Israeli Settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (Prohibition of Importation of Goods) Bill 2026: Committee and Remaining Stages Seanad Éireann — 2026-07-15 ============================================================ Laura Harmon (LAB), Industrial and Commercial Panel I agree with colleagues on the points around services. I want to put on the record again today that we believe services should have been included in this Bill. We are very clear in our later amendments in relation to that. Services make up 70% of overall trade with the occupied territories. That trade, including financial services, tourism, tech and booking platforms, is a huge boon to the illegal Israeli settlements there and it must be tackled. It is hard to fathom that we would pass a Bill we know is not fully compliant with international law. We are either compliant with international law or we are not. I would like to hear from the Minister how she intends for us to become fully compliant after today. I welcome the Palestinian ambassador. I commend her on her work representing Palestine in Ireland and globally. She is very welcome. It is not just disappointing but extremely disheartening. This has been going on for so many years since Senator Black first brought forward her legislation. I commend her team and Conor O'Neill on their work on that and for getting us to this point. I do not believe we would even be at this point today if it was not for Senator Black. We would not even have this watered-down legislation if it was not for Senator Black; I think we would have nothing. It is disappointing. It does not represent the will or the feeling of the Irish people. I do not believe that is what this proposed Bill represents. It represents a highly watered-down version. We had an opportunity to be the leader on this issue within Europe - not just a leader but the leader. We often talk about politicians in the past and might say that person was ahead of their time on that issue, but we can only ever be of our time. We cannot be ahead or before our time. We only get one life and unfortunately for many of those in Palestine and the West Bank, their lives were cut short because of genocide and the State of Israel, aided and abetted by the US in what it has done. We have stood by. We have had a lot of statements but have not taken enough action as a country. Given our history of being under colonial rule, it is disheartening. It does not do us justice as a people that we have allowed this to be watered down to this point. Of course, this legislation is not without meaning, as I said. There is meaning in the goods piece but services have a much bigger impact and would have hit them a lot harder financially. Unfortunately, we have succumbed to pressure and hearsay in relation to whether people will lose their jobs or whether companies stay in Ireland, but the humanity of the Irish people can never be bought or sold. We either uphold international law or we do not. After this Bill fully goes through the Houses, we need to understand from this Government and the Minister how we will become fully compliant and pressure other countries to do the same. It is important. There are marches every week in Ireland for this cause. In Cork, we erected a plaque a number of weeks ago in the middle of the city where the march meets every Saturday. People are crying out for more action. I would have been extremely proud of our Government and the first to say it if services had been included as part of this Bill. It would have been such a proud moment. It is such a disappointment that we did not have enough courage to include services. It would still be great to see the view of the Attorney General published in terms of the legal advice to get the depth and breadth of the advice given, and to be able to compare that with other legal experts who have said we could have included services as part of this Bill. The Bill is not without meaning but it is so disappointing that it has been watered down. Whatever about us as Senators or elected representatives, at the end of the day, it is the people of Palestine who are suffering because of this. We cannot allow the State of Israel and other rogue nations to go unchecked when it comes to upholding international law. International law has been made a mockery of over the past few years. We are allowing dictators and authoritarian governments to undermine international law whereas we here in a democracy have a responsibility to uphold international law and to be compliant. God forbid, we do not know in Ireland in future generations what will happen in the world. We may be calling on other countries to uphold international law to protect us. We cannot predict the future. We needed people to protect us in the past when we were under colonial rule. We cannot be hypocritical either about our own past. Ultimately, services should have been included. We need to see further action after this Bill to ensure we are compliant without delay with international law. --- Source: Houses of the Oireachtas. Licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). The Official Report is revised after first publication; the fetch timestamp below identifies the version quoted. Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/seanad/2026-07-15/debate/main Retrieved: 2026-08-27T06:52:16+00:00 Sitting date: 2026-07-15