be addressed. From a lot of the testimony, organic civil society, women's organisations and various other civil society organisations were crucial in filling in some of the gaps overlooked by the political parties and the two Governments. On the situation in the Middle East, do the witnesses see much cause for optimism? Do they see similar movements on the ground, whether in Palestine or in Israel? Are there things governments can do to try to encourage and support this?

Patricia Stephenson (Social Democrats)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

Ms Fearon mentioned we are in the humanitarian stage and I absolutely agree we need to protect UNRWA and all of the organisations and ensure they can deliver aid. At the same time, we cannot park the political. The international community has to create a pathway for politics and this includes member states promoting the UN, upholding its judgments and upholding the ICJ judgment by passing the occupied territories Bill.

It also means protecting, for example, Francesca Albanese from the sanctions she has faced and the ICJ judges and prosecutors because that is a direct attack on the UN multilateral system. From the Good Friday Agreement perspective - I know we are here to talk about the Middle East - Professor McWilliams mentioned the British Government is looking at pulling out of the ECHR. The Irish Government also signed the political declaration about looking at altering our thresholds for Article 3 on torture and inhumane and degrading treatment. We can see that change on both sides with the politicisation of the ECHR for domestic reasons. We have to uphold all those frameworks in the context of the Good Friday Agreement, as it relates to the ECHR being a pillar of it, the lack of a bill of rights and how important and fundamental it is. I am sorry for talking so quickly, but the Chair is going to cut me off.

From the ECHR or Council of Europe perspective, Israel still holds observer status to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe despite its Bill on the reintroduction of the death penalty. It is the first time in history a country has reintroduced the death penalty, and it has done so in a discriminatory fashion.

Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I will ask about two other aspects, including one where Ireland has learning that could and should be in the mix. It is disarmament. I am concerned that we played a complicit role to a degree in dual-use technologies in the Middle East. Will the witnesses comment on Ireland's history of disarmament, which is another part of peacebuilding, and how we could be a voice on that at this time of escalation?

Prisoners were also mentioned. The committee has met those advocating for Marwan Barghouti. It is important that people speak up and that voices are at the table. Ms Hinds mentioned demonisation at one point. There is a danger with NGOs being outlawed and key political prisoners who are perhaps the bridge between different factions in Palestine being excluded. Will the witnesses comment on the importance of championing those voices that need to be at the table, including civil society?

Fiona O'Loughlin (Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I thank the witnesses for their responses earlier. I really appreciated them. It is great they are all continuing to work, especially Ms Hinds whose work supports women in local government and at officer level. It is fair to say that the work the witnesses did in the past essentially changed the tenets of how people work together in Northern Ireland and ensured the essential foundations were human rights based and based around equality and inclusion, which is inspirational for those continuing to work. They are value-driven and their voices are still needed because they highlighted that the bill of rights is needed as is the full implementation of integrated education. So far on, it is disappointing to see that so much work needs to be done on that.

However, as we move forward, they can send a strong message to countries that are sadly at war now, particularly in the Middle East. There are strong women like Maryam Rajavi, who is doing work on democracy and so on, that is mainly women-based. What is the biggest thing the witnesses learned that they can pass on, not only around some of the work that is unfinished and they will continue to do, but the biggest thing they learned about trying to get everyone around the table?

John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I will ask my final questions. Some of the witnesses touched on this. What unique political or human characteristics did women bring to the process and do they have to offer on this? Will they synopsise that?

I will take the opportunity as Chair of the committee. Israeli and Palestinian women coming to the North and the issue of the Republic and antisemitism were mentioned. I will repeat this. This is a great smear on this country and its population. That is not to say there are not manipulative players who can exploit a position, but most Irish people can definitely discriminate between the actions of a state and the Jewish people and Jewish religion. Many Jews I have spoken to here and abroad recognise how the Netanyahu Government has set back the cause of Judaism by decades and generations. We need to combat that sentiment at every opportunity in every way. After Shakespeare, one of the greatest writers in the history of English literature is Joyce and the central heroic character of Ulysses is an Irish Jew. He comes out of that book in a benign way compared with many of his compatriots. We need to re-emphasise that the accusation of antisemitism cannot be let pass here or internationally in any form. I know I speak on behalf of my colleagues in saying that.

Having said that, given the asymmetrical nature - it is a word I am taking away from today - meaning the lopsided nature of the conflict in the Middle East, what can Ireland offer Israelis, given the impression they have been assisted in forming of us? What are their views on that? I was taken by what the witnesses are doing with the two sets of women in particular. That is where the great hope is.

The witnesses have ten minutes to wax lyrical in whatever order they wish and then we will conclude. That is ten minutes in total as 5.30 p.m. is the deadline. Ms Fearon's light is on. It is like "University Challenge"

Ms Kate Fearon:

The diaspora was very important for us during the process. The old diaspora got Bill Clinton interested in it and the thing about the US was that they were there in the background in Washington DC but in the foreground in the chairs.

