Israel

Comments on the Israel/Gaza motion passed by Canada’s House of Commons

March 20, 2024 by Don Hutchinson

Following are first impression summary comments on the Opposition Motion (Heather McPherson, NDP, Edmonton Strathcona) pertaining to Israel and Gaza (as amended) passed by a vote of 204-117 on March 18, 2024, opposed by Conservative Members of Parliament (MP) and three Liberal MPs.

My comments will be made in italics, interspersed with the text of the motion.

Although opposition motions are non-binding, the amendments to the NDP motion were introduced by the governing Liberal Party and passed with support of the government party, giving indication of the Trudeau Government’s support for its content and necessarily change to Canada’s foreign policy position in regard to Israel.

Opposition Motion (as amended):

Canada’s actions to promote peace in the Middle East

That, given that,

(i) the situation in the Middle East is devastating to many Canadians, particularly those with friends and family members in the region,

(ii) the death toll in Gaza has surpassed 30,000, with 70% of the victims being women and children,

This statistic is provided by the Gaza Ministry of Health (i.e. Hamas) and has been repeated without verification by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), by some humanitarian aid agencies (notably the Hamas controlled Palestinian/Gazan branch of Save The Children), and by media. Hamas does not distinguish between civilian and combatant deaths in its reported numbers. Israeli Defence Forces (IDF) records of deceased Hamas combatants suggest combatant deaths at approximately 11,000 as of March 15, 2024. International analysts of urban warfare suggest even the Hamas reported numbers are exceedingly low for urban warfare, particularly for as densely populated a small geographic region as Gaza, crediting the IDF with taking exceptional care to protect civilians while taking action against military targets. Population of the Gaza strip is estimated to be 2.2 million people within 365 square kilometres (141 square miles).

(iii) Hamas is a listed terrorist organization in Canada whose attacks on October 7, 2023, killed nearly 1,200 Israelis and that over 100 hostages remain in Hamas captivity,

(iv) 1.7 million of residents of Gaza are displaced and at risk of starvation, death, and disease, and Gaza is currently the most dangerous place in the world to be a child,

Israel disputes the lack of humanitarian aid as records indicate sufficient food and water entering the Gaza strip. Gazans have reported Hamas officials seizing food intended for distribution, with humanitarian aid supplies available for purchase from Hamas authorized sellers. Humanitarian supplies marked UNRWA have been found housed in Hamas facilities discovered by the IDF.

(v) the United Nations reports over 70 per cent of civilian infrastructure in Gaza, including homes, hospitals, schools, water and sanitation facilities, have been destroyed or severely damaged by Israeli military attacks,

Hamas integrated its military infrastructure into civilian infrastructure, including storage of weapons and ammunition in hospitals, schools, mosques, and private homes. Hamas has also built an estimated 560 to 720 kilometres (350 to 450 miles) of tunnels throughout Gaza which are connected to medical facilities, schools, mosques, and private homes. By comparison, the City of London is geographically 4 times larger than Gaza and has 400 kilometres (250 miles) of tunnels for its Underground (subway system).

(vi) on January 26, 2024, the International Court of Justice ordered six provisional measures, including for Israel to refrain from acts under the Genocide convention, prevent and punish the direct and public incitement to genocide, and take immediate and effective measures to ensure the provision of humanitarian assistance to civilians in Gaza,

This provisional ruling of the International Court of Justice was in response to allegations of genocide made by South Africa. There is no finding or indication that Israel is involved in committing genocide in Gaza. The IDF is perhaps the most scrutinized military force on the planet, maintains meticulous records of its activity, publicly notifies about disciplinary action, and Israel has filed a request to dismiss the claim.

(vii) all states, including Israel have a right to defend themselves and in defending itself, Israel must respect international humanitarian law and the price of defeating Hamas cannot be the continuous suffering of all Palestinian civilians,

In defending itself, Israel is required to adhere to the Geneva Conventions and the Convention on Genocide.

(viii) Israelis are still at risk of attacks by Iran-backed terrorist groups including Hamas and Hezbollah,

(ix) the increase in extremist settler violence against Palestinians and reports of Palestinian communities being forcibly removed from their lands in the West Bank,

(x) the casualties of the war on Gaza and the Hamas terrorist attack include Canadian citizens,

This statement sets up a moral equivalency between the State of Israel legitimately defending itself under international law and Hamas, a listed terrorist entity under Canadian law.

(xi) Canadian citizens remain trapped in Gaza, blocked from leaving,

Canadian citizens have been restricted from leaving Gaza by the governments of Gaza (Hamas) and Egypt.

