Letters to the Editor, July 9th: On Gaza suffering, anti-Semitism and women in the home

Irish Times

5 days ago

Sir, – As the Oireachtas Committee on Foreign Affairs and Trade this week continues its pre-legislative scrutiny of the Israeli Settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (Prohibition of Importation of Goods) Bill 2025, we must keep the reality of life for Palestinians in both Gaza and the West Bank to the fore.
In the West Bank, illegal settlements, the separation wall, severe restrictions, forced displacement, and violence create a daily reality of profound suffering.
Meanwhile, the situation in Gaza is catastrophic. The Israeli and US backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation has replaced 400 UN aid distribution points with just four overcrowded militarised aid sites which have become deadly flashpoints.
Armed groups, reportedly backed by Israeli authorities, routinely open fire on starving civilians, resulting in more than 500 desperate and hungry Palestinians being killed and nearly 4,000 injured while trying to access food in the last month alone.
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The long-awaited and welcome draft Occupied Palestine Territory Bill proposes to ban the importation of goods from illegal Israeli settlements.
However, it omits services, which make up around 70 per cent of Ireland's trade with Israel. This omission risks rendering the Bill toothless, leaving the bulk of Ireland's commercial ties with illegal settlements untouched.
This is an issue close to home. For example, Airbnb, which operates its European headquarters in Dublin, continues to profit from illegal settlement activity and recording global revenues of $2.5 billion in 2024.
If services are excluded, companies like Airbnb can legally continue facilitating and profiting from breaches of international law through their Irish operations.
We urge Irish politicians to act with courage. Without a ban on services, Ireland risks this Bill being an empty gesture, when really our legal obligations to act against genocide demand much more of us. – Yours, etc,
KAROL BALFE,
Chief executive,
ActionAid Ireland,
Dublin 2.
Anti-Semitism and Ireland
Sir, – Fintan O'Toole is right to say there are many figures in Irish history who we can be proud to say stood up against the vile poison of anti-Semitism.
However, reading his article ('
Ireland has a proud history of opposing anti-Semitism
,'(July, 8th), an outsider would be forgiven for thinking that this island has no history of racism against the Jewish people.
In 1904, the racist rantings of a priest in Limerick led many in the city to cruelly boycott the businesses of their Jewish neighbours, causing most to flee the city.
During the Holocaust, while many Jews pleaded to be let into Ireland, the attitude of the State was that these people were not like us and their plight was none of our business.
This callous indifference meant many of these Jews were instead condemned to die in the gas chambers of Auschwitz, Treblinka and Sobibor.
More recently, last year a man in a Dublin nightclub was asked, 'Are you Jewish?' and when he replied that he was, he was allegedly beaten up by a gang of anti-Semitic thugs.
So yes, let's remember with pride the brave Irishmen and women who stood up against anti-Semitism. But we should not delude ourselves that this island of ours is uniquely free of anti-Semitism. – Yours, etc,
JAMES WILSON,
Dublin 8.
Sir, – Fintan O'Toole assures us that Ireland has a 'history of solidarity' with the Jewish people. Indeed it does, but had he relied on history more recent than the 19th century he might have reached a different conclusion about the current state of anti-Semitism in Ireland. – Yours, etc
TERESA TRAINOR,
Rathfarnham,
Dublin 16.
Sir, – I would like to commend Fintan O'Toole. Even if Ireland's record in relation to anti-Semitism is not unblemished, this piece constitutes an excellent tutorial for the new US ambassador to Ireland on the indivisibility of human rights and human compassion.
It would seem that this principle needs to be relearned not just in the US but in Europe, particularly in relation to the Middle East conflict. – Yours, etc,
MARTIN HAWKES,
Terenure,
Dublin 6.
Sir, – The widely regarded architect of the deaths of at least 57,0000 Palestinians in Gaza writes to the Nobel Peace Prize committee nominating the person who supplies him with the funds and weapons to achieve this result.
The Nobel peace award is given to a person who contributes most to 'the abolition or reduction of standing armies and the holding and promotion of peace congresses'.
