A very small segment of the apartheid wall Israel has encircled the occupied territories with and which Irish Deputy Billy Kelleher posted on his Twitter page. 

RAMALLAH, June 30, 2018 (WAFA) – Billy Kelleher, a deputy from the Irish Fianna Fail – The Republican Party, said on Friday after visiting the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Jerusalem and observing the wall Israel had built around them that walls do not make a nation.

Writing on his twitter page, Kelleher said: “Walls do not make a nation. With a wall comes a victor on one side and a victim on the other side. Hands of friendship can’t be extended through a wall, not being able to see the victim makes acceptance of suffering easier. Palestine needs our help.”

Kelleher and fellow Deputy Niall Collins, Fianna Fail’s Foreign Affairs and Trade spokesperson from Limerick, Ireland, arrived in Palestine and Israel on Tuesday on a fact finding mission by their party in advance of a bill calling for control of economic activity with Israel.

“We have been lobbied by a lot of groups to go over and see it,” Collins told the Irish Limerick Leader newspaper. “There is proposed legislation coming – Control of Economic Activity (Occupied Territories) Bill 2018 by Senator Frances Black.”

“Basically the bill will ban the importation of goods and services which originate from an Occupied Territory. We are going over to inform ourselves in advance of the debate of the bill,” Collins told the newspaper ahead of his trip.

The three-day visit took the two Irish deputies to Jerusalem, Ramallah, Hebron and Tel Aviv, where they were introduced to various aspects of Palestinian life under Israeli occupation.

Their trip included a visit to the Bedouin communities around Jerusalem, who are threatened with expulsion from their homes so that Israel can build a settlement in that location.

Posting a picture of one of the Bedouin communities on his Twitter page, Kelleher wrote: “A Bedouin camp in the West Bank with eviction orders placed on them by Israeli authorities so more settlements can be built on Palestinian lands.”

The two deputies, however, were not able to travel to Gaza due to Israeli restrictions.

M.K.