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LAST UPDATE | 16 Dec 2024
GOOD MORNING.
Here’s all the news that you need to know as you start your day.
1. A second man has been arrested in connection with the assault and robbery of two off-duty gardaí who were attacked in the Temple Bar area of Dublin on Friday night, with one in critical condition with serious head injuries following the assault.
It is believed the incident happened as the gardaí were making their way home from socialising in the city.
2. The chairperson of the Jewish Council of Ireland has said he is “deeply concerned” by the deterioration in relations between Ireland and Israel following the closure of the Israeli embassy in Dublin yesterday.
Maurice Cohen, chair of the Jewish Representative Council of Ireland, said the Irish Government’s intervention at the ICJ alongside South Africa had risked “oversimplifying” a complex and tragic conflict.
3. Ireland is producing more waste now than it did a decade ago and is “almost certain” to miss EU recycling targets next year.
In 2022, Ireland generated 15.7 million tonnes of waste, according to a new report by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA).
4. Rescuers to search for survivors this morning after a powerful cyclone hit the French Indian Ocean territory of Mayotte, laying to waste the territory’s many shantytowns.
Prefect Francois-Xavier Bieuville expects the final death toll will reach “close to a thousand or even several thousand”, he told broadcaster Mayotte la Premiere.
5. The Israeli government has approved a plan to increase the population of the annexed Golan Heights, while insisting it had no intention of confronting Syria after seizing a UN-monitored buffer zone.
As Islamist-led rebel forces swept Syrian president Bashar al-Assad out of power last week, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had ordered troops to seize the demilitarised zone between the two countries’ forces on the Golan Heights.
6. A woman in her 70s has been seriously injured after a hit-and-run incident in Co Louth.
The collision occurred on the Armagh Road (R177) at the junction with the Toberona Road in Dundalk shortly after 1pm on Sunday.
7. A meeting has been scheduled this morning with hauliers to discuss the massive backlog across the Irish Sea.
This backlog has arisen from the HolyHead Port closure due to Storm Darragh damages.
8. Paul O’Donovan was named RTÉ Sport Sportsperson of the Year last night.
The Cork man became the first Irish Olympian to win medals at three consecutive games in 2024, winning Olympic gold at the double sculls in Paris – and gold at the World Rowing Championships single sculls.
9. South Korean enforcement authorities will request that impeached President Yoon Suk Yeol appear for questioning this week over his short-lived martial law decree.
Investigators are exploring whether his ill-conceived power grab amounted to rebellion.
The Jewish Council feel we are “oversimplifying” the issue?
The worst genocide in modern times is oversimplified?
israel is currently slaughtering men, women and children in Gaza, Lebanon and Syria. They are stealing land all around them. It’s as simple as that. Then they play the victim, leaving the embassy while playing the “antisemitism” card.
@James Groden: As a Putin fan, It’s not hard to see why you’d gloss over 500,000 killed by Putin, Assad, Hezbollah in Syria. Would you class this as a genocide? Or maybe Russia killing up to 2,000,000 Afghanis? Was that a genocide? Why hasn’t anyone called Yemen, with 400,000 dead, a genocide? Very strange, but it’s clear why Israel is being targeted.
@honey badger: When anyone mentions any Yeman, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya you shout whataboutry and ignore what they say. Now you’re asking why they are not mentioned. Total hypocrite
Israel feel they have carte blanche to do what they like because of the strong Jewish lobby in the states and Uk and with ww2 and their own persecution. The victims have become the perpetrators. Sickening that they can get away anything they are doing. This is nothing to do with religion but Israel pull the “jew card” saying that anyone who disagrees is antisemetic. Bullcrap and something big needs to be done about this soon.
@Ciaran: You and the rest are being played by Hamas. War is such a dirty cruel thing. All killing and plans to exterminate must end but getting int the minds of muslim Hamas caliphateists and fight to survive fearful Israelis is hard to see happening.
@Basildon Joe: We’ll see how the latest CIA backed terrorists group get on in Syria!
@Basildon Joe: I’m not happy with the closure of the embassy , that’s Israel throwing toys out of pram. Israel have grabbed the land of Palestine for years. Look at a map from 1960 to now. This is well before the October 7th attacks. Israel are greedy land grabbers who are now grabbing some of Syria with the same with lebanon. But even saying hamas hade a terrorist act on Israel in October 7th, how many women and children have been killed by Israel since ? Bombing hospitals and schools and refugee camps. Is that justified? Stopping aid getting to hungry and sick civilians. Netanyahu has an ICC arrest warrant for war crimes. You really think he is innocent ? More fool you. Netanyahu needs to be terminated. Dirt of the earth
@Ciaran: Israël surrendered Gaza completely in 2005. After a peace agreement with the Palestine authority.
War is an experience outside the sphere of safe Irish politicians and public. Hamas is an experienced terror army that uses terror warfare strategies incomprehensible to Irish. While most male Hamas fighters are active elsewhere they pack their military offices with expendable sacrificial(martyr) women and female children as human shields. This tactic to protect the Hamas commanders is clearly working on the gullible safe western political mouths.
@thomas molloy: still doesn’t change the fact 16+k kids were killed by Israel.
Israel just secured future extremists.
@Kieran Menon: That’s the plan. Hate begets Hate, Slaughter begets Slaughter. That’s what 7th October was about.
@Kieran Menon: Hamas started the war on October last year. Yes Israël react over the top but fact is fact.
Israël handed back Gaza in 2005. Removed all Israeli out of Gaza. A lot by force. There where no settlements in Gaza which was occupied only by Palestine. Still Hamas killed 1200 innocent civilian and took 200 hostage. Yes they started but the Irish government mention that every time only very briefly.
@Kieran Menon: So you have noticed that Hamas commanders and control centers locate in schools and surround themselves with women and girls. Why are the government not calling this out ?
@thomas molloy: You know damn well. Hamas was funded by Netanyahu to divide the Palestinians. You talk about Israel handing back Gaza. How do you think they got possession of it in the first place? Zionism is a toxic colonial venture born at the height of European colonial violence in the 19th century. It is a toxic offshoot of pan-German, racist, nationalism in Vienna in the 1890′s.
@Kieran Menon: Civilian death counts in the Israel-Hamas war have been inflated and distorted to portray Israel as deliberately targeting innocent civilians, a new study found.
The report from the UK-based Henry Jackson Society found that news outlets failed to distinguish between civilian and combatant casualties and relied on manipulated statistics from the Hamas-run Health Ministry when reporting on the war.
Gaza officials claim more than 44,700 people have been killed following the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks on Israel, but does not acknowledge that upwards of 17,000 were Hamas terrorists — a fact the media often omits, the study found, citing Israeli and US military and intelligence reports for its data.
@Ulick: read the full report at HenryJacksonSociety.org
Is there any good news
@Shanie: Dancing with the Stars is back soon!
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