This is surely a case of 'return to sender'. – Yours, etc,
MARTIN Mc DONALD,
Dublin
Women in the home
Sir, – Regarding the article '
Ireland should hold another referendum on women in the home
, UN committee says', July 8th): May I suggest that official Ireland ignore this advice, resist the habit of seeking a do-over when a referendum result doesn't align with its preferred outcome, and instead start to read the room that a majority of the electorate are in. – Yours, etc,
LIZ FITZPATRICK,
Rathfarnham,
Dublin 14.
Sir, – Last year, Irish people voted against the proposal to delete the word 'mother' from our Constitution in favour of ambiguous, nebulous gender-neutral wording.
Now, we learn that the UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) wants our Government to have another crack at it!
We are a highly educated, literate, informed society. We read and debated the proposed wording last year, and we clearly understood that, far from diminishing a mother's status in society, the word 'mother' in our Constitution is a recognition of the unique role that a mother plays within the family –whether she works outside the home, within the home, or both.
We have already had our say – and resoundingly so. –Yours, etc
LORAINE McSHERRY,
Nenagh,
Co Tipperary
Sir,– Over 70 per cent of the people who voted in 2024 rejected the proposal to remove Article 41.2 from the Constitution, despite the relentless onslaught of messaging in favour of a Yes vote from the government and so-called civil society organisations.
I can only guess that many of those people were women.
It strikes me as somewhat hypocritical of a committee for the elimination of discrimination against women to decide that those women didn't know their own minds when they cast those votes. – Yours, etc,
EMER BOLGER,
Dublin 9.
They think it's all over.
..
Sir, – The qualification rounds for the 2025-26 UEFA competitions are under way.
Yet, the 2024-25 season is effectively still in progress, as the FIFA Club World Cup hasn't concluded yet.
There used to be a clear boundary between seasons, but it has been whittled away so much that the seasons are now overlapping. – Yours, etc
BRIAN QUIGLEY,
Drumcondra,
Dublin 9.
Public access and Ireland
Sir, – Keep Ireland Open welcomes Wicklow County Council's announcement that public access to the splendid Magheramore Beach has been secured ('
Magheramore Beach: The €613,000 Wicklow council paid to secure access was likely less than cost of court challenge
,' (July 5th)
However, we are dismayed that it required a payment of €613,000 to a Chinese investor who had recently bought the site at auction. This was the cost of avoiding the risk of having the High Court adjudicate if a right of way that has been used by the public for decades, at least, is in fact a public right of way.
Unfortunately, Magheramore is but one of many beaches and seashores that are rendered inaccessible to the public because Irish law permits paths that were traditionally used to access the sea, and the countryside generally, to be blocked with barriers and barbed wire.
Contrast this with the situation in England where the default is to manage land for the benefit of people and nature – as recently described in your pages ('
No denying that King Charles is a climate visionary
', (July 1st).
The 2,700 miles long King Charles III England Coast Path will be the longest managed coastal path in the world.
It is a scandal and a disservice to our citizens that traditional access routes continue to be lost to the public because neither legislation or the political will exists to protect them.
A clause legally obliging local authorities to identify and preserve public rights of way which give access to seashore, mountain, lakeshore, riverbank, cemetery, monument or other places of natural beauty or recreational utility by marking them on maps and indicating their location on a list, was removed from the Planning and Development Act 2024.
There is still an opportunity to have this clause reinstated as the legislation passes through Leinster House.
Keep Ireland Open calls on politicians to implement legislation to protect the social, economic , health (mental and physical) and environmental benefits of outdoor recreation in the same way as they are respected and protected in English law. – Yours, etc,
TONY McDERMOTT,
Director,
Keep Ireland Open,
Dublin 6W.
Buses and timetables
Sir, – I can empathise with Gillian Lawless' experience regarding Dublin Bus delays en route (Letters, July 7th).
As a regular bus user, I dread hearing the announcement 'there will be a short delay ...'.
Firstly, how 'short' is short?
I once experienced a delay for the best part of six or seven minutes. In that time, a number of buses overtook us, as we languished at a bus stop, counting down time.
Secondly, any delay on the bus has consequences for me and no doubt many others ( in my case missing a connecting train, waiting up to 45 minutes for the next train, and being late home in the evening).
