FIANNA Fรกil TD Willie O’Dea has welcomed efforts to bring peace to the Middle East.
Speaking in the Dรกil, the Limerick politician expressed hopes that US President Donald Trump’s peace agreement takes hold.
Deputy O’Dea said he was disturbed by reports that Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu unilaterally sought to change certain fundamental aspects of that agreement.
“If so, he is acting in very bad faith,” Deputy O’Dea told Oireachtas members.
“The Israelis say they have achieved their war aims, but I am not entirely sure what their war aims are. Their only stated war aim is the destruction and elimination of Hamas. I suppose from one point of view that is understandable, but it must be borne in mind that if something does not fundamentally change in the Middle East, and if the way in which the Israelis treat their Palestinian counterparts and neighbours does not change, then the conditions that brought Hamas, and before Hamas the PLO and other terrorist organisations, a number of which are still in operation out there, into existence do not change, it will not matter.”
The former Defence Minister said that “even if every single member of Hamas comes in tomorrow and surrenders, other similar organisations, whatever they wish to call themselves, will spring up”.
Deputy O’Dea said that while the events of October 7, 2023, were “barbaric beyond belief”, to describe the Israeli reaction as proportionate or measured is to deprive language of meaning.
“We have had ad hoc brutality, 70,000 people dead, 20,000 of whom were children, people starving to death and food withheld. Then we have the threadbare excuses. A member of the Israeli military will appear on television when somebody hits a hospital instead of a military target and say that somebody in the military made a mistake and that they will have an inquiry into it. That is something akin to dropping an atomic bomb on a crowded shopping mall to get rid of one shoplifter.”
Limerick Sinn Fรฉin TD Maurice Quinlivan said it is his sincere hope that a ceasefire can be declared and the Israeli army halts its “daily murder of civilians”.
He also hoped that the Israeli hostages currently held by a variety of militant groups in Gaza are released unharmed, and that all Palestinian prisoners are returned to their families.
“We have seen a rogue state operate with impunity, yet despite overwhelming firepower, US armaments and political cover, Israel has failed to achieve its stated war aims, including the destruction of Hamas and the release or rescue of the Israeli hostages held in Gaza,” Deputy Quinlivan commented.
