Sinn Féin say they will not attend US St Patrick’s Day celebrations

When power-sharing is functioning, it is custom for the first and deputy first ministers to make the trip to Washington DC.

In a video posted on the social media platform X, McDonald said she had followed the president’s comments on Gaza with “growing concern” and had listened in “horror” to calls for “mass expulsion of the Palestinian people from their homes and the permanent seizure of Palestinian lands”.

“Such an approach is a fundamental breach of international law, is deeply destabilising in the Middle East and a dangerous departure from the UN position of peace and security for both Palestinians and Israelis and the right of Palestinians to self-determination,” she added.

O’Neill said Trump’s comments on “forced expulsion of the Palestinian people of Gaza cannot be ignored”.

On X, formerly Twitter, she said that she will “continue to engage with senior figures in the US for peace and economic growth”.

“In the future, when our children and grandchildren ask us what we did while the Palestinian people endured unimaginable suffering, I will say I stood firmly on the side of humanity,” she added.

Last week, SDLP leader Claire Hanna said her party would decline an invite to the White House over the president’s stance on Gaza.

She told BBC Radio Ulster’s Talkback programme that she could not “in good conscience” attend as people have made their hopes and fears for the Palestinian people clear.

It is the second year in a row the party have said it would turn down an invitation to St Patrick’s Day celebrations.

Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) assembly member David Brooks described the SDLP’s decision as a “petulant stunt”.