The Chief Rabbi of Ireland, Yoni Wieder, has welcomed the suspension of a Dublin City Council (DCC) vote to rename Herzog Park.
That vote will not proceed because of an administrative oversight, according to DCC Chief Executive Richard Shakespeare.
Councillors were due to vote this evening on a motion to rename the park in Rathgar.
Mr Shakespeare said that "a detailed review of the administrative missteps will now be undertaken and a report furnished to the Lord Mayor and Councillors".
We need your consent to load this rte-player contentWe use rte-player to manage extra content that can set cookies on your device and collect data about your activity. Please review their details and accept them to load the content.Manage Preferences
Speaking on RTÉ's Today with David McCullagh, Mr Wieder said renaming the park would be "shameful".
Chaim Herzog was born in Belfast and raised in Dublin and was the son of Ireland's first chief rabbi Yitzhak HaLevi Herzog.
He served as the sixth president of Israel between 1983 and 1993. The park was renamed in his honour in 1995.
"I welcome the suspension, but really the question is how we got to this stage, how this proposal was put forward in the first place," Mr Wieder said.
"The idea of removing Herzog's name from the park would have been a shameful erasure of and central part of Irish Jewish history.
"Chaim Herzog was a figure, and the Herzog name is a figure not just for Irish Jewry but for Ireland as a whole.
"And throughout his life, he retained a deep affinity for this city and its people, and the country was proud of Chaim Herzog during the Second World War."
Mr Wieder said Herzog Park was a place that had a "sense of belonging" for the Jewish community.
"This is a place that is, especially for the Jewish families who have grown up beside it, is a place that is filled with a sense of memory, a sense of heritage, a sense of belonging.
"I don't understand why there's such a focus on this one tiny park, which has been for a long time a quiet marker to Jewish families here of their presence in their city, the fact that they have deep and vibrant roots in Dublin and in Ireland."
Herzog Park proposal 'not about erasing history' - SF
Sinn Féin Dublin city councillor Daithí Doolan has said the renaming of Herzog Park in south Dublin is "not about erasing anybody from history".
Councillors were due to vote this evening on a motion to rename the park in Rathgar.
However, that vote will now not proceed because of an administrative oversight, according to Dublin City Council (DCC) Chief Executive Richard Shakespeare.
Mr Shakespeare said that "a detailed review of the administrative missteps will now be undertaken and a report furnished to the Lord Mayor and Councillors".
Speaking on RTÉ's Morning Ireland, Mr Doolan said the proposal was about "about renaming a park that was named in 1995 when Herzog was actually alive, which was against DCC's own rules and regulations about naming parks".
He added: "It's meant to be 20 years after somebody's passed away, but this is about a statement about current Israeli government carrying out genocide in Gaza.
We need your consent to load this rte-player contentWe use rte-player to manage extra content that can set cookies on your device and collect data about your activity. Please review their details and accept them to load the content.Manage Preferences
"It's an act of solidarity with Palestinians and also Herzog himself, his history of being involved in terrorism in Israel, driving Palestinians from their home. This is about trying to undo that."
The proposal had been criticised by senior officials in both Israel and the US.
However, Mr Doolan said that it should be up to the people of Dublin to decide what to name the park, and that there were lots of other Jewish people the park could be named in honour of.
"I think people should have a vote on this and send it out to the people of Dublin city to choose a more appropriate name rather than somebody who was associated with war crimes in Israel," he said.
"There's a lot of Jewish people we could name it after, and this isn't about erasing anybody from history," Mr Doolan said.
"It is in fact about sending a message of solidarity to the Palestinian people at this stage, when they're suffering from genocide at the hands of the Israeli government.
"I think we should go ahead today, we should have our vote and hand it out to the people of Dublin and let them decide what we want to call this park," he added.
Ireland can't be 'anti-racist' if park not renamed - PBP
People Before Profit councillor Conor Reddy has said that Ireland cannot be "anti-racist" if Herzog Park is not renamed.
Also speaking on RTÉ's Today with David McCullagh, he said that he was in support of changing the park’s name.
"I still support the renaming of the park," Mr Reddy said.
"This man, Chaim Herzog, was involved in mass ethnic cleansing, I think as military governor, 200,000 people displaced from their homes and their land.
"If we are anti-racist, if we're consistent in our application of kind of standards of human rights and decency in the world, we can't have a park honouring a figure like Chaim Herzog."
Mr Reddy said he found it "bizarre" that the proposal was coming under such scrutiny, adding that the matter had been debated in DCC for months.
"I find it quite bizarre actually that this legislative issue is only found over the weekend when international outcry began around the proposal.
Consultation
Mr Doolan said that there had been consultation with the Jewish community on the renaming of the park.
"We've received support from the Jewish community. Jews for Palestine, which is a Jewish group in Ireland, issued a statement only yesterday fully supporting the renaming of the park," he said.
"The Jewish community themselves do not want this park to be named after Herzog.
Watch: Report relating to renaming Herzog Park to be withdrawn - Lord Mayor
"But also, the Jewish community are not some single entity. They're diverse like the rest of us and have different opinions.
"There was a campaign, a two-year campaign, to rename this park. This is not something that arrived on the agenda last night. I'm appealing to the chief executive, don't buckle under pressure from senior government ministers.
"We should be allowed to have our debate, allowed to have our vote, and hand it out to the people of Dublin to choose a more appropriate name that we can all celebrate and be proud of."
Mr Doolan said he saw no reason as to why the vote to rename the park could not be carried out this evening as originally planned.
"My understanding is that once the chief executive gives us his information, we are allowed to proceed with a vote, and that's what we'll be demanding tonight," he said.
"It's the very least that can be expected of us. It's on the agenda. Let's vote on it.
"Let's hand it out to the people of Dublin and ensure we've got a name we can all be proud of."
An agreement by members of the council's Commemorations and Naming Committee last July recommended to the full council the removal of the Herzog name from the park. There was one objection.
It also agreed that a consultation process should be undertaken to determine an appropriate new name.
Lord Mayor Ray McAdam said that the legislation pertaining to the renaming of placenames has not fully commenced and there was insufficient information contained in the report submitted for the elected members of DCC to make "an informed decision" in relation to the proposal.
The Group Leaders of DCC met yesterday to discuss the matter and Mr McAdam will address the issue at this evening's council meeting under Lord Mayor's business.
Mr Shakespeare said in a statement yesterday that the authority to change a placename is contained within Part 8 of the Local Government Act 2001.
The process involves the adoption by resolution of a proposal to substitute a new placename by the elected members, the holding of a public consultation and a secret ballot of qualified electors should a proposal be approved, he explained.
'This is about Dublin'
Also speaking on RTÉ’s Morning Ireland, Labour Cllr Dermot Lacey said he is opposed to Israel’s "despicable" behaviour in Gaza but "this is about Dublin".
"And I have supported many measures, including the twinning of Dublin with Ramallah, as proposed by my colleague, Cllr Daithí Doolan.
"But this is about Dublin, and I have to do what is right for Dublin," Mr Lacey said.
He added: "And I, over my years in the council, have always voted against renaming proposals. Because I don't believe you can rewrite our history.
"I think that's as true in relation to Herzog Park as it is about anywhere else."
He said that he opposed the proposal when it first came before the committee.
"But more importantly, it was to honour the contribution of the Jewish community in this city, to the city," Mr Lacey added.
"And I don't believe that that should be undone. We named this for good reasons.
"There is still a good reason to honour that Dublin Jewish community and we should stick with it."
