Matt Carthy (Cavan-Monaghan, Sinn Fein)

I will ask this of Senator Black and her advisers. The Tánaiste said that those responsible for illegal settlements must be held to account. Obviously, nobody will disagree with that. The difficulty is where we lay the responsibility because any sanctions that have been applied have been applied on individual settlers, and rightly so. However, it is not individual settlers who are responsible for the illegal settlements; it is the Israeli state that facilitates them. Therefore, in line with the ICJ opinion that stated that all states must prevent both trade and investment in the illegal settlements, are our guests of the view that Ireland has done anything to meet our obligations in that respect? Are there things including but also beyond the occupied territories Bill that we would need to do in order to be in compliance with that?

I am conscious that when we discuss the occupied territories Bill, other legislation is stalled in the House, namely, the Illegal Israel Settlements Divestment Bill. No legal reason has been provided and no constitutional rationale has been given for stalling that. A political decision has stalled that. It is things like that which make me sceptical about the bona fides of the Government parties to progress this Bill, should they be returned to Government.

In respect of the obligations that the ICJ advisory opinion places on states, how close are we to being in compliance? What should we be doing in order to be in a better position to say that we are?