President's hand-written poem to be auctioned for Gaza 

It is understood that the President gifted the copy of his 2015 poem ‘The Profits are Weeping’ to a friend, who has now donated it to the charity auction. Picture: Gareth Chaney/Collins

A handwritten poem by President Michael D Higgins is among the works being auctioned in aid of Gaza.

The auction also includes pieces by REM musician Michael Stipe and the late Pogues singer Shane McGowan, as well as artists Sean Scully, Guggi, Jim Fitzpatrick, and Dorothy Cross.

Sabina Higgins will open the ‘Art for Gaza’ charity auction next Thursday, with the entire proceeds to go to Médecins Sans Frontières (Doctors Without Borders) which is working in the Palestinian exclave.

A signed poem by the President, with the inscription ‘For Rosita In Gaza Time of Suffering’, is the first lot in the timed auction and has an estimate of €1,000 to €1,500.

It is understood that the President gifted the copy of his 2015 poem ‘The Prophets are Weeping’ to a friend, who has now donated it to the charity auction.

Meanwhile, Siptu and Cork Trades Council are calling on the Government to introduce laws to protect workers who boycott Israeli goods and services.

The call for legislative change was made at a rally in support of Palestine in Cork to ensure workers who choose not to handle goods from Israel or any other country under the charge of genocide from the International Court of Justice can do so free from prosecution from regressive employers .

Adrian Kane of the Cork Council of Trade Unions told Saturday’s rally: “The trade union movement is an economic force, it is a social force, but not only that, if it is to remain true to our history and tradition, it must also be a moral force for good.

As a movement, we must do everything possible to prevent further ethnic cleansing, collective punishment and genocide. We must do all in our power now to call a halt.

Mr Kane said that the call for workers who boycott Israeli goods and services to be protected was backed by Karen Gearon and Mary Manning, who were among the leaders of a group of Dunnes workers who undertook a boycott of South African goods in the mid-1980s.

“Representatives of Cork Council of Trade Unions, myself, and others, have already begun discussions within our movement on the actions we must undertake to begin a process of ensuring that workers who implement such a boycott are legally protected.”

Mr Kane pointed out that “the boycott is a weapon forged in Ireland" and said it was effective boycotts by trade unionists of the British military machine which provided the impetus for a just peace in our country early in the last century.

"Further back, the activists of the Land League in their struggle for justice in Ireland gave birth to the modern tactic of the boycott.”