It’ll all be kicking off in the Dáil this week.
The main Opposition parties have laid out their game plans in the form of two motions calling for the Republic of Ireland’s upcoming football clash with Israel to be called off.
In the first leg on Tuesday, Sinn Féin will table its motion. Party leader Mary Lou McDonald has said the prospect of the game going ahead would be “unconscionable and unspeakable”.
The second motion is by the Social Democrats on Wednesday. Labour will be togging out in support of both – as confirmed by Ivana Bacik over the weekend.
Taoiseach Micheál Martin has expressed concerns that Ireland’s qualification prospects would be damaged if the games don’t proceed. However he has also said the Government decision on how to vote depends on how the Opposition lines out, that is, how the motions are worded.
Readers may remember that Martin’s away trip to Canada in April had to be postponed due to the fuel protests at home. Well, Canadian prime minister Mark Carney is in town later this week for a friendly visit.
Carney will head to Dublin next weekend – before travelling west to his ancestral roots in Co Mayo. Meeting him there will be someone who knows a thing or two about soccer – President Catherine Connolly.
The Canadian leader’s two grandparents left Aughagower near Westport more than 100 years ago, we are told, before making their way in the land of Maple.
According to his office, the trip is designed to deepen the long-standing ties between the two countries – and will seek to expand relationships across agri-food, digital innovation, AI, pharma and climate.
Carney has positioned himself and his country as the antidote to Donald Trump and current US policies. After Mayo he goes to Paris before sitting around the table with Trump and the rest of the G7 as its leaders meet in Evian, France.
Trump, as we know, likes Diet Coke – not necessarily French mineral water. As legend has it, he can sink up to 12 a day on occasion – and had a call button installed on his desk in the Oval Office that summons White House staff to bring him a can of the fizzy beverage.
Whether he will be reaching for other buttons in the near future is a good question – as the morass in the Middle East and the Gulf grows seemingly more complicated by the day.
Israeli attacks on the southern suburbs of Beirut last night prompted a response from Iran – who fired a number of salvos of missiles in Israel’s direction. The Israelis then attacked Tehran.
Trump has previously lashed out at the Israelis for threatening to completely unravel efforts to broker a deal with the Iranians.
He seems to have been under the impression that Israel’s Binyamin Netanyahu would hold off on further retaliation last night but that wasn’t the case – with reports of explosions in the Iranian capital.
“I’m not happy about it,” Trump told a Fox News reporter of the Israeli attacks on Lebanon.
In comments recorded on Friday and broadcast yesterday Trump again told NBC that a deal with the Iranians was close, but that he could also “blow the hell out of them”.
The Houthis in Yemen have upped their role in the conflict – and have declared a ban on Israeli ships in the Red Sea.
The price of Brent Crude took another little bump.
With the World Cup just around the corner, the plight of Iran’s team is again in the headlines. Iran has accused Washington of denying visas to vital back room staff and said it is engaging in “politically biased interference in sport”.
The players have been granted permission to travel to the US for the upcoming games, but the Trump administration has said it will not be allowing Iran to exploit the system and “sneak terrorists into the United States under false pretences”.
At home, the Rotunda has until the close of business today to disclose which public-only consultants have been given permission to continue providing private practice at the maternity hospital.
The HSE is warning that, depending on the response it gets, it could trigger a process that results in the withholding of funding. Minister for Health Jennifer Carroll MacNeill has knocked back an invitation to meet the Rotunda board until it backs down.
