Shortly after 6am this morning, US president Donald Trump took to his Truth Social online platform to say: “THE CEASEFIRE IS NOW IN EFFECT. PLEASE DO NOT VIOLATE IT!”
The post came hours after he announced that a “complete and total” ceasefire has been agreed between Israel and Iran.
The ceasefire – should it hold – would end 10 days of hostilities between the two nations. Neither country has confirmed the ceasefire yet.
“On the assumption that everything works as it should, which it will, I would like to congratulate both Countries, Israel and Iran, on having the Stamina, Courage, and Intelligence to end, what should be called, ‘THE 12 DAY WAR’,” Trump wrote on Truth Social last night.
“It has been fully agreed by and between Israel and Iran that there will be a Complete and Total CEASEFIRE ... for 12 hours, at which point the War will be considered, ENDED!,” Trump said.
A briefing by White House officials to Reuters suggested that Qatar had helped to broker the ceasefire deal.
According to CNN this morning, Iranian and Israeli media channels are reporting that the ceasefire has begun.
Trump’s suggestion that there would be a ceasefire came after Iran launched retaliatory attacks targeting the largest US base in the Middle East on Monday.
That attack came after the US bombed three of its nuclear sites – Isfahan, Fordow and Natanz – over the weekend.
As Sally Hayden reports in the lead story today, Qatar appeared to have advance warning about Iranian attacks targeting the US-run Al Udeid airbase, which houses about 10,000 troops.
The Gulf country temporarily closed its air space, while the US and UK warned citizens to “shelter in place until further notice”.
On our Opinion pages, Fintan O’Toole writes that nuclear weapons have been in the Middle East for decades – not in Iran, but in Israel.
O’Toole suggests that Trump’s “decision to go to war against Iran will not stop the spread of nuclear weapons. On the contrary, it has taught every dictator a simple lesson: get yourself a H-bomb fast or you will be bombed whenever we feel like it”.
Meanwhile, Taoiseach Micheál Martin has warned that Gaza could be forgotten as international focus moves to the war between Iran and Israel.
Political Editor Pat Leahy reports that Martin said the diplomatic process relating to Iran’s nuclear programme should have been allowed to play itself out but what was required now, he said, “is a complete de-escalation, an ending of the war and also we cannot forget Gaza”.
Domestically, Leahy also reports Tánaiste Simon Harris has said an initial draft of legislation to ban trade coming from Israeli settlements in illegally occupied Palestinian territories would be brought to Cabinet today.
The Government’s version of the Occupied Territories Bill would propose banning the trade of goods, but Mr Harris said he remained “open” to the legislation being expanded to also ban the trade of services. “We need to have legal clarity as to whether that’s possible or not,” Mr Harris said.
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Elsewhere on the front page Conor Lally reports that gun attacks in the Republic have plummeted to record lows and are now happening so rarely that a specific figure for the number of attacks does not register in official data for last year.
Irish students seeking US educational and exchange visas will be required to make their social media profiles public to allow officials to review their online activity, the US embassy in Dublin has said.
Taoiseach Micheál Martin condemned the new requirements as “excessive” and said that they will cause “fear and anxiety” among young people. Kate Byrne and Pat Leahy report.
From unborn twins to community stalwarts, Freya McClements writes about the Omagh bomb victims amid her continuing coverage of the public inquiry into the 1998 atrocity.
Ireland cannot afford to sit still and be left behind in artificial intelligence (AI) development, according to the chair of the new advisory council on the technology, Dr Patricia Scanlon. As Harry McGee reports the warning will come at today’s meeting of the new Oireachtas Committee on AI.
Playbook
The Cabinet meets this morning. You can find Harry McGee’s tee-up story – including how Ministers are to be warned of their responsibility to ensure value for money when they authorise the spending of public funds this year – here.
Dáil proceedings begin with Leaders’ Questions at 2pm.
A Sinn Féin Bill from 2014 proposing to extend voting rights in Presidential elections to Irish citizens abroad is to be referred to Committee Stage at 3.04pm.
Sinn Féin has a motion on Presidential voting rights which is to be debated in the Dáil later in the evening, from 5.22pm.
Government Business in the afternoon, from 3.50pm, is statements on nursing homes and the care of older people.
Minister for Transport Darragh O’Brien takes parliamentary questions from 7.22pm.
TDs have an opportunity to raise topical issues from 8.59pm.
The Seanad will debate Government motions on the continuing operation of the Offences Against the State acts – the laws that underpin the non-jury Special Criminal Court – from 4.45pm.
The Committee on Housing will consider challenges to tackling homelessness from 3pm. The Ombudsman for Children, Dr Niall Muldoon, is due to tell TDs and Senators that children have “borne the biggest brunt” of the homelessness crisis. Our story on what is expected to be said at the meeting is here.
Recent developments with the Air Corps is the topic for the Committee on Defence and National Security, which meets at 6pm.
The full Dáil, Seanad and Committee schedules can be found here.
