Simon Harris (Wicklow, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

Last week, I was at the United Nations and I met the President of the Palestinian Authority, Mr. Mahmoud Abbas. I also met the Prime Minister of the Palestinian Government. Both the President and the Prime Minister of Palestine thanked me, our Government and the people of Ireland for what we are doing in relation to Palestine. I come back here and I come into this Dáil and the Deputy's distortion of what the Government is doing is actually breathtaking, in terms of how he distorts the record of this Government. It is breathtaking. President Abbas thanks the Government and people of Ireland for our position but Deputy Boyd Barrett comes in here and constantly endeavours to misrepresent it. The Government's position is clear and the people of Ireland's position is clear in relation to the humanitarian catastrophe that is happening in Gaza. We are very clear in relation to the breaches of international law. We are very clear in relation to the ICJ ruling and in relation to the actions we took arising from that ruling in the context of defence equipment. Please do not attempt to misrepresent the Government of the people of Ireland in terms of our position in relation to this. The President of the Palestinian Authority understands it and, quite frankly, what he thinks of our record on Palestine matters to me a hell of a lot more than what Deputy Boyd Barrett thinks and how he wishes to misrepresent our record.

I note that in his comments - unless I missed it - that the Deputy did not condemn Iran and did not condemn what happened last night. A civilian is a civilian. International law is international law. We cannot just pick and choose if we like this country or do not like that country. What Iran did last night should be condemned by Deputy Boyd Barrett when he rises to his feet again and should be condemned by this House because we condemn other acts of aggression on a regular basis. Presumably, we wish to apply international law regardless of the country or our political stance on an issue. What Iran did last night was a despicable act that should be condemned by all. Had the air dome failed, we would be dealing with mass civilian deaths in Tel Aviv and in Jerusalem-----

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