Gaza ceasefire and ambassadors
A further exchange on Gaza follows, with the Taoiseach explaining his preference for stopping the violence, releasing hostages and enabling aid, while arguing that expelling ambassadors would weaken Ireland’s influence. Deputy Boyd Barrett challenges him repeatedly, but the Taoiseach says the facts remain unclear and any war-crimes allegations need proper investigation.
On the matter of the Israeli ambassador, it is not the Government's intention to expel the ambassador, and that is for very good reasons. Even countries at war have ambassadors. We have not expelled the Russian ambassador-----
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He should be expelled.
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-----and I do not think anyone in the House is as supportive of Ukraine as I have been in meaningful ways, not just in words. We have a situation now where we have about 40 Irish citizens in Gaza and we want them to be able to leave-----
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They may be dead.
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-----if they want to leave. We have an Irish citizen who may be held hostage in Gaza by Hamas and we want to get her out. At some point we also want to be able to talk about peace and reconciliation and an end to this conflict. When you expel an ambassador, you disempower yourself. You cut off links, you cannot talk any more and you have to rebuild those links. I can understand it as an emotional reaction but it is not a common-sense approach in my view, and it is not the way things get done in international affairs.
When it comes to Cashel, Councillor Burgess has been in touch with me about this matter and there is going to be community engagement on it. The Department of Children, Equality, Disability, Integration and Youth does not use accommodation where it is already being used for homeless accommodation. It is examining the situation in Cashel and will revert to all of the Tipperary Deputies and Senators soon.