Bríd Smith (Dublin South Central, People Before Profit Alliance)
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164. To ask the Minister for Finance if he will outline, given his powers to freeze, seize or otherwise impose restrictive measures on assets for the purpose of combating terrorism under the Criminal Justice (Terrorist Offences) Act 2005, and that the construction of settlements in the West Bank meets the definition of terrorist activity under that Act, as it is carried out with the intention of seriously destabilising or destroying the fundamental political, constitutional, economic or social structures of a state or an international organisation, the measures he intends to impose to prevent the financing of organisations carrying out terrorist activity in the West Bank; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [23622/24]

Michael McGrath (Cork South Central, Fianna Fail)
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Restrictive measures, or sanctions as they are generally referred, are a tool of the EU's Common Foreign Policy. Ireland does not impose sanctions regimes unilaterally. Ireland implements EU sanctions and it also implements UN sanctions via EU sanctions.

EU sanctions have direct effect in all Member States of the EU, and they are legally binding on all natural and legal persons in Ireland. As such, a natural or legal person who contravenes a provision of an EU sanctions regulation would be guilty of an offence and liable to prosecution.

EU sanctions regimes provide for the freezing of the assets for the duration of the sanctions regime, rather than the seizure or confiscation of the assets.

In view of the levels of violence being perpetrated by certain Israeli settlers against Palestinian communities in the West Bank, in particular since 7 October 2023, Ireland worked to agree sanctions against violent settlers, as well as Hamas members who were part of the horrific attacks in Israel on 7 October.

In accordance with international law, Ireland distinguishes between the territory of the State of Israel and the territories occupied since 1967 and it ensures that any bilateral agreements with Israel do not apply to the occupied territories. A whole-of-Government approach is applied to this policy of differentiation.

The Government has made clear that all Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territory, including East Jerusalem, are illegal under international law. Continuing, and indeed increasing, Israeli settlement activities dangerously imperil the viability of the two-State solution based on the 1967 lines. I therefore take this opportunity to reiterate Ireland’s consistent call to Israel to immediately cease all settlement activity across the occupied Palestinian territory.