Garda 'assault' on Mothers Against Genocide protesters condemned by Derry City and Strabane District councillors

The "heavy handed actions" of An Garda Síochána against a group of women participating in a Mother’s Day vigil and sleep-out protest at Leinster House have been condemned by Derry City and Strabane District Council.

The women who belong to ‘Mothers Against Genocide’ had been highlighting the impact of displacement and violence on women and children in Gaza. 

At Tuesday afternoon’s March meeting of Council’s Governance and Strategic Planning committee, Cllr Gary Donnelly (Independent) proposed the following motion: “Council deplores the heavy handed actions of the 26 county police force against peaceful women protesters against Israeli genocide, known as Mothers Against Genocide, outside Leinster House and during their subsequent detention on Monday, March 31.

“Council will contact Mothers Against Genocide and express out solidarity with them.”

In the discussion which followed, Cllr Donnelly described the action taken against Mothers Against Genocide as “assault”.

He also referenced an item on zero tolerance of violence against women and girls which was to be discussed later in the meeting.

He added: “A number of mothers gave up their Mother’s Day to highlight the slaughter of particularly non combatants - women and children - in Gaza. 

“The fact that they were manhandled and arrested on Monday morning, the fact that some of these women were strip searched and one had a cavity search, I think is completely unacceptable. 

“I think we need to be sending out a message from here,” said Cllr Donnelly.

Seconding the motion, Cllr Catherine McDaid (SDLP) said before the women from ‘Mothers Against Genocide’ were arrested An Garda [Síochána] trampled over dolls that were wrapped in blankets, as if babies.

“So they came essentially and trampled over what was supposed to be babies and then manhandled these women away who had given up their Mother’s Day.

“When I read about strip searching and a cavity search, I genuinely was nearly sick. I can’t believe that was in any way acceptable in this day and age.

“I fully agree with and endorse the proposal and we within the SDLP will be supporting it,” said Cllr McDaid.

Cllr Sandra Duffy (Sinn Féin) said she, like others, had been watching this on social media over the last couple of days. 

“I am absolutely horrified at the scenes. We had mothers come out on Mother’s Day to protest. We have seen the horrific scenes coming out of Gaza, coming out of the West Bank, of mothers, children, amputees. I actually saw a video of a man who was burying a head, that was what he had left of his son. 

“So these are the scenes we are seeing coming out of Gaza and out of Palestine and we have a duty to use our voices to be heard and to be seen around these issues.

“These women came together with their children, came outside the Dáil and the heavy handed response from An Garda Síochána has been absolutely shocking and disgraceful. I don’t know who gave the order. I don’t know what was going on in their heads around it, were they attacked a group of women protesting peacefully, in this manner. It does need to be called out and we do need to show our solidarity with ‘Mothers Against Genocide’,” said Cllr Duffy.

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Cllr Shaun Harkin (People Before Profit) said it was important to be clear in “our condemnation of the police actions”.

“This was a peaceful protest,” he added. “There have probably been thousands of peaceful protests across Ireland since this genocide began and the vast majority of them have not ended like this. So there is a question about what the Dáil Government is doing right now.

“As Cllr Duffy said, we need to establish what this order was given for this crackdown. Why was there strip searching?

“I see this as violence against women, state led violence against women and if there were girls there too, and it was disgraceful. But it also seems to me that there is an attempt to criminalise Palestinian solidarity and this is one example. Scaring people that if you participate in this, you are going to be confronted by the state, that you are doing something wrong.  

“There was a documentary on Friday night here in Derry about the Filton 18 - a group of young people who occupied an arms manufacturer in England who’ve been thrown in jail and it is absolutely wrong. Thrown in jail for trying to stop a genocide.

“Just to mention there was an action that a number of people, including Cllr Donnelly, participated in at Home Bargains here in Derry were the police turned up and arrested people, took people to the barracks. Those charges fortunately have been dropped and they were dropped in Strabane as well. This seems to be, whether it is the PSNI, the Garda or the British police, attempts again and again to criminalise people in order to break up this movement and stop the solidarity,” said Cllr Harkin.

Cllr Harkin added that the State was trying to do “goes against the wishes of many millions of people across this island.