Thousands of signed postcards delivered to office of Cork TD calling for enactment of Occupied Territories Bill

2,500 individually signed postcards were hand-delivered to the constituency office of the Minister for Foreign Affairs Simon Coveney on Friday by the Cork Palestine Solidarity Campaign.

The postcards are calling for the implementation of the Occupied Territories Bill and say that the Bill has been "languishing for too long". 

In May the Irish Government declared Israel’s settlements in Palestinian territories as “de facto annexation." 

The Occupied Territories Bill, despite receiving strong cross-party support, has not been enacted.

A crowd of people met at Grand Parade on Friday at noon and travelled to Carrigaline by bus to personally deliver the signed postcards to Mr Coveney's office. 

After proceeding to the office, there was a recital of a poem written especially for the occasion by Cork's Poet Laureate William Wall as well as other speeches including one from Solidarity TD Mick Barry.

Speaking about the situation, the Campaign group said: “Ireland has paved the way, being the first European state to condemn Israeli treatment of Palestinians and its encroachment on Palestinian land, however, Ireland has as yet failed to take any action, it’s time to put the money where the mouth is and enact this bill.”

They said that the enactment of the bill would make it illegal to trade with illegally occupied territories and would force corporations to stop trading to and from the Occupied Palestinian Territories.