Dessie Ellis (Dublin North West, Sinn Fein) | Oireachtas source

The Gaza Strip is one of the most densely populated areas of the world. Over 2 million people are squeezed into an area smaller than County Louth, the smallest county in Ireland. The people of Gaza are discriminated against and humiliated by the Israelis on a daily basis. There has been a land, air and sea blockade of the Gaza Strip since the early 1990s, which has resulted in great hardship for its residents and has led to a serious deterioration in the population's living conditions. This has been made worse by the global pandemic. At the end of April, fewer than 2% of Gaza's population had received at least one dose of a vaccine, compared to over 60% of the Israeli population. Vaccinations were stopped during the recent conflict and it was impossible to carry out testing. There is a real concern that the enclave could be hit by a third wave of Covid-19. Dozens of schools that became shelters during the conflict are now feared to be super-spreaders. Israel's disproportionate response of carrying out attacks on clearly identifiable civilian areas and complexes led to the deaths of at least 222 people, including 63 children. In a ten-day period, Israel destroyed more than 450 buildings in the Gaza Strip. Among those destroyed buildings were six hospitals, nine healthcare centres and a water desalination plant that supplied around 250,000 Palestinians with clean drinking water. Israeli forces also targeted a tower that housed various media outlets, including the Al Jazeera network and the Associated Press. Some 74,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, are now homeless as a result of these targeted Israeli attacks on the civilian population. These attacks by Israel violate international human rights standards. They are nothing less than war crimes, as defined under international law, and as such there is both individual and state responsibility for them. The state of Israel and those individuals responsible for the planning and carrying out of these actions should be held accountable for these war crimes.

See this speech in context