I am sorry but I do not believe that the Minister is committed to progressing the occupied territories Bill; I just do not. She said, quite rightly, that it was June 2025 when it went through pre-legislative scrutiny. It is now May 2026 and there is no sign of it. Deputy Boyd Barrett, Deputy Gibney and I, and others, ask every Thursday at the Oireachtas Business Committee about the occupied territories Bill but there is no answer. We get silence or "we do not know". We know where the Government's emphasis lies because the Minister betrayed it in her speech, copies of which were sent around. It actually states where the "clip starts", which presumably is an instruction to her social media team, and where the "clip ends". The emphasis from this speech, which will go out, is on co-ordination at EU level. Co-ordination at an EU level is important but we have an opportunity to do things domestically on our own. The Bill, introduced by Senator Black eight years ago is that measure but the Government is not supporting it. I have no doubt that the Minister has mothballed that legislation. I am enraged that we are in this situation. I recall the honeyed words of the Tánaiste when he was Minister for foreign affairs and sitting in that very seat. He took to his feet in the debate over the flotilla and said that not only would he progress the occupied territories Bill, but he would do so by November 2025. That is what he said on the Dáil record. He made a promise, a promise that has been broken. That promise was in the programme for Government and was made to the people of Ireland before the last election. It carried across the water and across the continent to the Palestinian people. They knew that this Bill, if it was passed, would probably not save one life but it was a tangible symbol. Other states in Europe have gone ahead of us and actually delivered, including Spain and Slovenia. We are becoming a laggard in our support for Palestine. What is the threshold for action against Israel? More than 75,000 people have died in Gaza in the past three years, 2,800 have died in Lebanon since March and more than 1,000 have died in the West Bank with the continued expansion of the illegal settlements. What is the threshold? Is it because Israel is a white, western economy that it is getting away with this exceptionalism? If it was any other ethnicity or any other place in the world, it would be sanctioned beyond existence at this point. There is no other state that is as roguish, illegal or horrific as the Israeli state has been over the past number of years, if not decades. A new law was brought in by the Knesset in March, which the Minister referenced in her speech, permitting hanging and the death penalty. Israel has not carried out a judicial death sentence since 1962. It has carried out many killings, as we know, but it has not carried out a judicial death sentence since 1962. The United Nations is absolutely appalled by this law. I have not seen such strong language in a UN document. It states: ...the Knesset approved a bill ... Israel has not carried out executions nor imposed death sentences since 1962. This new legislation not only marks a significant regression: it also does so by imposing capital punishment on de facto ethnic or national grounds and by diluting basic legal safeguards. It is the worst of the worst. This is where the State is at. Where are we this week? We have boycotted the Eurovision. That is the right thing to do but it is a very, very small measure. That competition is still going ahead. Tens, if not hundreds, of millions of people are going to watch it and the vast majority of European nations are still taking part. We have a football match coming up in the autumn. That cannot happen. That has to stop. We have to go belt and braces on sanctioning Israel. There is no other state in my lifetime or in any of our lifetimes that has acted with such impunity, so illegally or so grotesquely in carrying out genocide. There are measures that we can take. Sadaka launched a document this week, "Beyond Words", the most aptly named document because words is all that we have given from this Chamber and from this Government to the people of Palestine. We have not delivered any action. Sadaka sets out, in a fantastic document, well-referenced actions that we can take without having to go through collective EU sanctions because that, in essence, is a cop-out. We know the veto powers of the EU. EU states will not support any actions against Israel but we can do things here in terms of sanctions, visas, military and civilian flights, and dual-use technologies. We can do that now. We can support this Bill. This is a strong, robust Bill. It is the kind of Bill that meets, in so far as we can, the devastation that has been caused by Israel. We must support it. I am beyond frustrated. I am enraged and angered and so let down. The one thing that we could have done in the short lifetime of this Government was to bring Senator Black's Bill, or at least the spirit of that Bill, into some form of legislation. This Government has abandoned it.

Sentiment score: -0.12

No, I am sorry.

Sentiment score: -0.36

I am sorry but until I see the Minister standing there delivering a Second Stage speech on that Bill, I will believe in my heart that it has been abandoned because that is how it feels.

Sentiment score: -0.63