Jim D'Arcy (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

There are representatives from Palestine and Israel in the Visitors' Gallery. I am reminded of the Balfour declaration of 1917 and Arthur Balfour's famous statement, "Nothing matters very much, and few things matter at all." I do not agree with that. It matters greatly. What I would like to see, in the words of St. Paul, is for the two states to settle their differences and come together in peace and harmony. Left to themselves, they would be able to do that. That is what we all want, because we feel deeply for both Israel and Palestine. Go back to Camp David and Oslo and sort out your differences.

I believe that Israel and Palestine are, in a sense, victims of a proxy war and are being used by other, stronger forces in the Middle East. I was on the OSCE/PAS election observer mission for the presidential election in Turkey in August 2014 and also for the early legislative elections in Ukraine in October 2014. In Turkey I was based in Diyarbakir, a Kurdish city in the south east, not too far from the Turkey-Syria border. We travelled quite close to the border and to the town of Kobani, which is at present an area of hostilities. Things are not great there. In general the Kurds have something of an existential existence, being alone and abandoned. There are 30 million Kurds on the borders of Turkey, Iraq, Iran and Syria. They have no homeland and feel politically abandoned.
I was very conscious that when I was on the banks of the River Tigris I was in the cradle of Indo-European civilisation, where the Celts came from and the Kurdish language and cadence is very close to Irish. I learned one word - "inshallah" when I said to a Kurdish woman "You will have a little president of Turkey next time". She said "inshallah", which means "That will be the day". Hopefully now the Kurds will have their day. To understand the Middle East and its problems, one must look first at the ancient Shi’ite-Sunni situation, which goes back as far as the second caliphate in 632 following the death of Mohammed. In other words, a large part of the conflict is between Iran and Saudi Arabia, mostly by proxy war. Hence Iran supports Hezbollah, Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. Saudi Arabia opposes these bodies fundamentally, but on the ground the religious in Saudi Arabia - not the monarchy - supports ISIS. It is a proxy war that is going on in the Middle East. To complicate matters further, America now has little strategic interest in the Middle East, so there is a vacuum and nature abhors a vacuum.
On Ukraine, it is Russia's intention to build up its borders with Europe. It will do this incrementally. It is a long-term strategy. We must stand by the territorial integrity and unity of Ukraine, as the Minister said. I was in Kharkiv in eastern Ukraine for the early legislative elections. Although it was controlled by pro-Russian forces, it is now stable and under Government control, but the situation is extremely volatile and needs our support. Allied to that, although we support Ukraine turning towards Europe, there is massive corruption in Ukraine and some of the pro-European forces are involved in that corruption. It is 154th out of 178 countries on the corruption league. That must be addressed and we cannot lose sight of it. These people need wise guidance. Having gone through the situation we have gone through with the North, we know what regions of conflict are like and we know that one must talk in the end, so one might as well talk now. It is with a deep sense of affection and compassion for what is going on in the Middle East and Ukraine that I speak.