Israel has for decades used cultural whitewashing to present an image of itself to the world as a just and free society when in fact nothing could be further from the truth. Israel is a racist apartheid state as declared by human rights organisations the world over including the Israeli human rights organisation, B'Tselem. Israel occupies and brutally oppresses millions of Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza whilst continuing to expand its illegal settlement enterprise. Israel's treatment of people in Gaza is akin to genocide and Gaza is in a constant state of humanitarian crisis. It's with cultural events like Miss Universe that Israel masks it's war crimes and human right violations against the Palestinian people by presenting itself to the world as a normal society. But it's not a normal society! Israel is an apartheid state and we must make every effort to make sure the world learns the truth about Israel.

We are failing the women and children in the community. Currently we have a population of 218,018 and no domestic violence refuge. The shortage of emergency accommodation for people affected by domestic violence is an issue that is getting progressively worse. Domestic violence spikes significantly during the festive season which is exacerbated by the pressures brought about by Covid-19 and the housing crisis. The provision for domestic violence in our area is comprehensively under developed. There are 144 refuge spaces available nationwide yet Dublin alone needs 143 refuge spaces, and Ireland needs almost 500. There are only 31 spaces, in 4 refuges, to service the entire Dublin area. 68% of the calls Women's Aid made to refuges are being turned away due to there being no room left. The nearest refuge for Rathdown is in Bray, this means that many people may have to travel for over an hour on public transport to be turned away. This huge lack of essential support services results in: • Unmet requests for refuge everyday; • Accommodation problems and homelessness; • People trapped in abusive relationships; • Increasing likelihood of people returning to violent and abusive homes; • Fear of reporting the abuse due to the lack of emergency accommodation available; The government is failing women and children. The most vulnerable people in our society are being failed on every level and government inaction continues to silence them. This is a national issue - there are currently 9 counties without a refuge. Please sign this petition, and please support the work of Carlow Women's Refuge Campaign too: https://my.uplift.ie/petitions/carlow-needs-a-women-s-refuge

Church and state should be separate, and given the appalling history that Ireland has when it comes to Church control of State affairs and institutions this should be evident. This not only happens in Waterford County and County County but in the majority of Local Authorities around Ireland.

During the first Covid 19 outbreak in 2020, 23 residents in Dealgan House Nursing Home died tragically and under harrowing circumstances as a result of contracting COVID-19. This represents one of the highest incidence rates of COVID in nursing homes in Ireland at that time. The RCSI hospital group took over operational control of Dealgan House during this period. Dealgan House is the only nursing home in Ireland where this happened. We have, over the last nearly 2 years, worked tirelessly as a collective of families to find out the circumstances surrounding the deaths of our loved ones. Our objective is to ensure safeguards, regulations and other measures are put in place to prevent the devastating events that unfolded in Dealgan House taking place again. We met with Minister Stephen Donnelly on 28th October 2020 and we put our questions to him and highlighted the importance of such an inquiry. We asked Minister Donnelly when he would respond to our call for a public inquiry into the deaths at Dealgan House. He said his response would be issued 'in weeks, not months.' Over one year later we have had no reply and no substantive reply to continued emails to the minister's office. We have a myriad of outstanding queries and concerns that Dealgan House management and government officials have yet to clarify and respond to. For all of those who care about the safeguarding of the most vulnerable members of our society can we ask you to sign our petition asking for Minister Donnelly to set up an independent public inquiry into the deaths at Dealgan House. We need a mechanism where people are compelled to tell the truth about what occurred, to clarify inconsistencies and to provide learnings for the State in relation to how we care for older people in residential settings. Thank you.

A spokesperson for the IWOC, a union directly linked to the radical Industrial Workers of the World, called upon the NIPS to end the book ban "immediately". In a statement issued they said "Incarcerated Workers throughout the Covid-19 pandemic have been hit hard with restrictions of movement seeing prisoners locked up for 23 hours a day. Reading materials are vital for prisoners, it's a lifeline for everyone to be able to immerse themselves in books, pamphlets, magazines and newspapers. To have that restricted, withheld or banned is a denial of prisoners basic human rights and we call upon those within the Northern Ireland Prison Service to lift the ban immediately as it runs counter to Article 10 of the European Convention of Human Rights. Prisoners have even been refused books, reading materials and even accessing music interests if it wasn't bought from a reputable outlet such as from multinational corporations as Amazon. This in turn prevents those incarcerated from accessing material of their choice such as small independent publishers and distributors who actually have a wider range of reading materials which are fundamental to freedom of choice. Effectively this is a ban on books to prisoners by another name. At present there is currently only regulated access to book distributors which NIPS approve of such as Amazon. This in turn dramatically limits financially what a prisoner can access. There is also a ban on books and publications which family and friends send in from the outside. No matter what way they dress it up, this is fundamentally a ban on books by another name. The Incarcerated Workers Organising Committee demand that the Northern Ireland Prison Service immediately end their policy of banning books and reading materials across the prison system. This must not be allowed to continue. We call upon those interested in human rights and social justice, to writer's, independent publishers, artists and musicians to help add their voice by supporting prisoners human rights by also demanding that this be stopped immediately.

