Tom Clonan (Independent) | Oireachtas source

I want to echo the concerns about what is happening in Rafah. We have approximately 1.8 million Palestinians trapped in Rafah. It is their final place of refuge along a line between Kerem Shalom in Israel through Rafah out to the Mediterranean. Based on the reprehensible calculus used by Benjamin Netanyahu, it is likely, if this assault continues, that one in ten Palestinians will either have been killed or maimed during this operation. That is the literal and metaphorical decimation of a population. It is biblical in its savagery. It is bestial. The killing of children at this point is not unforeseen collateral damage, it is a deliberate and systematic tactic and strategy that is being used by the Israeli Defense Forces and by the Netanyahu-led Government. These are war crimes and I compliment the Taoiseach and the Tánaiste for their very firm line on this. I am sorry, a Chathaoirligh, but I also want to bring up again the issue of children on surgical waiting lists on the watch of Children's Health Ireland, CHI. In the last two weeks I have been made aware by concerned parents that it is not just children awaiting complex spinal surgery who are left behind, but also children who require urological surgery. These are the same disabled children and we are in breach of our EU obligations to provide urological services to children and adolescents. That means children, young teenagers and adolescents at a very sensitive point in their development into young adults are having their urinary continence compromised, their faecal continence compromised and their sexual development, that is, the development of their sexual organs compromised by a lack of surgical intervention on their developmental pathway. This is absolutely scandalous. I do not have the words for it. Not only are they being crippled - permanently paralysed, with their limbs allowed to become deformed - but they also have to contend with this. I have no confidence in the board or the executive management team of Children's Health Ireland and on its watch we will see further children become unnecessarily disabled. Think about that aspect of a child's development and how it is being unnecessarily curtailed in this way. We will also see avoidable deaths on the watch of CHI. I want a debate on this matter. I will be submitting another Commencement matter and I hope that on this occasion the Minister or a Minister of State might attend or at least strive to attend.