Senator Paul Gavan has made a call on European countries to impose an arms embargo on Israel, end the special EU trade deal with Israel and pressurise the apartheid state to immediately call a halt to their genocide against the Palestinian people.

Sinn Féin’s European Election candidate for Ireland South was leading the debate on behalf of the Unified European Left at the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe.

The debate on Palestine only took place at the insistence of Senator Gavan and his party colleagues, as it was originally planned to exclude the topic from discussion at the human rights assembly.

Senator Gavan said:

“We need an immediate ceasefire. We need an arms embargo against Israel, and an end to the EU-Israel trade agreement. We need real European pressure to end the slaughter of the Palestinian people.

“We are all witnesses to the ongoing genocide in Gaza. Member states who are not found wanting in confronting Putin’s criminal invasion of Ukraine have abandoned the Palestinians to annihilation. The double standard is scandalous. Shamefully, Council of Europe member states Germany and Britain continue to supply the weapons that allow Israel to keep the slaughter of Palestinian women and children going.

“It is truly shocking that six months into this unfolding horror the Secretary General of PACE still has nothing to say about the genocide taking place, even as children are dying from an imposed famine. This disgraceful silence has to end now.”