Eugene Regan (Fine Gael)

I thank the Minister of State for his comprehensive report. The cross-party motion demonstrates that when the problem is far from this country we can reach consensus while we have difficulty doing so with many of our own problems. Despite the other problems we have in this country, we have an interest in adding our voice to the member states of the EU and the EU itself in trying to foster a solution in the Middle East.

The motion refers to a number of issues, the first of which is the action of the Israeli forces in Gaza in January. The preliminary issue is the justification for the invasion under international law. Then the proportionality of the actions taken must be considered. These ultimately resulted in more than 1,000 civilian deaths, an extraordinary level of injuries, mass destruction of property and what appears to be collective punishment of the entire population. In commenting on this subject, the role of Europe and the European Union has not been as effective, although it is a major donor to the area. That is because of the structure of the foreign representation. I do not apologise for making the point that the Lisbon treaty, which we will revisit in the autumn, is important because there are provisions in it relating to the Presidency of the Council and a foreign affairs delegate which are fundamental to Europe's having a more coherent foreign policy on this subject, as it does on so many others.

In regard to the actions of the Israeli army in Gaza, the country has serious questions to answer about breaches of international law. It is useful to review very briefly the provisions of the Geneva Convention, particularly the first additional protocol to that convention, in respect of protecting civilians in occupied territories. It specifically provides that protected persons must not be exposed to coercion, torture, collective punishment, reprisals, use as human shields and acts of terrorism, pillage or hostage taking.

In terms of the military actions taken, it provides that everything feasible must be done to verify that the objects intended for the attack are not civilian or in any way subject to special protection under international human law. The attacks are prohibited if they may be expected to cause incidental loss of civilian life or damage to civilian targets which would be excessive in comparison to the military advantage anticipated. One must judge the balance of the requirement in the motion to have an independent international investigation of the violations of international humanitarian law during this military action in Gaza. I fully support the approach of the Government and the collective action of the different parties represented here.

In its latest report, Amnesty International has highlighted some of the serious issues that have arisen. It has noted the matter of proportionality, the enormous cost in human life and how an entire population has been affected by this action. It continues to be affected by the economic blockade which has been referred to by the Minister of State.

I will provide some quotes so that I am not just giving my own views. Mr. Henry Siegman is the director of the US Middle East Project in New York, which is in the context of the Council on Foreign Relations. I served on the committee of that project at one point. Mr. Siegman is a research professor at the Sir Joseph Hotung Middle East Programme, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. He is also a former executive director of the American Jewish Congress and of the Synagogue Council of America so he can speak as a friend of Israel. I take his views as being authoritative on this question.

In an article published on 17 April 2008, he indicates that in terms of international peace efforts in the Middle East, the problem primarily responsible for the impasse is not faced up to. He states:

. . . for all the sins attributable to the Palestinians — and they are legion, including inept and corrupt leadership, failed institution-building and the murderous violence of rejectionist groups — there is no prospect for a viable, sovereign Palestinian state, primarily because Israel's various governments, from 1967 until today, have never had the intention of allowing such a state to come into being.

It would be one thing if Israeli Governments had insisted on delaying a Palestinian state until certain security concerns had been dealt with. But no government serious about a two-state solution to the conflict would have pursued, without letup, the theft and fragmentation of Palestinian lands, which even a child understands makes Palestinian statehood impossible.

Given the overwhelming disproportion of power between the occupier and the occupied, it is hardly surprising that Israeli Governments and their military and security establishments found it difficult to resist the acquisition of Palestinian land. What is astounding is that the international community, pretending to believe Israel's claim that it is the victim and its occupied subjects the aggressors, has allowed this devastating dispossession to continue and the law of the jungle to prevail.

As long as Israel knows that by delaying the peace process it buys time to create facts on the ground, and that the international community will continue to indulge Israel's pretense that its desire for a two-state solution is being frustrated by the Palestinians, no new peace initiative can succeed and the dispossession of the Palestinian people will indeed become irreversible.

There can be no greater delusion on the part of the Western countries weighed down by guilt about the Holocaust than the belief that accommodating such an outcome would be an act of friendship to the Jewish people. The abandonment of the Palestinians now is surely not an atonement for the abandonment of European Jews 70 years ago, nor will it serve the security of the state of Israel and its people.

