Mark Daly (Fianna Fail)

It is not often that a former Israeli ambassador to the United Nations comes to the Oireachtas. On 3 April Mr. Dore Gold was here. It is unfortunate that when he was, he misled and deceived Members on the situation in the West Bank. He told members of the Joint Committee on Foreign Affairs that in 2008 there had been 41 road blocks and 14 this year. When other members of the committee and I were in the West Bank in 2008, we were briefed by the UN humanitarian affairs division and told us there had been 380 road blocks in 2005 and 580 in 2007. There are now over 600. Mr. Gold told us that there were 14. When I challenged him on this, he said he would come back to us, but he has still not done so. When I asked him about the case of two girls, one aged nine years, Souad, and one aged three years, Amal, who had been shot by the Israeli defence forces while holding white flags, he said he would come back to us, but he has not yet done so.