{"id":37162,"date":"2025-09-22T22:02:09","date_gmt":"2025-09-22T22:02:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/37162\/"},"modified":"2025-09-22T22:02:09","modified_gmt":"2025-09-22T22:02:09","slug":"connolly-stresses-palestinian-advocacy-and-commitment-to-neutrality-at-campaign-launch-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/37162\/","title":{"rendered":"Connolly stresses Palestinian advocacy and commitment to neutrality at campaign launch \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Leaders of left-wing parties and independents launched the campaign of presidential<\/a> hopeful Catherine Connolly<\/a> in Dublin on Monday night at an event that stressed her advocacy for Palestine<\/a>, her commitment to neutrality<\/a> and social justice \u2013 as well as the opportunity to deliver a blow to the Government.<\/p>\n

Labour<\/a>\u2019s Marie Sherlock said the meeting was very much about creating a left-wing political platform.<\/p>\n

\"CatherineCatherine Connolly launches her presidential campaign with Holly Cairns Social Democrats leader and Mary Lou McDonald leader of Sinn Fein last night. Photo: Bryan O\u2019Brien <\/p>\n

Social Democrats<\/a> leader Holly Cairns<\/a> described Ms Connolly as \u201cincredibly warm and sound\u201d. Ms Cairns said she would \u201calways speak truth to power\u201d.<\/p>\n

She said that Ms Connolly was the only candidate who would stand up for neutrality.<\/p>\n

Green Party<\/a> leader Roderic O\u2019Gorman<\/a>, often fiercely criticised by many present when he was in government, said the Ms Connolly has \u201calways used her voice for those who don\u2019t have a voice\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t believe this is the left uniting, I think Catherine united us,\u201d said Senator Eileen Flynn.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Presidential election: Meet the three hopefuls who will be on the ballot paper next monthOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

People Before Profit\u2019s Paul Murphy said that other candidates would just \u201cnod along\u201d to the Government\u2019s agenda.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is your opportunity to strike a blow against Fianna F\u00e1il and Fine Gael,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Sinn F\u00e9in leader Mary Lou McDonald said the united campaign was \u201cready to move heaven and earth\u201d to get Ms Connolly elected.<\/p>\n

\u201cCatherine will be a president who champions Irish unity in our time,\u201d she said. \u201cTogether we will say in this campaign, \u2018Hands off our neutrality\u2019 \u201d, she added.<\/p>\n

\"CatherineCatherine Connolly merchandise on sale at the launch of her her presidential campaign. Photo: Bryan O\u2019Brien \/ The Irish Times <\/p>\n

To the cheers of the crowd of about 250 people, Ms Connolly said that she was only \u201cpart of a movement of energy, vibrancy and vision to move the country in a different way\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe will show them there is another way,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Ms Connolly declined to comment on her way into the event when asked by reporters about her remarks to the BBC with regard to Hamas earlier in the day.<\/p>\n

She had said she disagrees with the suggestion that Hamas<\/a> can have no role in a future Palestinian<\/a> state, saying this was a matter for Palestinians to decide themselves.<\/p>\n

\"CatherineCatherine Connolly with Social Democrats leader Holly Cairns and Sinn F\u00e9in leader Mary Lou McDonald at the former’s campaign launch on Monday night. Photograph: Bryan O\u2019Brien\/The Irish Times <\/p>\n

Asked about Mr Starmer\u2019s view that Hamas could not be involved in a Palestinian government, she said: \u201cHamas is part of the fabric of the Palestinian people, and we \u2013 it\u2019s interesting and really cynical that we never imposed sanctions on Israel, who are carrying out genocide, so we need to have an honest discussion.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI come from Ireland, a history of colonisation, and I would be very wary of telling a sovereign people how to run their country. The Palestinians must decide in a democratic way who they want to lead their country.\u201d<\/p>\n

Taoiseach Miche\u00e1l Martin criticised her comments, saying Hamas had \u201cbroken every humanitarian law and cannot be part of Gaza\u2019s future\u201d.<\/p>\n

Speaking to reporters at the United Nations in New York on Monday he said there should be \u201cunequivocal condemnation of Hamas if we\u2019re trying to chart future for a Palestinian state, with guarantees for Israel into the future\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cHamas is not that option because Hamas has consistently refused to recognise an Israeli state and are vowed and committed to the elimination of an Israeli state.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Social Democrats, who have backed Ms Connolly\u2019s presidential campaign, said that while they \u201cwould not have used the same language as Catherine\u201d the party believes \u201cit is up to the Palestinian people to decide who their political representatives should be, following free and fair elections\u201d.<\/p>\n

Labour\u2019s Alan Kelly said he expects Ms Connolly will have to withdraw the remarks while presidential candidate Jim Gavin said he was \u201csurprised\u201d by the comments, but added Ms Connolly had acknowledged \u201cthe atrocities and horrific crimes that Hamas committed over two years ago\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Leaders of left-wing parties and independents launched the campaign of presidential hopeful Catherine Connolly in Dublin on Monday…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":37163,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,28606,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-37162","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-palestinian-state","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37162","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=37162"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/37162\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/37163"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=37162"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=37162"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=37162"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}