October 14, 2023

A Call for Canadian Action: Reconsidering Support for Israel and Advocating for Peace in Palestine

Canada, the USA, Europe, the UN, and the rest of the world share responsibility for the ongoing and current genocide of Palestinians in the concentration camp called Gaza, which is home to 2.2 million people.

Canada, the USA, Europe, the UN, and the rest of the world share responsibility for the ongoing and current genocide of Palestinians in the concentration camp known as Gaza, housing 2.2 million human beings.

For 75 years, the world, including Canada, has supported Israel’s crimes documented in my upcoming book, “Palestine Colonized by a Two-State Solution.” These crimes include:

• Colonial practices involving forced displacement, ethnic cleansing, genocide, apartheid, torture, and occupation.
• Verbal, physical, and sexual abuse of Palestinian children.
• Bombing, desecration, destruction, and burning of churches, mosques, universities, homes, hospitals, and schools.
• State-sponsored terrorism, backed by the IDF, supporting ultra-right-wing illegal Israeli settlers in illegal outposts to carry out terrorist activities in the occupied West Bank.
• Ultra-right-wing extremism and fascism exemplified by figures like Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir.

With the unwavering support of Western governments, including Canada, the settler-colonial Israeli state has initiated a new campaign of ethnic cleansing and forced displacement, which includes bombing the civilian population of the northern Gaza Strip. White phosphorus munitions, while permitted for battlefield use, are illegal for use on civilian populations as chemical weapons under international conventions. Regrettably, Israel has employed white phosphorus in Gaza, despite its devastating effects, as it can cause serious burns and start fires.

Israel has dropped approximately 4,000 tonnes of bombs on Gaza, resulting in the deaths of more than 3,200 people, including over 600 children. Additionally, 7,700 people have been wounded, and hundreds of thousands of Palestinians have been displaced from their homes. Israel has also cut off access to food, water, medicine, and fuel in Gaza, an area known for its extreme population density, with around 2 million people squeezed into a 140-square-mile territory.

Just yesterday, Israel used white phosphorus bombs on Al-Durrah Children Hospital. The hospital was later evacuated. These are not just war crimes but barbaric acts of terrorism. 

 

Why are the majority of rabbis, Jewish leaders, and Jewish scholars, along with synagogues, remaining silent and not condemning the ultra-right-wing Jewish extremism, fascism, and terrorism being perpetrated by Israeli security forces, who are actively engaged in acts of genocide, ethnic cleansing, forced displacement, and another Nakba?

It is shameful that Canada is supporting a policy that is colonial, apartheid, settler-based, illegal, and inhumane, such as administrative detention and the withholding of Palestinian bodies as bargaining chips, preventing their burial by their loved ones.

Furthermore, it is concerning that Canada and the world did not condemn Israel on June 21, 2023, when 400 Israeli terrorist illegal settlers entered the town of Turmus Ayya in the West Bank, setting fire to 60 cars, 30 homes, several trees, injuring several individuals, and killing one Palestinian. On June 19, 2023, the IDF conducted a raid in the Jenin refugee camp in the West Bank, resulting in the deaths of 5 Palestinians and the injury of more than 90.

Living under colonial occupation and apartheid is an unbearable burden. On April 15, 2022, during the Holy month of Ramadan, Israeli apartheid colonial occupational forces raided Al-Aqsa Mosque:

1. They wounded and injured over 400 innocent Palestinians, including the elderly, women, and children, using rubber-coated steel bullets, teargas, and stun grenades during a dawn assault.
2. They arrested at least 300 Palestinians.
3. They killed more than 20 Palestinians in the West Bank.

UN expert Michael Lynk, the UN special rapporteur on the rights situation in Palestine, has criticized the entrenched and repressive nature of the Israeli occupation, which has lasted for 55 years. He has characterized it as an apartheid reality in a post-apartheid world.

