Sir, – It is about three weeks now since Taoiseach Simon Harris announced he was seeking fresh advice from the Attorney General on Ireland’s legal position regarding trade with Israel.
He raised hopes at the time by appearing to accept the usefulness of purposeful sanctions by Ireland. “It is not enough to say ‘I want a ceasefire’,” he observed, “you have to look at everything a country, and indeed the European Union, can do to create that environment in which a ceasefire becomes an inevitability” (“Taoiseach receives advice from AG on suspending EU-Israel trade agreement”, News, August 31st).
On the surface, the Taoiseach’s move seemed to mark a shift from the Government’s position, which ruled out unilateral action on trade with Israel.
The impression given was that the advice from the Attorney General would come soon, an urgency made necessary by the ceaseless horror in Gaza. But still we wait. In truth, this has become the norm in the “global north”, where nothing happens quickly when it comes to taking action against the rogue state of Israel.
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International Criminal Court prosecutor Karim Khan, for example, recently publicly expressed his frustration at the failure so far by the court to issue the arrest warrants he requested in May for Israeli prime minister Binyamin Netanyahu and his defence minister, Yoav Gallant, as well as for two prominent leaders of Hamas (“ICC prosecutor requests urgent arrest warrants for leaders of Israel and Hamas”, World News, September 11th). There can be no doubt that the blockage – which, hopefully, will be resolved – is around the warrants requested for Mr Netanyahu and Mr Gallant, and not those for the Hamas figures.
The Taoiseach will have a political choice to make when he does eventually receive the opinion of the Attorney General, but let us hope that his decision is guided by what we have witnessed over the past year. In a way, it scarcely matters what the Attorney General says because it will be a legal opinion, not a judgement, and eminent legal experts have already disputed the idea that unilateral sanctions would be in breach of EU trade rules.
Regardless of the Attorney General’s opinion, Mr Harris can choose to test the parameters of these rules by pushing ahead with the Occupied Territories Bill and other sanctions. With more than 41,000 people now dead, including many thousands of children, the beleaguered civilians of Gaza and the West Bank deserve nothing less. But does the Taoiseach have the political will? – Yours, etc,
FINTAN LANE,
Lucan,
Co Dublin.