DULIN, Thursday, November 29, 2018 (WAFA) – A bill the Irish Senate has approved in July in preliminary reading was passed in first reading on Wednesday night, eve of the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, despite Irish government objections, according to reports, with 25 senators voting in favor, 20 opposed and 14 abstained.

Independent Senator Frances Black had sponsored the bill, Control of Economic Activities (Occupied Territories), adopted in July, along with co-signers Senators Alice-Mary Higgins, Lynn Ruane, Grace O‘Sullivan, Colette Kelleher, John Dolan and David Norris.

“The Irish Senate has sent a strong and important message to both the Palestinian people and to the global community that there is a price to be paid for Israel‘s criminal behavior and its persistent violations of international law, international humanitarian law and human rights law,” Palestinian official, Hanan Ashrawi, had said following the adoption of the bill in July.

The bill calls on the government to ban export and sale of products made in illegal Israeli settlements in the occupied Palestinian territories. It still needs to go through two more readings before it becomes a law.

M.K.