(xii) Jewish, Muslim, Arab, and Palestinian Canadians have reported an increase in hate-motivated attacks and racism since October,

Incidents of antisemitism have more than doubled, including vandalism and shooting at synagogues, private Jewish schools, and private residences. Pro-Palestinian demonstrations have targeted Jewish owned businesses, stores that sell Israeli products, Jewish hospitals in Toronto and Montreal, Jewish neighbourhoods and main intersections accessing Jewish neighbourhoods in several Canadian cities.

(xiii) Palestinians and Israelis both deserve to live in peace, with full enjoyment of their human rights and democratic freedoms,

the House call on the government to:

(a) demand an immediate ceasefire, the release of all hostages, and Hamas must lay down its arms;

(b) cease the further authorization and transfer of arms exports to Israel to ensure compliance with Canada’s arms export regime and increase efforts to stop the illegal trade of arms, including to Hamas;

Although the Canadian government had already paused lethal and non-lethal military-related exports to Israel in January, on March 19 Foreign Affairs Minister Melanie Jolie announced stopping the transfer of military-related exports to Israel. Israel is the only democratic nation in the Middle East. It is in the middle of a war that was initiated by Hamas and is now under attack from Hezbollah (also a listed terrorist entity under Canadian law) from the north as well. Canada does not sell arms to Hamas.

(c) ensure continued funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) to meet the dire humanitarian need, engage with the United Nations internal investigation and independent review process, and ensure implementation of necessary long-term governance reforms and accountability measures;

UNRWA has been shown to have been demonstrably infiltrated by Hamas operatives and relatives of Hamas combatants, has permitted Hamas to construct military facilities adjacent to, underneath, and within UNRWA buildings, as well as to have provided support and supplies to Hamas. Hamas facilities have been directly and noticeably wired into the electricity panels of UNRWA buildings. UNRWA operated schools teach genocidal antisemitism and Israel-eliminating anti-Zionism, over 3,000 teachers celebrating the October 7 massacre in a group chat.

(d) support the prosecution of all crimes and violations of international law committed in the region;

(e) support the work of the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court;

(f) demand unimpeded humanitarian access to Gaza;

Israel and Egypt have the right under international law to control their borders with Gaza.

(g) ensure Canadians trapped in Gaza can reach safety in Canada and expand access to the temporary resident visa program;

(h) sanction extremist settlers and maintain sanctions on Hamas leaders;

Extremist settlers are not listed terrorists in Canada. Foreign Affairs Minister Jolie announced in February that the Government of Canada would be sanctioning extremist settlers.

Hamas is a listed terrorist entity, the leaders of which should already be sanctioned under Canadian law. Minister Jolie announced in February that the Government of Canada would be sanctioning Hamas leaders.

(i) reaffirm that settlements are illegal under international law and that settlements and settler violence are serious obstacles to a negotiated two-state solution, and advocate for an end to the decades long occupation of Palestinian territories; and

Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005, re-entering in 2008 in an effort to stop rocket fire into Israel (Iron Dome defence system operational 2011) and again after the Hamas massacre of Israeli citizens on October 7, 2023. Egypt has strict border measures in place for Gaza with one border crossing. The first Israeli fence was put up in the 1970s as a matter of border control, and supplemented with a wall in 1994 as agreed in the Oslo Accords agreed between the Government of Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization. There are two border crossings between Israel and Gaza. An emergency crossing for additional humanitarian aid was opened March 12, 2024.

The West Bank security barrier, wall and fence, was built starting in 1994 and completed in 2006 with supplementary security measures put in place at various sections of the barrier since then. This action was taken following years of terrorist activities in Israel that originated from the West Bank. In 2003 the United Nations passed a general resolution requesting Israel stop building or remove portions of the barrier and sought the opinion of the International Court of Justice. In 2004 the International Court of Justice issued a non-binding advisory opinion that sections of the barrier were in violation of international law. Israel has said the portions of the barrier in question cannot be constructed along official boundary delineations because of land topography.

The Palestinian territories are not an independent state. Egypt has declined to accept responsibility for Gaza. Jordan has declined to accept responsibility for the West Bank.

(j) work with international partners to actively pursue the goal of a comprehensive, just and lasting peace in the Middle East, including towards the establishment of the State of Palestine as part of a negotiated two-state solution, and maintain Canada’s position that Israel has a right to exist in peace and security with its neighbours.

