Defence Forces
Dail Éireann — 2026-06-09
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Helen McEntee (FG), Meath East

I join with the Deputy in thanking all of our troops who, for the past number of decades, have contributed significantly to peace in Lebanon and to monitoring the situation and who continue to do so even in the most hostile of environments. I met many of those members who travelled out in the past few weeks with their families. For many of them this is their second, third, fourth or fifth mission. This is something we know our troops are absolutely committed to, for which they are held in high regard, not just by the Lebanese armed forces and Government but by the people on the ground. I have no doubt but that had our troops and other troops not been present in recent months, the situation could have been much worse for them, which is hard to imagine in what is already a very difficult situation.
We wish to reassure our colleagues in our discussions in the months ahead and I have already met our French, Italian, Spanish and Polish colleagues to discuss how we can ensure there is a continued presence on the ground but without the UN-mandated mission. We are talking about something much smaller that does not provide the same level of support or numbers of troops, which is a real regret for all of us. We will do everything we can to ensure there is still that presence on the ground.

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Record URI: https://data.oireachtas.ie/akn/ie/debateRecord/dail/2026-06-09/debate/main
Retrieved: 2026-09-14T01:01:05+00:00
Sitting date: 2026-06-09