A referendum is a judgment for the Northern Irish secretary of state to make, in accordance with the agreement. That would necessitate discussion between whoever is the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland and whoever is in the White House or US diaspora. That said, the diaspora is not the same now as it was then.

Are the roles of civil society crucial in Northern Ireland? Absolutely. Is there a cause for optimism? I go back to the idea that optimism is necessary for any process. People have to be able to imagine a different type of society and once they have that goal in their heads, they have to work backwards to see what they need to do. Politics always has to be held up as the art of the possible and people need as much as possible to get things into the political realm.

What is the sequencing or choreography? I take the point that the humanitarian issue is here. I do not see that there is an incentive for the Israeli Government right now to engage in negotiations. I wish there were. Linking in with the Cathaoirleach's last question about what Ireland can offer Israel, the prize is peace and people being able to live with their neighbours in a way that they do not feel threatened or that they have to attack. As Professor McWilliams said earlier, our approach to decommissioning in Northern Ireland was to remove the mindset or to remove the need to take up the weapons and that is applicable to both sides in the Middle East process.

On prisoners, this was something we supported, but we need to recall these are political prisoners. They were not people breaking into-----

Alice-Mary Higgins (Independent)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

Of course.

Ms Kate Fearon:

It was linked to the conflict.

Again, that has applicability in a Middle East context as well. Our biggest learning is around this issue of not giving up, always going back to the table, even when there was despair in the room. It was a case of take a little time out, go outside, rest, recover, reflect, renew and come back in and try again. That was something we had to do.

On the unique characteristics women bring, it is our experience of being excluded from the day and the hour that you are born and become a social being that enables us to see things a little more broadly and from a different perspective. We see this is an asymmetrical conflict between Israel and Palestine, but we also need to remember that it was an asymmetrical conflict for us in terms of the minority population and the British Government, which was, perhaps, not always as benign as it is in current days.

Ms Bronagh Hinds:

Let me talk first about the asymmetrical nature and what Ireland can offer the Israelis. I agree with Ms Fearon. Most conflicts are asymmetrical in some way or other. It is about going in with the values and really basing it on what is right and on human rights, equality, inclusion, values and working from a values perspective.

On what can governments do to support and what can Ireland offer the Israelis, not everybody believes the same thing. The issue is working with and giving a platform to Israelis who want to be different and who want to say something different. It is about helping to protect them and give them a voice. It is also about accepting criticisms that come your way. As Gideon Levy, who is an incredible Israeli, has said, Israelis need to be helped out of the situation they are in and will need outside pressure and support to do that. It is about thinking in that way.

On disarmament, Ireland has a very proud track record in being involved in the disarmament campaign. I remember when I did the first review of the first national action plan on women, peace and security, we were trying to engage different sections of the Department of foreign affairs and other Departments. The people who were involved in disarmament came knocking at the door of the conflict resolution unit and said “Why didn’t you ask us? We’re involved in this.” It has a long track record of working with the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom. I think there is a good record there.

On voices at the table, protection and champions, human rights defenders and civil society actors are doing that defending. Let me add to that journalists who are throwing a light, more of whom have been killed in this conflict in the Middle East than ever before, and we need to be speaking out about that. These people include people like Francesca Albanese.

I want to mention integrated education. That was championed by our wonderful Baroness Blood, May Blood, who died a few years ago. Some of the members may have known her. We have to extend and promote it. Our current Minister for Education is not totally a fan. He prefers shared campuses, which is not exactly integrated education. In the case of two schools, a primary school and a second level school in Bangor which voted to go integrated, he decided not to grant them permission to do so. Lots of schools can go integrated slowly – Bangor had predominantly one side of the population, and that is the reason he gave. Actually, it is not okay to just say that our schools are integrated; it is about the values. We have talked a lot about the values. The integrated education movement is not precious about this. Whatever way it happens, integrating our education and our housing must happen. We must desegregate our areas, and we must do it on the basis of integrated values not just optics.

On our biggest learning, I agree with Ms Fearon about not giving up. Inclusion works, and also listening. Women learn to listen and read body language, and that made all the difference. We could listen to the gaps as well as what was being explicitly said.

John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I am going to have to use some body language at this point.

Ms Bronagh Hinds:

All right. On the unique characteristic, down here has what we have in terms of equality grounds. What we call intersectionality of those grounds means combining the discriminations in order that we are not just looking at men and women or disabled people and not disabled people, but how they all present themselves in one person - a woman of colour who is disabled and who is a lone parent, for example. Women carry that understanding of those burdens and discrimination in spades and can therefore reflect that more holistically. That is an important contribution to the debate.