The original wording of the motion would have requested Canada independently and unilaterally recognize a State of Palestine. The amended wording is closer to the historic Canadian position that Canada recognize a State of Palestine when the State of Israel does, following a bilateral peace agreement between the two. This wording suggests Canada might recognize a State of Palestine as part of negotiations, prior to a bilateral peace agreement, a position on which the Foreign Affairs Minister and Prime Minister have declined to comment.

The original motion was heavily criticized. The amended motion remains criticized for its undue attention to actions required of Israel and its treatment of the government of Israel and the government of Gaza (Hamas) as moral equivalents when Israel’s is a democratically elected government and Gaza’s is a listed terrorist entity that imposed itself by violence and exists for the purpose of destroying Israel and killing Jews.

Why “Never Again”

January 27, 2015 by Don Hutchinson

A year ago, I was on my first visit to Israel. Frankly, it was exciting to be invited as part of the delegation that accompanied Prime Minister Stephen Harper on what was also his first visit to The Holy Land. The special experience of walking where Jesus walked was made even more unique by the environment of that visit. Conversations with cabinet ministers in Bethlehem’s Church of the Nativity. A walk-and-talk with Members of Parliament through the streets of Jerusalem to the Garden Tomb. A state dinner at which the Prime Minister of Israel implored the Prime Minister of Canada to perform with a Beatles cover band; and he did!

Don, praying at the Western Wall

My knowledge of Israel from the Scriptures and studying history could not compare with the actual experience of walking the streets of the Old City of Jerusalem, standing on the shore of the Sea of Galilee or visiting several holy sites. And, meeting the living stones; a reminder that it’s not just about the sites but also the people of The Holy Land – Jews and Arabs.

It’s the people that are the reason for Israel. And, like every other democracy on Earth, the people cause of both political peace and political unrest. Unlike every other democracy on the planet, however, Israel is under a constant and distinct form of threat of violence, from within and outside its borders, for no reason other than its very existence.

If an awareness of the history of the Jews, as it was called in Bible College, wasn’t enough to give a heartfelt understanding of the United Nations’ decision to establish the State of Israel in 1948 then a visit to Yad Vashem was. Yad Vashem is “the Jewish people’s living memorial to the Holocaust.” More than 6 million people – men, women and children – exterminated, gone prematurely from the history of several nations, simply because they were born Jewish.

I have not been to a concentration camp but Yad Vashem carried me to the heart of the hatred and loss suffered by the Jewish people, as well as the hope and victory of the resilient living stones of the Middle East’s only functional democracy.

Sitting at a meal with a survivor of the death camps is heart stirring. Having an extended conversation at the airport in Tel Aviv with the author of an autobiographical survivor memoir I had read was a deeper stirring still. Being on the same flight as we returned home to the relative safety of Canada was pause for quiet, personal reflection.

The events of recent days in France brought to light, again, something that has been bubbling to the surface in many European nations for months, and to which Canada is not immune. Something that is centuries old.

In addition to caricatures of Mohammed, the magazine Charlie Hebdo published grotesque caricatures of Jews over recent months; contributing to a rising tide of anti-semitism in France and throughout Europe. Four French Jews were murdered in a Paris kosher deli by the same radical Islamist cell who killed at Charlie Hebdo. Born and raised in France, French Jews are again feeling unsafe in their own nation, their own neighbourhoods. It’s a feeling that was supposed to be “never again.”

Today, at Ottawa’s City Hall, I attended a commemoration of the 70th anniversary of the liberation of the Auschwitz-Birkenau camps where over 1 million were killed. Present were survivors, ambassadors and Members of Parliament, among others. One of the speakers, Floralove Katz, put what happened in Paris in precise perspective, “Cartoonists were murdered for cartooning. Journalists were murdered for journalism. Police were murdered for policing. Jews were murdered for being Jewish.”

Never again is not just about remembering the genocide of the holocaust. Never again is not just about telling the truth about what happened. Never again is not just about providing assistance to aging survivors of the Holocaust or listening to their stories of horrific human behaviour.

Never again is about standing together to prevent what took place from happening again, not just the behaviour but the underlying attitudes that feed the behaviour. Never again is about teaching our children more than tolerance. We need to teach them, by word and deed, to live with acceptance of “other.”

Prime Minister Netanyahu has assured the French Jews that Israel is open to welcome those who wish to move there. Although, for me at least, it’s a concern that Jews from France (and currently also large numbers from Ukraine) would make Aliyah (immigrating from the diaspora to Israel) out of fear rather than desire.

Israel is both the safest and not a safe place.

Israel was born from and bears the heart of never again. But, it’s necessary for the rest of the world – the rest of us – to share that heart or Israel will instead become the centre of again.