We should call on the International Criminal Court (ICC) to investigate war crimes in Ukraine against Russia and in Palestine against apartheid, colonial, occupational Israel for:

• Genocide of Palestinians for the last 74 years.
• Bombing and destruction of hospitals, schools, mosques, churches, and neighborhoods.
• Forced displacement, murder, torture, and occupation of land.
• Verbal, physical, and sexual abuse of Palestinian children on a daily basis.

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen has decried Russia’s attacks on civilian infrastructure as war crimes, but similar actions against Palestinians in Gaza are justified as legitimate self-defense. This double standard is deeply hypocritical.

Canadians should be ashamed of the two-faced human rights policy exhibited by Canadian politicians. They champion democracy for Ukraine while supporting state-sponsored terrorism by illegal settlers on occupied Palestinian land, reinforced by the IDF, resulting in war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The International Human Rights Commission (IHRC) has stated, “The Israeli government’s actions against Palestinians amount to apartheid and crimes against humanity.”

Benjamin Netanyahu, who is currently facing corruption charges, along with the most extreme right-wing Israeli government, has made alarming threats regarding Gaza as revenge against Hamas:

1. “A mighty revenge on Gaza for this dark day” – Netanyahu, October 7th, 2023.
2. “I tell Gazans to leave Gaza, as I am going to turn it into rubble” – Netanyahu, October 8th, 2023.
3. “I have ordered a total blockade of Gaza by cutting off all power, fuel, food, and water” – Gallant, Minister of War, October 8th, 2023.
4. “I have ordered the Israeli military to intensify its bombing of Gaza” – Gallant, Minister of War, October 8th, 2023.
5. “I have removed all restrictions from the Israeli soldiers on their actions in Gaza” – Gallant, Minister of War, October 8th, 2023.
6. “Gaza will be an island of desolation after we are finished, that their generations will remember” – Netanyahu, October 9th, 2023.
7. “I have called 300,000 reservists for our ground attack to uproot Hamas from Gaza” – Gallant, Minister of War, October 2023.

Before you go to bed tonight as a Canadian, remind yourself or your children that your support has been extended to Israel, a settler apartheid state, rather than a democracy. It’s time for Canada to reconsider its stance and:

“Canada must cease supporting Israel in its apartheid, colonization, and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians and actively engage in the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement while helping implement the 83 United Nations Resolutions.”

Canada should approach the Occupation of Palestine similarly to its approach to Ukraine:

1. Deploy Canadian soldiers to train Palestinians in their fight for freedom.
2. Provide Palestinians with the necessary resources to defend themselves against Israeli colonial practices, including forced displacement, genocide, apartheid, torture, occupation, and the abuse of children.
3. Allow Canadians to join Palestinians in their struggle for freedom.

The only viable path toward peaceful coexistence between Colonial Jews (from Europe, America, and Canada) and Arabs (Jews, Christians, and Muslims) is:

• A One-State Solution, given the vast number of illegal settlements and the Israeli occupation of 93% of Indigenous land, controlling 100%.
• Implementation of the Geneva Conventions of 1949 and United Nations General Assembly Resolution 3236, reaffirming the inalienable right of Palestinians to return to their homes and property from which they have been displaced and uprooted.
• Implementation of UN Resolution 194, recognizing the right to self-determination.
• Implementation of the 28 resolutions of the United Nations Security Council that Israel has violated, along with the 55 resolutions brought against Israel by the United Nations Human Rights Commission.
• Active support for the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement.
• Disarmament of Israel and the deployment of UN troops for peacekeeping.

To express your concerns and call for an end to support for Apartheid Israel, you can write to the following individuals:

The Right Honourable Justin Trudeau: justin.trudeau@parl.gc.ca

Pierre Poilievre: pierre.poilievre@parl.gc.ca

Jagmeet Singh Jagmeet.Singh@parl.gc.ca

Foreign Minister Melanie Joly melanie.joly@parl.gc.ca

Write to them:

“Canada and the rest of the civilized world must stop supporting Israel in its apartheid / colonization and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians and be a part of the BDS Movement (Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions).”

For further information and comments please contact:
Dr. Mukarram Zaidi, Canadian Muslim Research Think Tank.
587 890 8321, chairman@thinkforactions.com