Patrick Costello (Dublin South Central, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I thank the Tánaiste. I find his language quite diplomatic, which is perhaps appropriate given his position, but I tend to agree with Deputy Gannon that we should call things what they are. In the question I have mentioned settlement building, settlement expansion, state-supported settler violence, demolitions and the forced transfer of Palestinian populations. What we are witnessing is Israel deliberately inflicting on Palestinians actions and conditions of life designed to destroy them within the West Bank. They are designed to destroy Palestinian communities in the West Bank. We need to call these out. To call them negative trends or say they are not giving rise to optimism is overly soft. We need to call them out. If we compare and contrast the response to Russian aggression and Russian war crimes to Israel's continued impunity in breaching international law we see quite a stark contrast. This is a frustration for many Deputies when we see international law being held up and given teeth with actions and concrete responses towards some states but not towards Israel, which continues to inflict these horrendous war crimes.

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