Palestinian Canadians and human rights lawyers are suing Foreign Affairs Minister Melanie Joly over exports of military equipment to Israel, which they argue violate Canada’s obligations under domestic and international law.
The lawsuit, filed on Tuesday, asks a federal court to order the Canadian government to stop issuing export permits for military goods and technology destined for Israel.
Sending military goods to Israel during Gaza war violates Canadian and international law, lawsuit argues.
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Just days after International Development Minister Ahmed Hussen was
swarmed by vociferous pro-Palestinian protesters in downtown Toronto over the weekend, his department is set to restore funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) — even as
new details about the involvement of the organization’s staff in the Oct. 7 terrorist attacks on southern Israel come to light.
One could hardly dream up a more perfect metaphor for the Liberal government’s total and complete
moral cowardice over the last five months than the development minister literally caving to an angry mob of keffiyeh-clad demonstrators waving Palestinian flags and serenading him with shouts of “shame!” It may even be too on-the-nose as a piece of symbolism, but here we are.
Announcement comes amidst new details of agency’s staff involvement in Oct. 7 massacre
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Hussen was
reportedly set to announce the resumption of funding to the troubled UN agency Wednesday morning during a news conference in Mississauga, Ont., but this event was
abruptly cancelled late in the day on Tuesday, shortly after Israel released a new
audio recording implicating two UNRWA employees, one a schoolteacher, in the Oct. 7 onslaught.
The teacher, Yousef al-Hawajara, was
caught on tape calling a female Israeli hostage a
“sabaya,” a term ISIS uses for sex slaves under its capture. Assuming it is authenticated, the recording brings the total number of agency workers found to be active participants in the attacks to 14. Israel
also said Tuesday it believes that at least 450 UNWRA employees “are military operatives in terror groups in Gaza.”
New recordings show UNRWA teachers taking women hostages
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Make of the timing what you will.
For its part, Hussen’s office has denied that the press conference’s nixing had anything to do with Tuesday’s bombshell development, blaming
“logistics” for the last-minute cancellation, according to the Toronto Sun’s Brian Lilley. The development minister’s office also refused to comment on the just-released evidence out of Israel.
Aurel Braun, a political science professor at the University of Toronto, told the National Post the decision to resume funding UNRWA makes little sense, particularly since the reasons why Canada cut funding in the first place haven’t been addressed.
“Aid was suspended because there was evidence so damning that democracies all over concluded there was no ethical or moral rationale to fund an organization that had been engaged with these kind of horrific acts of murder and rape,” he said.
“It’s not that this evidence has changed — on the contrary, more evidence keeps coming up of specific individuals who actually took part.”
Canada paused funding to the contentious UN agency after allegations that UNRWA employees took part in the Oct. 7 attacks
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As well, with Canada publicly supporting a negotiated two-state solution for Israel, Braun questioned the wisdom of funding an organization that he says is ideologically opposed to such a plan.
“Those who say that they are for the two-state solution cannot logically also say that they can be for UNRWA,” Braun said.
“The very existence of UNRWA is basically an attempt to prevent a two-state solution.”