End the Irish Arms Trade With Israel

The Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign (IPSC) is calling on the Irish government to place an immediate arms embargo upon the state of Israel.

Here’s how you can take action to help.

1) Sign and share the online petition calling for an end to the Irish arms trade with Israel.

2) Write to the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade and your local TDs asking them to support the call for an arms embargo on Israel.

3) Share this campaign page, this campaign image and this campaign video on Facebook, Twitter or other social media sites.

4) Write letters to local and national Irish newspapers raising the issue of an arms embargo on Israel.

5) Print out this copy of our petition, collect signatures in your locality and send them back to us.

6) Get informed! Read the facts and view the report from the campaign launch, or watch the launch video.

=====

Why an arms embargo?

Ireland has bought €14.7m worth of arms and military components from Israel over the last decade, while Irish-based companies have exported €6.42m worth of military and ‘dual use’ hardware to Israel since 2011. Meanwhile, Israel has killed over 9,000 Palestinians, including 2,060 children since 2000. Military items exported from Israel will have used Palestinians as ‘human test subjects’ so such weapons can be marketed as ‘battle proven’. Any military components exported to Israel will be used to kill and maim yet more Palestinians and to entrench the decades-long military occupation.

Neither Israel nor arms manufacturers in Ireland should be allowed to profit from the killing of Palestinians; this trade in death must end. We call upon the government of Ireland to end the Irish arms trade with Israel, and to advocate for an international arms embargo at EU and UN levels until Israel ends the occupation of Palestinian land and complies fully with its obligations under international law.

What type of equipment is being traded?

According to the Irish government, some of the items the Irish Defence Forces have bought from Israel include “small arms ammunition”, “an Artillery Fire Control System”, “Unmanned Aerial Vehicles”, “a Surveillance and Target Acquisition Suite for Light Tactical Armoured vehicles” and “Ground Surveillance Radars”. Israeli arms companies promote such products with the slogan that they have been “battle-tested”.

What this means, in plain language is that these bullets, drones, targeting devices and other military items have been used – “battle-tested” – to viciously attack and kill the people of Palestine who live under Israel’s apartheid occupation regime. This should be unconscionable for a state like Ireland that claims “respect for and the promotion of human rights has always been and will continue to be a cornerstone of foreign policy”.

Similarly, all military components that are exported from Ireland are used to destroy Palestinian lives and livelihoods. Last summer we all watched in horror as Israeli occupation forces brutally assaulted the largely defenceless population of Gaza, killing over 2,200 people (70% civilians), wounding thousands more, leaving over 100,000 homeless, destroying homes, medical facilities, schools and infrastructure. By allowing military exports to Israel, Ireland has played a role in enabling these, and many other crimes against the people of Palestine.

This trade in death is a shame and a stain upon our state.  While it may be ‘legal’, it is nevertheless of the utmost moral repugnance. It is time to end it!

=====

Watch Richard Boyd Barrett TD raise the issue of an arms embargo on Israel in the Dail on Wednesday 11th March 2015.

Note that when, at 1:06, he says “Palestinians can be executed on the word of one Israeli solider”, he obviously misspoke and meant they can be “convicted on the word of one Israeli solider” in the military court system. Though of course, any Palestinian anywhere in the occupied territories can be executed on the whim of any Israeli solider with virtually no repercussions. Like the state they represent, they act with complete impunity.

Who supports this campaign?

Alongside the Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign, the campaign has been endorsed by many politicians, public figures, NGOs, community groups and trade unions, including; Robert Ballagh; Dr Raymond Deane; Dr Ronit Lentin; Sinn Fein; Anti-Austerity Alliance-People Before Profit; The Socialist Party; The Socialist Workers Party; The Workers’ Party of Ireland; Communist Party of Ireland;  Richard Boyd Barrett TD; Joan Collins TD; Padraig Mac Lochlainn TD; Martin Ferris TD; Sandra McLellan TD; Paul Murphy TD; Ruth Coppinger TD; Clare Daly TD; Thomas Pringle TD; Seamus Healy TD; Catherine Murphy TD; Maureen O’Sullivan TD; Finian McGrath TD; John Halligan TD; Martina Anderson MEP & European Parliament Chair of the Delegation for Relations with Palestine; Lynn Boylan MEP; Matt Carthy MEP; Liadh Ní Riada MEP; Nessa Childers MEP; Sen. David Norris; Sen. Averil Power; Sen. Labhrás Ó Murchú; Sen. Kathryn Reilly; former TD Joe Higgins; John Douglas, General Secretary of Mandate trade union and former President of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions; Patricia McKeown, Unison NI regional secretary and former President of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions; Brian Campfield, President of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions and NIPSA General Secretary; Frank Keoghan, General President of TEEU; The Communication Workers Union; Afri – Action From Ireland; The Centre for Global Education; Palestinian Community in Ireland; Palestinian Rights Institute; Academics for Palestine; Gaza Action Ireland; Trade Union Friends of Palestine; Peace and Neutrality Alliance; Irish Anti-War Movement; The People’s Movement; Shannonwatch; TCD Apartheid Free Campus Campaign; NUIG Palestine Solidarity Campaign; Cllr. Paul Hand; Cllr. Michael O’Brien; Cllr. Paul Mulville; Cllr. Éilis Ryan; Cllr. Patrick Costello; Cllr. Emer Higgins.

In July 2014 Dublin City Council voted unanimously in support of an arms embargo on Israel.

Internationally, noted supporters of an arms embargo on Israel include Nobel Peace Laureates Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu, Adolfo Peres Esquivel, Jody Williams, Mairead Maguire, Rigoberta Menchú and Betty Williams; intellectuals and academics such as Noam Chomsky, Rashid Khalidi, Judith Butler, Ilan Pappé, and David Palumbo-Liu; artists such as authors Alice Walker and Michael Ondaatje, musicians Roger Waters, Brian Eno, and Boots Riley, and filmmakers Mira Nair, Mike Leigh, Ken Loach, and John Pilger. An arms embargo against Israel is also called for by human rights organizations such as Amnesty International and War on Want UK.

If you would like to sign your organization up, please contact us at info [at] ipsc.ie.