He continues, "Time and again, this history has shown that the less opposition Israel encounters from its friends in the West for its dispossession of the Palestinians, the more uncompromising its behaviour."

In regard to the recent Gaza invasion, Mr. Siegman, as an authoritative source, states in the London Review of Books:

I am not aware of a single major American newspaper, radio station or TV channel whose coverage of the assault on Gaza questions [the Israeli] version of events. Criticism of Israel's actions, if any ... has focused instead on whether the IDF's carnage is proportional to the threat it sought to counter, and whether it is taking adequate measures to prevent civilian casualties.

Middle East peacemaking has been smothered in deceptive euphemisms, so let me state bluntly that each of these claims is a lie. Israel, not Hamas, violated the truce: Hamas undertook to stop firing rockets into Israel; in return, Israel was to ease its throttlehold on Gaza. In fact, during the truce, it tightened it further. This was confirmed not only by every neutral international observer and NGO on the scene but by Brigadier General (Res.) Shmuel Zakai, a former commander of the IDF's Gaza division.

The article continues:

The truce, which began in June last year and was due for renewal in December, required both parties to refrain from violent action against the other. Hamas had to cease its rocket assaults and prevent the firing of rockets by other groups such as Islamic Jihad ... and Israel had to put a stop to its targeted assassinations and military incursions. This understanding was seriously violated on 4 November, when the IDF entered Gaza and killed six members of Hamas. Hamas responded by launching Qassam rockets and Grad missiles. Even so, it offered to extend the truce, but only on condition that Israel ended its blockade. Israel refused. It could have met its obligation to protect its citizens by agreeing to ease the blockade, but it did not even try. It cannot be said that Israel launched its assault to protect its citizens from rockets. It did so to protect its right to continue the strangulation of Gaza's population.

Everyone seems to have forgotten that Hamas declared an end to suicide bombings and rocket fire when it decided to join the Palestinian political process, and largely stuck to it for more than a year. Bush publicly welcomed that decision, citing it as an example of the success of his campaign for democracy in the Middle East . . . When Hamas unexpectedly won the election, Israel and the US immediately sought to delegitimise the result and embraced Mahmoud Abbas, the head of Fatah, who until then had been dismissed by Israel's leaders as a "plucked chicken". They armed and trained his security forces to overthrow Hamas; and when Hamas . . . pre-empted this violent attempt to reverse the result of the first honest democratic election in the modern Middle East, Israel and the Bush Administration imposed the blockade.

I wish to cite a final quotation from this gentleman on the effect of the invasion. He states:

Anthony Cordesman, one of the most reliable military analysts of the Middle East, and a friend of Israel, argued in a 9 January report for the Center for Strategic and International Studies that the tactical advantages of continuing the operation in Gaza were outweighed by the strategic cost — and were probably no greater than any gains Israel may have made early in the war in selective strikes on key Hamas facilities. 'Has Israel somehow blundered into a steadily escalating war without a clear strategic goal, or at least one it can credibly achieve?' he asks. 'Will Israel end in empowering an enemy in political terms that it defeated in tactical terms? Will Israel's actions seriously damage the US position in the region, any hope of peace, as well as moderate Arab regimes and voices in the process? To be blunt, the answer so far seems to be yes.' Cordesman concludes that 'any leader can take a tough stand and claim that tactical gains are a meaningful victory. If this is all that Olmert, Livni and Barak have for an answer, then they have disgraced themselves and damaged their country and their friends.'

In citing those quotations I quoted from people who are friends of Israel, who are Jewish and who wish to make their contribution to a peaceful solution in the Middle East. The motion before the House touches on all these issues and the promotion of the two-state solution in Israel. Before Europe can play its full role in this process, it must fully understand the background and acknowledge the respective positions of the different parties, including Hamas. This represents an objective view of the problem, but it also highlights just how intricate it is.

I commend the motion to the House and welcome that it is a cross-party one. We endorse what the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Deputy Martin, has done in regard to these issues, how he has articulated a view on the investigations into the violations in Gaza, promoted the two-state solution and welcomed the involvement of George Mitchell as the Middle East peace envoy. I commend the motion to the House.