Operation Transformation is a weight loss TV show in Ireland that has been on our screens every year since 2008. Every year, 5 volunteers are recruited and endure a strict weight loss plan including a restrictive diet and intense exercise programme for 8 weeks.  The goal of the show is to lose weight, yet there is no research to prove that the weight loss intervention advocated by OT is effective in the long-term. There has been no participant follow up study to date. Furthermore, Operation Transformation perpetuates weight stigma in Ireland and contributes to the ongoing discrimination of people in bigger bodies across our country. The Irish public deserve to know if the OT programme will result in long-term weight loss and improved health markers. The research clearly concludes that dieting does not result in long-term weight loss for the vast majority of people. The Irish public deserve to not feel stigmatized or shamed on the basis of our weight. The health of our nation is at great risk with this advice of restrictive dieting. Weight is not a behaviour. This programme sends the inaccurate message that weight determines our health. @intuitive.eating.ireland & @binge.eating.dietitian are initiating this petition.

Campaign to Nationalize Facebook & All Social Media Platforms Worldwide To make them Non Profit Organizations Administered by The people for the people. Facebook had misled investors and the public about potential harms associated with the platform. Facebook is wrongly prioritizing platform growth over safety. Facebook groups have proven to be hubs for misinformation and harmful content, where there often [are] no gatekeepers and false information is allowed to flourish. Facebook's closed design hides information from researchers and regulators. As long as Facebook is operating in the shadows, hiding its research from public scrutiny, it is unaccountable.

It is in every Irish citizens interest to protect our Healthcare Workers and the people they care for, one day it might be you who needs to be cared for! This petition is not only for Healthcare workers but for every single person who lives in Ireland. We Need every one of you. This is a movement in itself. If we get enough signatures we could help to improve the quality of life not just for the healthcare workers but also for the vulnerable people they care for. We need the people of Ireland behind us and we need the minister for health and the government to listen to us and take us seriously because we will not stop, we will never give up until this catastrophe is fixed. We need your support now!! We need better working conditions for all healthcare workers so that we can provide the best quality of care for the people we care for!!

The more young people who sign in support, the more we can pressure our decision makers to implement these demands.

Big business are producing more, not less emissions and are making the climate crisis worse. Government decisions are letting them off the hook and pushing the burden for the climate crisis on to regular people, not the corporations who drive it.

Julian Assange is a political prisoner simply because he exposed US military and other war crimes, human rights abuses and corruption in the futile US-led wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. His continued incarceration in Belmarsh Prison and his threatened extradition to the US, is a threat not only to him but to all journalists, editors and publishers, to the cause of investigative journalism, to press freedom and to freedom of speech generally. The appeal hearing brought by the US Government against the decision by a British court not to extradite Julian to the US will be held on 27 & 28 October. If he is extradited he faces a prison sentence of up to 175 years. There are campaigns happening around the world to get him released. Will you join the campaign here in Ireland? The open letter to Simon Coveney has been endorsed so far by Mairead Corrigan Maguire, Denis Halliday, Christy Moore, Sinéad Cusack, Stephen Rea, Medea Benjamin, Eamonn Mc Cann, Bernadette Mc Alliskey, Dr. Harry Browne, Raymond Deane, Trevor Joyce, John F. Deane, Honor Heffernan, Dr. Ronit Lentin, Prof. Ray Kinsella, Peader King and elected politicians Brid Smith, Richard Boyd Barrett, Paul Murphy, Clare Daly, Mick Wallace, Paul Gavan, David Norris, Thomas Pringle, Chris Andrews and Melisa Halpin. Here is the link to the full letter - http://irishantiwar.org/node/2786

Institutional care is harmful to children and orphanage volunteering puts children at increased risk. There is a growing global movement working to transform the way we care for children. Care leavers and child protection experts, disability advocates, faith-based and community organisations have come together to better support families and other caregivers so that children can grow up in a family and community where they belong, instead of being placed into institutions. You can support this global care reform movement by making a pledge that you will neither promote nor engage in volunteering and/or visits to institutions for children. You can also pledge to further educate yourself and people around you about the harm caused by orphanage volunteering and institutions and to only support volunteering opportunities that put the best interests and wellbeing of children and families first.