A lot can happen in two weeks

July 15, 2014 by Don Hutchinson

I’m just a few days home from a two-week motorcycle tour that touched base in each of the four original provinces of Confederation, the province that hosted the Confederation conference and the last province to join the Dominion of Canada (answers later in the blog). While away, much that is important in my life unfolded in my absence.

Don – Headshot “Love, Hope, Believe”

Gloria, my wife, took the initiative to enlist some helpers and undertake several projects that were on the summer to-do list. The bench swing is stained and back up and swinging. The deck and front porch bench are stained. The windows are washed and bathrooms painted. The garage has been cleaned. And, there’s a small garden in the back yard. I don’t do gardening so this one is extra special for Gloria.

A little farther from home, there were developments in significant situations that lie close to my heart.

Hamas attacked Israel. This time it was more than the five rockets fired on the first day of Prime Minister Harper’s official visit in January. I was there that day. Apart from the local media reports – with confirmation from some of the IDF members who accompanied the delegation – there wasn’t much of anything said in January because the Iron Dome missile defence system did its job. Last week, however, Hamas launched a barrage that has seen more than 1,000 rockets (and climbing) fired into Israel from Gaza; some going deeper into Israel than ever before. Iron Dome has taken out more than 90% of them and the extensive network of bomb shelters throughout Israel has handled safety for all but a handful of Israeli citizens.

Sadly, hundreds of Gaza residents have died or been injured in the launch sites targeted defence initiatives of the Israeli Defense Force (which is potentially the only standing military force in the world that is named for and has the primary objective of defense). The IDF operates in a protective manner, engaging only when Israel is first attacked. As recently as this morning, Israel agreed to the Egypt brokered ceasefire, waiting 6 hours before conceding that the 47 rockets fired by Hamas during that timeframe meant that the political authority in Gaza – which said it was considering the ceasefire proposal – and the terrorist Hamas – which said it was not consulted – were not in step with pursuing peace, temporary or long term.

Please pray for the peace of Jerusalem and the State of Israel.

Back in Ottawa, there was a special sitting of the Justice Committee to hear testimony on Bill C-36, the Protection of Communities and Exploited Persons Act, the proposal to replace Canada’s prostitution laws; for the first time criminalizing the purchase of sexual services and related conscription and marketing activities. It was a pleasure to pray that the voices of survivors and those they have trusted to advocate alongside them be heard. In this mix of witnesses, much like the motorcycle community, I have been privileged to meet and become friends with people I might otherwise never have come in contact with based on my own background and education.

Please pray for wisdom and compassion as the committee meets this week to consider amendments to the proposed legislation.

On the road, my friend Barry and I moved through original Canadian provinces Ontario, Quebec and New Brunswick to enjoy a few days on Prince Edward Island. On PEI we attended the Atlanticade motorcycle gathering and visited Province House where the Confederation conference was held in September 1864. PEI didn’t join the new nation until 1873.

We hit original province number four, Nova Scotia, after leaving PEI. Riding round the spectacular Cabot Trail we arrived precisely on time in North Sydney to load the bikes on the ferry to Argentia, Newfoundland. Newfoundland and Labrador was the last province to join the Dominion, doing so in 1949.

On day one in NL we trekked to the easternmost point in North America and visited the famous spot on which Marconi received the first trans-Atlantic wireless signal – seeing icebergs just outside the St. John’s harbour. The next day we toured some of the most scenic highway I’ve ever encountered. A quick jaunt into Gros Morne National Park was to follow but will have to wait as plans were interrupted by post-hurricane Arthur wind and rain. Instead, we raced to Port-aux-Basques to beat the 110km/h plus winds forecast (and fulfilled) at Wreckhouse (still we encountered gusts between 80 and 100 km/h), arriving just before noon to weather the storm from inside our hotel. The next morning we caught the ferry (well it didn’t leave until mid-afternoon, waiting for the swells to drop below 4 metres) to North Sydney.

Waiting to get on the ferry, we met with two motorcyclists from Baton Rouge, LA, who had started the journey in a group of three. One rider went off the road near Wreckhouse and died a few hours later in Corner Brook. Please pray for Andy’s family and friends. His memorial service was today.

On the final part of our journey home, we rode through some neighbourhoods in Fredericton where trees were down and power was still out from their experience with Arthur. Please pray for folks there, some of whom have lost much and others who are still waiting for electricity to be restored.

A lot can happen in two weeks. And it did. Life is fragile. Handle with prayer.