Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance) | Oireachtas source

Actions absolutely speak louder than words. I start by paying tribute to the very brave and committed students of Trinity College Dublin who, after five or six days of a sit-in, managed to get full boycott divestment from the Israeli state from the authorities in the university. This is a very hopeful sign in the midst of what is a desperate and hopeless situation as Israel moves to its next stage of onslaught against the people of Palestine and threatens the ground invasion of Rafah. Interestingly, Joe Biden stated this morning that he will not provide any more bombs. One shipment of bombs has been refused. That is a small amount of weaponry compared with what the USA has already provided to Israel but it is progress and that is an amazing thing to see. Where did that incentive come from? Where did that impetus come from? It came from the students across America who are occupying colleges there and driving from below the absolute imperative on our rulers across the world to do something; not just to talk, but to act. The students have acted and they are being listened to.

There is an historic context to this. Students acted when the Vietnam war was at its height. Students across America, Europe and Britain occupied and took action and began the end of the Vietnam war. The same is true of apartheid in South Africa. Student action began the end of apartheid and fed into a movement that spoke to the rulers of the world and said "Do something. Act. You must act now." When will the Government act? Rather than just talking about what needs to be done and bemoaning the fact that there is terrible genocide, children are being killed and the scenes are horrific, when will it actually do something that will force the hand of the Israeli state to back off and stop the genocide? We have a legal obligation under the Genocide Convention to do something rather than just sitting on our hands and waiting to see what happens and whether the European Council meeting will be called or not. We have to act and we should now start taking a leaf from the book of students. These young people, the locked-out generation who cannot get homes, who are living in their mammy and daddy's box room, who have to emigrate when they finish their education because they cannot afford to live in this country, have been inspiring. They have been courageous and gone the whole nine yards. They are at this in America and across Europe and Britain as we speak. They are trying to tell people like the Tánaiste, who rule these democratic countries, to do something. It is not just about being cool, young and a student. It is about telling the adults who are well-paid, well-resourced and powerful in this world to actually take action, stop the genocide and the slaughter of children, and tell Israel that this is not acceptable and the apartheid and the occupation of Palestine must end.

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