Paul Murphy (Dublin South West, Solidarity)

I want to speak about the so-called peace plan. It is not a peace plan. It is a plan for the continued colonisation of Palestine. That is what it is. I think it is shameful that the Irish Government is officially welcoming this plan, and even officially thanking Donald Trump for his efforts to end the conflict in Gaza. It is a plan for the continued colonial carve-up of Palestine - that is what it is - while they hope the global resistance movement will be halted by such a plan.

We look at where this plan came from. It is a peace process. You would expect it to be a negotiation between Israel and Palestine but, no, this plan emerged from discussions between Trump and Netanyahu, between the man who is directing the genocide, and has been for the past two years, and the man who is funding, arming and enabling that genocide. It is crazy. It is the equivalent of Hitler and Mussolini coming up with a peace plan to end the Second World War.

When we look at the content of the plan, and it can be found online, there is no mention of the right of the Palestinian people or people living in Gaza to select their own representatives or to have democracy. No. Instead, there is the installation of Donald Trump, Tony Blair and an obscenely named board of peace as viceroys of Gaza. Tony Blair, the war criminal, the man whose hands are dripping with the blood of 1 million Iraqis, the man who should be rotting in a prison for his war crimes, is instead installed as technocratic dictator, with others, of Gaza. There is the establishment of a special economic zone and a Trump economic development plan to rebuild and energise Gaza; in other words, a rebooted version of the Trumpian Gaza Riviera plan.

And for what? There is no guarantee of the withdrawal of Israeli forces. In fact, Netanyahu has boasted to the Israeli media that, no way, that is not happening and Israeli forces will not be withdrawing. There is just simply a sentence, after lots of other things: “... the conditions may finally be in place for a credible pathway to Palestinian self-determination and statehood, which we recognise as the aspiration of the Palestinian people.” It does not even commit to any road to Palestinian statehood. It is another colonial carve-up of Palestine. It is why we need not be lulled into the sense that peace is going to come about. It is not going to be delivered by Trump and Netanyahu. We need to continue our movements. We need to support the flotilla. We need to be on the streets this Saturday. We need to push for workplace action, as we saw in Italy with the 24-hour general strike.

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