Richard Boyd Barrett (Dún Laoghaire, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

Is the international and EU division of the Taoiseach's Department at all concerned about the massacre that Israel has been perpetrating against unarmed protesters in Gaza for the last number of weeks? Two days before those protests began I begged the Taoiseach to condemn and speak out against any likely Israeli armed attack on those protests but the Taoiseach ignored me in the Dáil that day. I have asked the Taoiseach about this every week since then, as the death toll has risen to 42. Unarmed protesters who represent no threat to human life have been shot down by Israeli armed forces. Those forces have admitted, in the face of protests by Israeli and Palestinian civil society, that they are using the rules of war and military engagement to deal with unarmed protesters. The UN has spoken out on this. Last week Mr. Ilan Baruch, the former Israeli ambassador to South Africa, compared what has been done in the last few weeks to Bloody Sunday. He said that these events are Palestine's Bloody Sunday but are happening week in, week out. He condemned the European Union, including Ireland, for its failure to use diplomatic means to deter Israel from such direct and brutal violence towards unarmed, non-violent Palestinian demonstrators. He asked if Irish and EU leaders preferred profitable economic co-operation with Israel over upholding international human rights. He went on to say that firing live ammunition at non-violent, unarmed demonstrators is "an act of inconceivable brutality, yet standing indifferently on the sidelines is inconceivable, too". He accused European governments, including the Irish Government, of doing exactly that. Where is the condemnation? Where are the expulsions and sanctions? We have absolute, deadly silence. Teenagers are being mowed down by snipers and nobody is doing anything. I ask the Taoiseach to say something about this.

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