This month’s meeting of Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown Council saw the hyper-local nature of parish politics intertwine with geopolitics.
A proposal by People Before Profit councillor Melisa Halpin, which looked to have the council explore the possibility of twinning the area with a municipality in Gaza, saw the Fine Gael councillors taking issue with the proposal.
Explaining the rationale for her proposal, Dún Laoghaire councillor Halpin said “over the last few years, we have witnessed unparalleled horror,” and the motion was a symbolic way for a local council to express solidarity with the people of Gaza.
“The people of Dún Laoghaire and Rathdown have held a vigil in Monkstown every single Sunday since December 2023,” she noted, and wanted to express that at a council level.
She explained that the practice of twinning towns comes from England, in the wake of World War 2, where English towns paired themselves with towns that were bombed during the war.
Halpin also noted that the advocacy group, Jews For Palestine Ireland, as well as the Palestinian ambassador to Ireland (Dr. Jilan Wahba Abdalmajid) are both based in Rathdown.
Social Democrats councillor John Hurley said, “the best value of twinning is not when it’s commercially motivated, but when it’s a cultural exchange.”
“The great difficulty with what’s going on in Gaza is that for generations, people have been dehumanised. The ability to twin with people in that area, who have been stigmatised and maligned for years, is an opportunity to know what it really is, and know what people are really like.”
The Stilorgan councillor said the motion was “forward-thinking,” noting that Dublin City Council has a similar measure for twinning with Palestine.
Fine Gael councillor Jim O’Leary took major issue with the proposal, saying that he was not comfortable with the idea of twinning Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown with “a dogmatic, religious police state of huge inequity and oppression.”
“How is it in the interest of the people of DLR to enter into any agreement with Hamas-controlled municipalities?” he asked.
He noted that Hamas are a proscribed terrorist organisation, which he says “raises serious and valid questions for us as councillors.”
“How would such a relationship operate in current circumstances, and what are the legal and reputational implications of entering into a formal, civil relationship in that context?”
The Dundrum councillor claimed, “this is not an act of solidarity, it is an act of enablement of a terrorist regime, whose decisions have not been in the interest of our people.”
Fianna Fáil councillor Justin Moylan said, “what we have seen on our television screens is appalling. It is on a scale that is unprecedented in our generation,” and contrary to O’Leary’s point, he said the proposal was “reasonable.”
The Dún Laoghaire councillor questioned who, exactly, the council would be twinning with in the event the motion is passed, and questioned who has the democratic authority in Gaza.
International observers have noted that free and fair elections have not been held in Gaza since 2006, when Hamas won a majority, but no subsequent elections have been held.
Moylan said “we need to be very mindful about the municipalities with whom we are twinning with, and their democratic mandate,” but he said he “trusted” the council’s policy committee to “go through that vetting process.”
“I don’t want us to twin with something that is not democratically elected and does not represent people fairly,” but said, “I will trust you guys (committee members) to bring back something that is equitable and fair.”
Labour councillor Lettie McCarthy said that when she served as Cathaoirleach of Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown Council in 2022, she had the opportunity to visit Gaza.
She said she has “no regrets” about the visit, and said Irish trade unions have “strong links” with the area, noting it was “something worth exploring.”
“It’s horrific, what we are watching on television; leaving everything else out of it, it’s human beings treating other human beings in such a savage manner, it’s really hard to take.”
The Glencullen-Sandyford councillor said, “if there is anything we can do as councillors or individuals to strengthen those bonds, I am 100% behind it.”
Green councillor Tom Kivlehan said, “this is an unusual situation; it’s not a normal twinning.”
“I’ll say it straight; the day I see Benjamin Netanyahu in a criminal court will be great, but also, the day I see the leaders of Hamas in criminal court, I will be very happy as well for what they have brought on their own people too.”
Kivlehan said the Council was “too early” to look at the potential twinning, implying that the future status of Gaza and its leadership is still in flux, and it wouldn’t be pertinent for the Council to proceed with the twinning framework in lieu of established leadership in the area.
“I would ask that when peace comes there, that is something we look at; I’m not against twinning with Gaza, but as long as it’s stable, free and democratic.”
Independent councillor Hugh Lewis has said that Dún Laoghaire residents have been “proactive” in Gaza activism.
“The horrors of what has happened in the last few years has politicised people, and raised their consciousness of what has happened in Palestine.”
He noted that the Council has already passed a boycott on trade with Israel (although that particular measure was largely symbolic, with the council not having unilateral control on trade issues).
Lewis said that there were a number of “ignorant” remarks about the lack of material, cultural and sporting links between the government and Gaza.
The independent councillor said that on his visit to Gaza, he visited Al-Hilal football club, and invited the same club back to Ballybrack for a match.
Lewis informed the council that one of the teams players, Mohammad Khalifa, who played against Ballybrack FC, was killed by an Israeli strike on a refugee camp in 2024.
“There are very real links here, links that we need to formally recognise.”
Lewis remarked, “the councillors who are speaking against this motion are not representing the people who voted for them, quite frankly.”
The motion did pass, but it was not unanimous; in council protocol, when the Cathaoirleach asks if the motion is agreed and a councillor says they do not agree, it is put to a roll-call vote.
In this instance, 25 councillors voted for the motion, seven voted against, while two abstained.
The majority of the against votes came from Fine Gael councillors, while two of their councillors abstained from the vote.
What was striking from the debate was Fianna Fáil’s contributions being supportive of the motion, with some conditions, whereas some Fine Gael contributions were outright dismissive of the motion and refused to engage with it on a material level.
Despite Fine Gael having 16 of the 40 council seats, five shy of an overall majority, they are far and away the biggest party on Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown Council.
The Greens are the second-largest party on the council with six seats, while Fianna Fail and Labour have five apiece.
The motion did receive cross-motion support, with Fianna Fáil joining the opposition parties to support the People Before Profit motion.
The last paragraph isn’t a one you would see in a write-up of a Dáil vote, but anything is possible in the wild world of local Irish politics.