THE GOVERNMENT HAS been urged not to dilute the Occupied Territories Bill as senior figures in Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael raise concerns about the impact the draft law will have on Ireland’s international standing.

In recent days, senior government and diplomatic figures have warned of possible trade retaliation from Israel and from the Trump administration in the US.

One senior government minister told The Journal that they believe the finalised law will be a “very vastly different Bill” than what was first tabled by Senator Frances Black in 2018.

“Frances Black’s bill that was proposed wasn’t constitutional anyway so that can’t be enacted,” the source said.

“The Tánaiste was very open about that on the record. It will take an awful lot of amendments and work to get a bill that would be constitutional,” they said.

The minister added that they personally have concerns about how the law would work in practice.

Asked about the possibility of the EU taking action against the bill, given that trade is an EU competence rather than the sole perogative of member states, the minister said: 

“I’d be more worried about the [United] States than Brussels. The more immediate threat would be from the States I think.”

Asked how this “threat” might manifest, the minister said it depends.

“It’s anyone’s guess how serious the States would judge it.” 

On enforcing the Bill, they said: “How is it going to be policed? That’s what I don’t understand.”

“I haven’t seen how we are going to implement it, is it only for symbolism but never going to be enforced? I don’t know how we could enforce it to be honest.

“It’s a tricky Bill, there’s more to it than meets the eye,” they added. 

Despite these concerns, the minister said their understanding is that the Taoiseach and Tánaiste both remain “very committed” to getting the bill passed.

They added that it has not been a “sticking point” during government formation talks. 

Hold firm

It is understood that there will be a commitment to passing the bill in the Programme for Government, the draft of which is to be published today. However, the level of detail that will be contained in the Programme for Government document remains to be seen.

One of the drafters of the original bill, Conor O’Neill, who is head of policy at the humanitarian NGO Christian Aid, told The Journal that he believes there has been a level of “fear mongering” involved in a lot of the recent discussion of the bill.

“I think what you’re seeing is maybe other people in [Fianna Fáil or Fine Gael], or even some commentators who, in my view, regrettably, haven’t really looked at it in detail.

“One of the differences with Micheál Martin and Simon Harris is that they have been looking at this in detail for a long time. There have been long, detailed meetings with them and their officials on how would this work in practice…What are the implications, the technical ins and outs of it – and I think they get it,” O’Neill said. 

A farm in Israeli-occupied West Bank Alamy Alamy

O’Neill believes the test now will be whether it gets “watered down” as it progresses through the Oireachtas.

“It’s one thing having a bullet point in the Program For Government that says they will pass the Occupied Territories Bill. That’s a kind of a general commitment. What matters then is what shape it’s in, what they do to it or what they don’t do to it,” he said.

As it is currently drafted, the bill would cover both goods and services imported from occupied territories.

In O’Neill’s view, it will be important to watch if any exemptions are proposed for specific companies or perhaps exempting services as a whole, meaning the bill would only apply to the import of physical goods. 

“The real value of this bill is the politics of it.

“This would effectively be the very first time that a Western European country would have applied a trade measure of this kind to Israel…I think that’s why this is important, because it’s the first step over that threshold to saying it’s not just words. There is going to be actual, real economic consequences,” O’Neill said. 

Next steps

Once the new government is up and running, what is likely to happen is that officials in the Department of Foreign Affairs, who have been preparing what O’Neill understands to be “technical amendments”, will have to meet with the new Minister for Foreign Affairs and the bill’s sponsor, Senator Black.

It will then be passed to the Oireachtas Foreign Affairs Committee for further amendments. 

“They will have to go through it line by line, and the minister might say, okay, there are 10, 11, 12 changes they want to make, and they’ll have to go through it and either accept or reject them,” O’Neill said.

Despite the concerns raised in recent days by government members, others within the ruling parties remain fully committed to enacting the legislation. 

Fianna Fáil MEP Barry Andrews said Ireland has legal obligations it must adhere to as a result of the International Court of Justice’s (ICJ) ruling last year which labelled Israeli settlements in the Occupied Territories illegal.

“The Irish people have consistently asked that the Irish Government take a principled stand against the ongoing brutal actions of the Israeli Government in the Gaza Strip,” Andrews said. 

The Dublin MEP said it would be “naive” to think the Israeli government would not respond in some way, but said “any threat of retaliation should not prevent the Irish government from doing the right thing”.

“While I understand there are risks involved in the passage of the Bill, this is not a rash decision.

“It is crucial that we remember the legally binding nature of the obligations set out by the ICJ, which includes the requirement for states to avoid engaging in trade relations with Israel relating to the occupied Palestinian territories, if they contribute to sustaining the illegal settlements.

“It goes without saying that any future legislation should be compliant with EU law,” Andrews added.