{"id":846356,"date":"2026-06-05T14:57:15","date_gmt":"2026-06-05T14:57:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/846356\/"},"modified":"2026-06-05T14:57:15","modified_gmt":"2026-06-05T14:57:15","slug":"hardline-israeli-ministers-ben-gvir-and-smotrich-barred-from-travel-to-ireland-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/846356\/","title":{"rendered":"Hardline Israeli ministers Ben-Gvir and Smotrich barred from travel to Ireland \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Irish officials have been instructed to block any attempts by hardline Israeli ministers Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich to travel to the State, a symbolic but significant sanction of the Israeli<\/a> government. <\/p>\n

Confirming the effective travel ban on Friday, Taoiseach Miche\u00e1l Martin<\/a> said a direction had been given to prohibit the Israeli politicians from entering the country. <\/p>\n

\u201cMinister for Justice Jim O\u2019Callaghan, [it] is my understanding, has instructed his officials to prohibit any travel into Ireland [for] both minister Ben-Gvir and minister Smotrich,\u201d Martin told reporters in Tivat, Montenegro, where he was attending a meeting bringing together EU leaders and their counterparts from the western Balkans. <\/p>\n

Ben-Gvir and Smotrich, ministers for national security and finance respectively, have been among the most outspoken advocates<\/a> for Israel\u2019s campaign in Gaza<\/a> and the West Bank<\/a>. <\/p>\n

The Government recently condemned Ben-Gvir for releasing a video of himself taunting activists<\/a>, who had been on board a Gaza aid flotilla, after they were detained by Israeli forces. <\/p>\n

Martin said the behaviour of the politicians \u201cjustifies\u201d them being subject to wider-reaching sanctions at European Union level. The statements of the far-right Israeli ministers essentially \u201camount to a desire to see the elimination of Palestinians from Palestine\u201d, the Fianna F\u00e1il leader said. <\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s again something that the international community needs to take on board and we will be pursuing that with others. <\/p>\n

\u201cIn my view, their behaviour justifies sanctions at EU level as well, and that\u2019s something that we will raise; whether we can get sufficient support across the European Union is a different matter.\u201d <\/p>\n

There has been a fresh attempt in Brussels to sanction Ben-Gvir in response to the flotilla controversy, but it is still unclear whether such a move would secure the unanimous agreement of all 27 member state governments.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Israeli minister\u2019s taunts \u2018accelerate momentum\u2019 for EU action, Taoiseach saysOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Israel\u2019s actions during and after its two-year war in Gaza, which reduced large parts of the Palestinian enclave to rubble and saw famine spread through the besieged population, were \u201cunacceptable\u201d, Martin said. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re now hearing very poor, negative reports about the absence of really sufficient humanitarian and medical aid going in [to Gaza]. Almost what we\u2019re witnessing is a sort of permanent state of subjugation of a people and that\u2019s not acceptable,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

Diplomats from the 27 governments have been debating whether their leaders could agree to EU-level sanctions on extremist Israeli ministers.<\/p>\n

Recent closed-door discussions suggest Germany, always a firm defender of Israel, might be open to the bloc sanctioning Ben-Gvir, but not Smotrich, according to one source briefed on the talks. However, the Czech government is opposing EU sanctions on either man, which would prevent any restrictions being approved. <\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the Government is scheduled to bring the Occupied Territories Bill to the D\u00e1il next week. First proposed by Independent Senator Frances Black more than eight years ago, the Bill was stalled by successive governments before finally being adopted \u2013 and rewritten \u2013 by the current administration. <\/p>\n

It is now called the Israeli Settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory (Prohibition of Importation of Goods) Bill 2026.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0The Irish Times view on the Occupied Territories Bill: where principle meets realpolitikOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

However, contrary to the wishes of many campaigners, the Bill will not include a prohibition on trading in services with entities in the occupied Palestinian territories. Opposition figures have promised to seek to amend the Bill to include services, though these efforts will be resisted by the Government.<\/p>\n

The D\u00e1il is due to debate the second stage of the Bill \u2013 actually the first D\u00e1il debate on its general principles and aims \u2013 for 3\u00bd hours next Wednesday.<\/p>\n

Sinn F\u00e9in will on Tuesday bring a motion urging the Government to block the soccer international between the Republic of Ireland and Israel scheduled for October and to compensate the FAI for any costs it incurs.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Irish officials have been instructed to block any attempts by hardline Israeli ministers Itamar Ben-Gvir and Bezalel Smotrich…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":846357,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[2],"tags":[8697,4526,99,210125,136887,50,4851,16815,17262],"class_list":["post-846356","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-european-union","tag-gaza-strip","tag-israel","tag-jim-ocallaghan","tag-micheal-martin","tag-news","tag-palestine","tag-viktor-orban","tag-west-bank"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116698090666101452","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/846356","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=846356"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/846356\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/846357"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=846356"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=846356"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=846356"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}