Thirdly, there is no indication on the outside of any bus that it may be subject to a delay en route. Why not put an initial beside the bus number (to indicate the possibility of a scheduled delay), so that passengers can make an informed decision prior to embarking?
Or better yet, get rid of this 'on schedule' requirement entirely. – Yours, etc,
MARY FOGARTY,
Balbriggan,
Co Dublin.
Sir, – Ms Lawless feels passengers who are already on board buses are penalised by buses being held at stops to get back on schedule.
Surely the customers who would be penalised are those who turn up at their stop to find the bus has departed earlier than time-tabled?
One of the basic aims of any transport provider is to stick to the published schedule where possible.
Buses being held at stops to stay on schedule is common in many other countries. – Yours, etc,
DAVID GORDON,
Clondalkin,
Dublin 22.
Ireland's links with Japan
Sir, – During my years in Japan I have noted with bemusement the surprising manifestations of Ireland's soft power: the presence of Lafcadio Hearn (1850-1904), famous in his adoptive country though forgotten in Ireland until a few decades ago; the Japanese fascination with Yeats (translated into Japanese in the 1890s), Wilde, Joyce, and Beckett; the visits of Irish writers (Heaney, Montague, Muldoon, Mahon, Kennelly, Welch, O'Toole) as guests of the Japanese branch of the International Association for the Study of Irish Literatures, flourishing since 1984; the children singing Beidh aonach amárach i gContae an Chláir at the St Patrick's Day parades in a dozen cities; the brilliant young performers of the harp and of Irish dancing; the diligent Japanese students of the Irish language.
Now, with the opening of Ireland House, which dominates an attractive new piazza in the very centre of Tokyo, proudly displaying the Irish and European flags, and combining Japanese and Irish spaces in an architectural poem which provides a radiant new platform for Irish hospitality, it is clear that the affinity and interaction between the two nations is something wider and deeper than I had suspected.
Ireland has made a weightier investment in the new embassy than in any other overseas project. And it is a sound investment, injecting new life and colour into the Tokyo landscape, confirming economic opportunities for both countries, and sealing an alliance in devotion to the values of democracy and peace.
A threshold has been crossed, and the Irish-Japanese entente is no longer a matter of sentiment, but a significant factor in global civilisation today. – Yours, etc
JOSEPH S. O'LEARY,
Tokyo,
Japan.
Sir, – Your correspondent Denis Staunton contributed an interesting article regarding the life of Lafcadio Hearn ('
Celebrating the Irish writer whose ghost stories still grip Japan,
' (July 4th).
Should anyone want to further their knowledge of the writer's life and times they would be well advised to visit the beautiful Lafcadio Hearn gardens in Tramore , Co Waterford.
They celebrate his peripatetic life with a section of the garden given over to Victorian, American, Greek and Japanese gardens. – Yours, etc,
DARREN MAGUIRE,
Co Meath.
Guardian ad litems
Sir, – The Association of Guardians Ad Litem (AGALI) was established last year and is mandated to represent the majority of guardians ad litem in Ireland.
The guardians are independent, court-appointed professionals who are charged by the court in child care proceedings to represent the voice of the child and what is in the child's best interest.
AGALI notes Harry McGee's article ('
Unregulated court guardian service cost €21m last year
', June 27th) and welcomes the Child Care (Amendment) Act 2022 which provides, inter alia, for the setting up of the national guardian ad litem service, and has met the officials appointed to lead the service.
AGALI is committed to collaborative engagement with the new service and will continue to seek appropriate resourcing, professional standards and effective legal representation for children.
This is part of creating a nationally consistent, child-centred and trauma informed service; one that upholds the integrity and effectiveness of the crucial independent service that guardians provide to the 3,500 children who are the subject of current active child care proceedings.
AGALI is concerned the plans as outlined for the new service will dilute the voices of children.
The service is also to be a division within the Department of Children, Equality, Disability Integration and Youth, when the State continues to fail so many children in its care.
Guardians work tirelessly in the discharge of their duties under close review of the court.
The role of the guardian is one element of our childcare system that has, because of its independence, been able to continue to deliver a high quality service that responds to the individual needs of our most vulnerable children. – Yours, etc,
Dermot Simms,
Chairperson,
AGALI,
Dublin.