Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity) | Oireachtas source

Last week, Israel attacked an aid flotilla bound for Gaza with drones in international waters against people who were bringing humanitarian aid to Gaza. That is shocking, but for Israel it is not unprecedented. Fifteen years ago, ten people were killed aboard the MV Mavi Marmara as part of the freedom flotilla. Fourteen years ago, when I was an MEP, I participated in the freedom flotilla. Our first boat was sabotaged and later, when we got to sail, we were surrounded by Israeli warships, boarded, and brought to an Israeli prison. Then, as now, the aim of the flotilla was to break the siege of Gaza and provide humanitarian aid but the humanitarian situation is a thousand times worse.

For more than 20 months, Israel has been carrying out a genocide. Starvation is a weapon of war for Israel just like bombs and bullets. There are 290,000 children in Gaza who are starving and 70,000 have been hospitalised for severe malnutrition. Three and a half thousand little children under five face imminent death by starvation, according to the health ministry. All the while there are large stockpiles of food a mile away from where the children are starving to death.

How can the EU and European states continue to arm Israel? How can the EU continue to be Israel's largest trading partner while Israel continues to commit such atrocities? Why is the EU so supportive of Israel's genocide that it will not act even when Israel attacks a humanitarian ship 14 miles off the coast of Malta? The EU's silence and its complicity in genocide makes a mockery of the claim by the EU to be an institution of peace. It is not. It is a great power block and, increasingly, an imperialist military alliance in which Ireland, a post-colonial, neutral state should have no part.

The EU is pressuring member states into billions of euro worth of increased military spending. This money will not be used for defence. It will be used for imperialist military interventions alongside the US and NATO. That is why the Government wants to abolish the triple lock. If the increased military spending was just for defence then there would be no need to abolish the triple lock. The triple lock does not prevent the State using troops to defend itself at all. It just restricts the Government from sending troops overseas without UN approval. In other words, it stops Micheál Martin and Simon Harris from currying favour with Trump, von der Leyen, Macron and Merz by sending Irish soldiers to fight and die in offensive imperialist wars.

In preparation for abolishing the triple lock the Government here is cracking down on the right to protest. The same is happening across the EU. In France, one of the most prominent Palestine solidarity organisations, Urgence Palestine, is under threat of being banned. So is the anti-fascist organisation, Jeune Garde antifasciste. In Germany, protesters are banned from speaking as Gaeilge on pro-Palestine demonstrations and Irish citizens are threatened with deportation as a result of their pro-Palestine solidarity. Far from standing up against this repression, the Irish State is eagerly joining in. Gardaí physically assaulted pro-Palestine protesters outside NATO HQ in Dublin, viciously breaking a man's ankle. They strip searched women protesters from Mothers Against Genocide, a form of sexual assault. The Government is bringing in new laws to allow gardaí to use facial recognition technology and to criminalise the wearing of face masks on protests so people can be easily identified by police.

The Government says it will need these draconian powers for the EU Presidency in Dublin next year. The Government knows the EU is authoritarian and anti-democratic and therefore will need these powers to suppress protest against it. That is why we need to rally against militarism, against the increasingly oppressive direction of the EU and in defence of peace this Saturday at 2 p.m. in the Gresham Hotel in Dublin, which is being organised by the Irish Neutrality League.

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