The Palestine flag flies over Belfast City Hall today, after nationalists pushed through the move for a second time after debates on the issue split the council and court action looms

The flag was erected shortly after midnight on Tuesday (2nd), going up several days after it was originally meant to be hoisted to mark an international campaign expressing solidarity with the Palestinian people that happened over the weekend.

It flies over the site of Belfast’s popular Christmas market today, including the city’s main Christmas tree plus festive decorations around city hall.

Shortly before the market opened this morning, the flag didn’t attract much in the way of onlookers. The first part of the day didn’t bring much in the way of wind, so the banner mostly hung limply from city hall’s flagpost instead fluttering in the breeze.

The main interest in it came from professional photographers, who gathered to grab photos for the media; passers-by largely didn’t bother to look at it.

Although there had been a police presence at city hall first thing in the morning, there was no sign of them as the market’s opening time neared.

Sinn Fein had pushed for the flag to fly on Saturday, a day that saw supporters of the Palestinian cause march though Belfast city centre.

But the move was halted at the eleventh hour, the council confirming last Friday that lawyers had found procedural failures with the original vote approving it. The problem, said a legal team analysing a unionist call-in of the issue, was that equality tests had been run after the vote, not before, so weren’t factored into politicians’ decision.

The issue came back before the council last night, the meeting seeing Alliance unsuccessfully attempt to scrap the flag move in favour of lighting up city hall in Palestinian colours.

Sinn Fein’s motion to raise the flag on the next available day was passed by 32 votes to 28, with council staff hoisting it several hours later. It’s expected to be fluttering over Belfast for around 24 hours.

The TUV is to challenge the decision in court, pledging to bring a case at around 11am today.

More to follow.