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

It is very obvious to everybody who is being honest that Israel is engaged in a genocidal massacre in Gaza. Why does the Taoiseach, along with the sponsors of Israel, namely, the United States, Britain and the European Union, continue to persist with the falsehood that this has anything to do with Israeli self-defence or that Israel is in any way a normal state, particularly when its own spokespeople have made it clear what they are doing? Gallant has described all Palestinians as human animals. The Israelis have said that they are going to target the entire population by cutting off food, water, electricity and medical supplies. They have been doing that, not only in the last month, but have been doing it for years. This Israeli Government, long before October 7, and one of its members, Smotrich, said that there is no such thing as the Palestinians. Netanyahu said that he was not interested in and would never allow a Palestinian state. That has been the history of this state since its foundation.

Let me quote David Ben-Gurion in 1937: “We must expel the Arabs and take their place”. Chaim Weizmann, the first Israeli President, said: “There is a fundamental difference in quality between Jew[s] and [the] native.” One can go on through the list. Ben-Gurion said in 1948: “The Arabs of the Land of Israel ... have but one function left - to run away.” That has been the entire history of the state, which is one of ethnic cleansing, apartheid and occupation. I ask the Taoiseach why he says this state is defending itself when it is clearly involved in a genocidal war to destroy the Palestinian people.

I ask the Taoiseach again - I asked him this before - if a regime built on ethnic cleansing, apartheid and illegal occupation has the right to defend itself. I say that it does not have the right to defend itself. The people who have the right to defend themselves are the people who are the victims of apartheid, illegal occupation and ethnic cleansing. It is the Palestinians who have the right to defend themselves. They are the oppressed. Israel is the aggressor. Why will the Taoiseach not honestly admit that that is the truth of this horrific situation because unless we acknowledge the truth----

See this speech in context