FINE GAEL leader Enda Kenny is to raise his concerns about the situation in Gaza and the Israeli/Palestinian conflict with the European People’s Party (EPP) and US peace envoy George Mitchell.
Mr Kenny returned at the weekend after a three-day visit to the region where he was accompanied by party colleagues Alan Shatter, Billy Timmins and Pat Breen. Commenting on his Gaza visit, he said: “I never saw anything like it. The place is absolutely flattened.”
Mr Kenny also visited the Israeli town of Sderot which is close to the border with Gaza and has been subjected to sustained rocket attack by Palestinian militants.
He travelled on Saturday morning to Ramallah in the West Bank to meet president of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, who told him that unless a peace agreement was concluded soon, the region faced a “very long period of instability”. Mr Abbas predicted Fatah would “rout” Hamas in the next Palestinian elections. Mr Kenny did not meet any Hamas representatives in Gaza because “Hamas is listed in Brussels as a terrorist organisation”.
FG is a member of the EPP in the European Parliament and will highlight the region’s problems with other members as well as putting down a motion in the Dáil.
“We support the two-state solution,” Mr Kenny said. There should be no further annexation of land by Israel and he called for an end to violence on both sides.
During his visit, he held discussions with Israel’s deputy foreign minister Danny Ayalon and other Israeli politicians. Mr Kenny said: “Everything, from a political perspective, is focused on Iran and the statements of President Ahmadinejad.”