In January 2010, 26 Mossad agents were involved in the assassination of Mahmoud al-Mabhouh, a senior Hamas military commander. The assassination took place in a hotel room in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.
The Mossad agents involved in that operation included eight who used fake or cloned Irish passports, with others using similarly forged UK, Australian, French and German passports.
In June 2010, the then Irish Minister for Foreign Affairs, Michael Martin, expelled a single diplomat from the Israeli embassy in Dublin, with the UK and Australia undertaking similar action.
At no time, despite the quality of the evidence implicating the Israeli Government, was there any talk of imposing a blanket ban on Israeli members or ex-members of the Israeli Intelligence Network, or Armed Forces—let alone a ban on Israeli citizens.
Nor was there any response along those lines by the Irish Government when, six years later, the Israeli Ambassador to Ireland, Zeev Boker, in an interview with the Cork Examiner published on 10th October 2016, not only confirmed that Israeli Intelligence had been involved in using forged Irish passports back in 2010, but refused to rule out the prospect of Israeli Intelligence doing so again at some point in the future.
Although Ireland and the UK delivered a diplomatic equivalent of a slap on the wrist in 2010 nothing was done by Ireland in 2016. There was no call from Ireland, the UK, France or Germany, for an EU-wide response towards Israel either in 2010 or 2016.
Ireland has a good reputation internationally, on account of its Neutrality. And it is known to support the rights of Palestinians in their own country, Palestine. The use of Irish Passports to provide cover for malevolent activities must undermine its reputation—particularly if there is no sanction for such action.
Now, however, on the back of unsubstantiated allegations of Russian involvement in a highly amateurish operation at Leipzig Airport, which injured no one and did very little damage, we see Ireland joining in an EU-wide hue and cry arising for Russian citizens to be banned from legally applying for visas to travel in EU countries! And, amongst those supporting that hue and cry we see none other than the current Irish Minister for Foreign Affairs, Helen McEntee (Fine Gael).
The influence of Israel on European politics is the blight that continues to erode the EU’s credibility when it comes to its claim to represent any kind of “rules-based international order” when set beside its belligerency against Russia.
Eamon Dyas
