Dáil Protest For Israel Sanctions Bill

Ramadan in Gaza 22FEB26 Pic: Jehad Alshrafi AP

atest press release from People Before Profit’s Kellie McConnell, issued on Friday, May 15th 2026…

The Dáil debated the Sanctions Against the State of Israel Bill 2025 on Thursday, with a vote scheduled for Wednesday May 20th.

The bill is the first time a proposal of full economic sanctions on the state of Israel itself has come before the Dáil, proposing to prohibit all trade, investment, financial dealings and state-linked economic activity with the entire Israeli regime.

Previous sanctions bills proposed in the Dail have focused solely on trade and investment in the occupied territories.

People Before Profit representative for Greystones-Wicklow and co-founder of North Wicklow Against Genocide, Kellie McConnell has called on all Wicklow TDs, and all TDs from every party and none, to back the Sanctions against the State of Israel Bill 2025, saying that “TDs who vote against this bill are voting to keep Ireland economically tied to a state actively committing genocide and guilty of apartheid, ethnic cleansing and countless violations of international law.

“It is absolutely shameful that after three years of a genocidal massacre of Palestinians in Gaza by Israel and decades of systematic apartheid and ethnic cleansing, Ireland continues to do billions of euros worth of trade every year with the regime guilty of these crimes. it makes a mockery of the government’s claimed commitment to International law.”

The bill, first introduced by People Before Profit on November 27th 2025, will prohibit:

⦿ The import of goods and technology from Israel
⦿ Business dealings, including the acquisition of property, shares, equity and joint ventures
⦿ The export of goods and technology to Israel or for use in Israel
⦿ Technical assistance, brokering, construction and engineering services in Israel
⦿ Dealing in Israeli state and Central Bank securities and money-market instruments
⦿ The provision of new loans or credit to the State of Israel

“The bill aims to ensure that the government fullfil its obligations under the UN Genocide Convention and the UN Convention on the Suppression and Punishment of the Crime of Apartheid, the orders of the International Court of Justice in South Africa v. Israel, the ICJ’s July 2024 advisory opinion on the occupied Palestinian Territory, and the International Criminal Court’s arrest warrants for Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant.

“For the past two and a half years the world has watched a genocide unfold in Gaza and there have been no sanctions imposed by Ireland or the EU. This stands in stark contrast with the sanctions that were immediately imposed on Russia in 2022 when they illegally invaded Ukraine and in 2014 when they annexed Crimea. The bill that will be proposed on Thursday is seeking to implement the same sanctions that have been used time and again against regimes that have broken international law,

“This is the first time that a bill has come before the Dáil that proposes comprehensive economic, trade and financial sanctions on the State of Israel for its serial breaches of the genocide convention, the Rome Statutes for the crime of Apartheid and its multiple violations of international law. Its complete denial of human and civil rights to the Palestinian people.

“These sanctions should be placed on the state of Israel not just for the ongoing genocide in Gaza but also for the last 80 years of ethnic cleansing, of apartheid, of a systematic genocidal campaign across Palestine and the complete denial of any rights to the Palestinian People.

“We are calling on everyone who is horrified at the genocide and crimes being committed by the Israeli state against the Palestinian people to come to join a protest on Wednesday May 20th at 5.30pm outside the Dáil.”

More info on how TDs are voting on the Israel sanctions bill here.