Criminal Justice (Terrorist Offences) (Amendment) Bill 2025: Committee Stage
Seanad Éireann — 2026-06-30
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Alice-Mary Higgins (IND), National University of Ireland

I indicate my support for this set of amendments. It is important. I refer to previous legislation.
I understand it was the case that participation in an armed force which is engaging in terrorist activity would have been included and was something that was identified. A shift has been taken to remove accountability for members of such armed forces in regard to terrorist offences in the Bill.
Reference was made to international humanitarian law and other structures in place regarding such offences. There is a significant concern, however, that that is not always applied and there is an inequality in the Bill to which we will come later. There are measures in the Bill which could lead to somebody who is taking action to prevent breaches of international law becoming, in effect, criminalised and committing criminal offences. I refer to those in breach of international law, the deepest essence of what we mean when we talk about terror and terrorism, who are instilling and dealing in terror and who have terror as their goal, strategy and modus operandi in terms of what they inflict on the civilian population in places like Gaza. They might fall outside the rubric of the Bill. However, a person who prevents to seek such action might come under it. That is a problem and needs to be addressed.
I will support the amendments put forward. This is not theoretical because we know Israeli armed forces have been trained in Ireland in the past. There are major concerns about whether we might find ourselves complicit and give the rubric of legitimacy to actions which are flagrantly in breach of international law, including the Genocide Convention, one of the greatest and strongest obligations on all states, which is to take all necessary steps in respect of crimes of genocide.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-06-30/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-08-14T04:55:07+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-06-30