Irish government assisting ICE crimes through use of Shannon airport

Micheál Martin’s government is backing the criminal actions of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) brownshirts by allowing Shannon airport to be used as a refuelling point for illegal deportations.

A report by The Guardian highlighted the latest breach, in which a private jet belonging to a friend of US president Donald Trump flew groups of Palestinian men to so-called ‘Israel’. Once there, Zionist thugs transported them to the West Bank and dumped them at the side of the road.

One of the men is Maher Awad, a:

…24-year-old originally from the West Bank, who had lived in the US for nearly a decade.

He has a girlfriend and young son in Michigan where he lived. Awad was detained by ICE following a police arrest for a domestic violence charge a year previously. Despite authorities dropping this charge, he:

…spent [a] year being shuffled between immigration detention centres across the country, including in Michigan, Texas and Louisiana.

ICE — men illegally dumped in ‘active conflict zone’

ICE then deported him to the illegitimate Zionist settler-colony. Another man The Guardian spoke to was Sameer Isam Aziz Zeidan. He had been in the US for over 20 years. Before ICE kidnapped him, he was living in “Louisiana with his wife and five children”. They were among eight men shipped overseas in shackles, then left stranded with only a few belongings at a West Bank checkpoint on 21 January 2026.

Senator Patricia Stephenson, foreign affairs spokesperson for the Social Democrats, pointed out that the rendition amounts to leaving people in an “active conflict zone”. The terrorist regime based in West Jerusalem has killed over 1,000 Palestinians in the West Bank since 7 October 2023.

Land thieves — sometimes referred to as ‘settlers’ — have carried out a relentless series of ethnic cleansing raids in the last two years. 700 Palestinians have been subject to these pogroms in January alone. Deporting people to a territory where they are at risk of violence is illegal.

Stephenson said:

The government must now answer serious questions regarding whether they view this action as a breach of international law, and what action they will take to take control of the situation.

She continued:

The government claims it is a staunch supporter of international law, a beacon of hope when it comes to upholding human rights – it must now explain its hypocrisy.

This is not the first time the Irish government has assisted ICE crimes. In November The Ditch reported that US planes landed at the Clare airport to refuel while:

…carrying deportees to African countries they have no personal ties to…

Orville Etoria was one of those kidnapped, a Jamaican man with no connection to Eswatini, the country he was dumped in. His legal team say he was:

…illegally deported and imprisoned in Eswatini without charge or access to a lawyer for two months…

Government once again turning a blind eye to Shannon crimes

He eventually managed to make it back to Jamaica. The Irish government told The Journal that:

…stops at Irish airports by private aircraft and commercial charters for technical, non-traffic purposes (such as refuelling) “do not require prior authorisation from the Department.”

The government takes a similar lackadaisical approach to military planes stopping off at the airport before going on to assist Zionist atrocities in Palestine. Shannon Watch has documented the massive volume of these warplanes using the airstrip. Given the scale of US criminality on all fronts, it would seem a sensible policy would be to inspect all flights coming from the North American territory. This would invert the current policy of inspecting virtually none.

Gil Dezer was the man responsible for ferrying the kidnapped Palestinians thousands of miles away from their homes. A close friend and business partner of Trump, Dezer is also a:

…member of the Miami branch of Friends of the Israel Defense Forces.

The private jet used appears to be the property of Dezer Development:

…a real estate company established by the Israeli-American developer Michael Dezer and today run by Gil Dezer, his son.

The company has built various Trump branded properties and contributed to his presidential campaign. In the wake of the latest Epstein documents, this serves as another example of the sickening links between the ultra-wealthy, US politicians, ‘Israel’ and serious criminality. A class of truly wretched people causing harm to everyone they deem beneath them, with their racism and misogyny exacting particular suffering on women and people of colour.

Featured image via the Canary