Delivering on the new Government’s commitment to progress legislation prohibiting goods from occupied Palestinian territories is proving to be far from straightforward.
As reported by The Irish Times on Saturday, an internal Department of Enterprise briefing note from October sets out a series of legal and practical difficulties in the existing long-stalled Occupied Territories Bill.
The new Coalition will face many of the same challenges in seeking to progress what will probably be brand-new legislation.
There have also been significant international developments since October which will likely feed into the deliberations.
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The first is the ceasefire in Gaza.
The renewed impetus to revive the Occupied Territories Bill came about amid Israel’s war in Gaza. Sparked by the Hamas attack on Israel in October 2023, the war has led to the death of more than 46,000 Palestinians, according to the Hamas-run health ministry.
Taoiseach Micheál Martin told RTÉ News in recent weeks that, once a ceasefire was in place, the Government’s focus would be on reconstruction and peace. However, he also said it would be “pushing ahead” with the legislation which is a programme for government commitment.
The end of the killing, should the ceasefire hold, may ease some – though definitely not all – of the pressure to get the legislation over the line quickly.
And proponents of the Occupied Territories Bill – first put forward in 2018, long before the war – will still demand that the Government acts to bring in the legislation or something very similar given the injustices suffered by the Palestinians due to the expansion of illegal Israeli settlements.
The other international development is the election of the strongly pro-Israel US president Donald Trump.
This presents the potential for a diplomatic headache should the Irish legislation go ahead.
There has already been speculation that Ireland’s stance on the Gaza war may prompt potential economic headwinds here, with many US multinationals supportive of Israel.
The Government would of course face a significant backlash from the Opposition and others if the legislation was delayed or even scuppered due to Ireland’s diplomatic or economic interests.
Then there are the issues raised in the Department of Enterprise briefing note from October.
The long-standing position of successive governments had been that the Occupied Territories Bill was contrary to European Union trade law. This is reflected in the note.
Last July’s advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) stating that Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem were in breach of international law prompted the Government here to seek fresh legal advice on the Bill amid a view that there was a “new context” to examine the issue.
Attorney General Rossa Fanning subsequently briefed the three then-coalition leaders on his assessment of the matter on October 14th last.
The following morning Mr Martin, who was tánaiste at the time, said that the ICJ’s opinion “puts obligations on member states not to do anything that would support the illegal occupation of Palestine”.
He said there are “still challenges and the existing Bill would need to be redrafted and amended very substantively”.
Later that same day Department of Enterprise secretary general Declan Hughes was sent the briefing note on the Bill from the department’s trade division.
The accompanying email said the note outlined “some additional considerations” on which government departments “may be best placed to handle the above Bill, or an alternative Bill to be brought forward by the Govt in future”.
The note detailed practical difficulties with enforcing a ban and potential problems for businesses including multinationals.
It sets out how the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) led the government’s opposition to the Bill in the Seanad.
The last visible part of the partially redacted note says: “This bill is introduced to address Human Rights concerns and violations in the Middle East, it is political in nature and should remain with the DFA.”
As it happens, the new Government’s reorganisation of departments sees responsibility for trade being moved to the DFA.
It appears the political hot potato of progressing the legislation will fall to the new Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs Simon Harris.
Speaking last December, Mr Harris said he would like to see the Bill introduced “in the first year of the government”. Time will tell.
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