Professor Monica McWilliams:

On the issue of the referendum, diasporas can be positive but they can also be very negative. I have watched that in Minnesota with the authorities telling the Somalians or almost imposing on them what they should do. Our situation has to be handled carefully. One thing I will say about the diaspora relates to the funding we received. When you go to other conflicts, there is no comparison with the amount of money that came through the International Fund for Ireland, which is not so much the diaspora funding as it is government funding by Canada, Australia, New Zealand and the United States. That was very important and, of course, it has been cut by President Trump under the cuts to USAID, although it is still there. I was a little heartened during the week to see that there will be an increase. It was hugely important to us because not everybody wanted to give taxes in respect of the risk work that had to take place. It was the international funds that did it, and also the Ireland funds from the diaspora. There is something of a lesson there. In terms of the work I am doing on the Independent Reporting Commission on Paramilitaries, the line “Why should we pay for these people to go away?, still gets thrown up to me. It is like, as they say in Colombia, their tax money is being misspent. It is really important to pay attention to resources. We are no longer going to get European Union funding because of Brexit, and that is a real issue.

I will make a point on the shared island fund and the Minister to whom Ms Hinds just referred. The Minister for Education took that money, much to the surprise of people, for the education of Protestant boys who have really underachieved. That is one of the ways forward.

Then there is the point that the Chair made. I think it is probably up to the unionists to speak to the Israelis because nationalists are so much associated with the historical legacy of Ireland, both North and South, in terms of occupation, colonialism or whatever language has been used to describe it. However, I take heart from what was said this morning by the panel in Stormont where Peter Robinson spoke very strongly, as did the Ulster Unionist person, about the need to reach out and include voices they did not particularly want to have at the table. It is the importance of having them at the table and how much we all changed in that process.

I also want to pay tribute to the Department of foreign affairs which was mentioned earlier. We have gone to those countries we have gone to because of the conflict resolution unit in the Department. It was the unit that funded us. I must say on record that we did not get the same support from the foreign and commonwealth office at UK Government level. There is no comparison in the way it has used us and the way the Irish Government and, in particular, the Department of foreign affairs officials have used us. We have been prepared to be used in that way. It has been on a pro bono voluntary basis, so you might well ask why did the Westminster Government and the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office use us. Where it is reaching it is NGOs like Inter Mediate, directed by Jonathan Powell, that occasionally ask us, but there is no comparison, so some tribute has to be paid there.

The interesting thing about a referendum is that we put it on a table – the coalition – that we should have been able to vote for an Irish President if we were going to recognise in an agreement that we were British, Irish or both. We were told by people around the table “No representation without taxation”, but look at how that has changed, and look at that whole discussion. You might look to the future on that, but how would that change the constitutional referendum?

If people were going to be able to vote in the referendum on either remaining with the Union or unification and the diaspora had a vote, that would be an interesting one.

I will also say something about antisemitism. We need to reverse the shame. I do not think Ireland should be perceived as antisemitic but as we know in Northern Ireland, perception is everything and is damaging. It is unfair to Ireland to have it perceived like that, but we need to listen to the people as I did when I went on the barefoot walk in Rome. I asked people why and where they were getting it from. It is disinformation, but it is also about tarring everybody with the same brush, as the Chair has said. There is much that was unique about Northern Ireland's peace process, but we hope today that we have presented the committee with some things that are common to all conflicts.

John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

I look forward to reading the transcript. I do not say that after every session, and it is no disrespect to anybody. I am leaving with a few things. The peace process belongs to everybody who participated in it. I would love to see Peter Robinson and one or two others on the unionist side come here at some point to contribute to this conversation. One of the witnesses mentioned something potentially politically invaluable about what that side of the peace process could do as an Irish contribution to peace in the Middle East.

Ms Bronagh Hinds:

That is depending on how you ask.

John Lahart (Dublin South West, Fianna Fail)
Link to this: Individually | In context | Oireachtas source

They might advise us on that. An issue was mentioned, and I have noted it and it will be taken up. It is unacceptable and unfortunate if you have invited people to participate in peace building initiatives in Northern Ireland and visa issues in the Republic prevent them from travelling to the North because they are landing in Dublin. Am I understanding that correctly? I am. We might do a piece of work on that.

All that is left to say is that this has been a really powerful session, and I think everybody will agree on that. We could have continued listening. I thank the witnesses for giving so generously today, and I also thank them for the ongoing work they do and giving so much of themselves. I suspect we may have them back if Parliament runs its course. I thank Professor McWilliams, Ms Hinds and Ms Fearon for appearing today and for their invaluable contributions. I recommend that anybody watching but who did not catch it all to go back on Oireachtas TV or read the transcript.

I thank the officials from the Houses, our clerk, everybody who makes the meeting possible and our communications people in audiovisual who ensure that the wider world can see the witnesses’ contributions and that they are recorded for posterity and the record.