Skip to main content

Don't let up

Re: Joint statement on Gaza

Joint statement from the leaders of Canada....

Dear Mr Carney and Ms Anand

First of all, congratulations to you both on your election to Parliament.

Mr Carney, thank you for the beautiful words of your acceptance speech, touting humility above all else and your desire to “fight for” all Canadians (although I might suggest “govern for” is both more accurate and less adversarial in framing).

Thank you for your joint statement with the leaders of the UK and France.

Thank you for “strongly oppos[ing] Israel's military operations in Gaza.”

Thank you for denouncing the “wholly inadequate” trickle of food aid.

Thank you for “denouc[ing] the denial of essential humanitarian assistance as “unacceptable.” Please note that it does not merely “risk breaching international humanitarian law” but has clearly already done so.

Thank you for the call to release the Israeli hostages in Hamas captivity. Please note that should have been accompanied by a demand to release the Palestinian hostages in Israeli “administrative detention.” They are just as illegally and unjustly imprisoned.

Thank you for promising “not [to] stand by while the Netanyahu Government pursues these egregious actions.”

However, Israel has already received warnings like this and done nothing. In addition to their repeated and escalating actions demonstration what can only by seen as genocidal intent, Israeli government ministers have boldly stated clear genocidal intent. The time for ultimatums is long past. This is not an “if” situation. It is already happening. Whatever concrete action you have planned, you must begin to take it now. Do not wait for the inevitable “crossing of the red line." So many red lines have already been crossed that Gaza is a field of blood.
You can immediately enforce the promised arms embargo with Israel: not only enforce it immediately and completely (closing every loophole), but enforce it as a two-way embargo: absolutely no military materials destined for either country, no matter which intermediaries are involved and no matter what sort of purpose they serve. No water containers or anything. 

You can immediately crack down on Israeli military recruitment in Canada. 

You can launch CRA investigations into all organizations credibly accused of funding settler colonialism or militariasm in Israel and if they are found to be noncompliant, remove their charity designation.

You can immediately recognize the Palestinian state. You have said you support a two-state solution, so why would you hesitate to recognize one of said two states?

This egregious humanitarian crisis has been going on for far too long. The credibility of Western nations is at stake and has already been made precarious in the world due to their silence in the face of clearly illegal and utterly immoral behaviour from the Israeli government. 

You must act now. 

We are all suffering moral injury due to our complicity with this genocide unfolding before our eyes.

Mr Carney and Ms Anand, you have the power to take the wishes of Canadians and act on our behalf. Please do not delay.

Sincerely

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Living stones in the holy land

I met Jesus in Israel-Palestine a few years ago. I found him not in the rocky, desert ground he trod, nor in the ancient stones of the towns and cities he visited; not in the subterranean grotto in the Church of the Nativity, nor in the mammoth Church of the Holy Sepulchre, encompassing the traditional site of his death and resurrection. No, I met him in the lives of Palestinians who incarnate his spirit, in humble, passionate people who are convinced that love is the only way. I met Jesus in people who spoke like this: “We need to be soaked in the love of Christ. Love is not a hug and a kiss. Love is to seek the life of the other that the cost of one’s own.” --Labib Madanat, coordinator of the Palestinian and Israeli Bible Societies “Love is not an opportunity to overlook justice. Love is an opportunity to pursue justice…. [But] we want to resist any form of evil with the heart and mind of Jesus Christ.… There is no love without justice. And there is no true justice without lov...

Broken people...

After reflecting with one coworker on how often churches in all their forms really mess up and hurt a whole bunch of people in the process -- and how "we gotta do better" -- I stumbled into another conversation with a coworker which highlighted our brokenness, and I suddenly realized what was wrong with my take in the first. I wanted the church to be better at fixing our mistakes, or better yet, at not making them in the first place. But maybe this "fix-it" attitude is partly the reason we keep blowing it again and again! My friend recollected an experience when a church community was in a terrible place: compounded mistakes, hurts, and frustrations had blown up, spewing pain all over all parties. (I'm sure anyone with a long history in the church can think of one, if not several, such occasions in their past.) A new Christian who observed all these goings on responded in an unexpected way. Instead of "you people are a bunch of screw-ups! How could this pos...

Deep breaths, just relax

I am immensely relieved to have my visa application in the mail...except I won't be free of trepidation until I have my passport back, visa approved. Sending my visa makes me realize it's actually going to happen -- sooner rather than later. Just one more day of work at the newspaper, 2 1/2 more shifts at the bookstore. Training the new guy today went well for me; I hope it went well for him as well! Thankfully, I have news that I will not be wandering around Douala by myself upon my arrival in Cameroon. (Okay, not that that was going to be the case, but it sounds more dramatic.) The original plan was that I'd meet Dan and Lisa at Charles de Gaulle and continue with them from there in on. Just the way I like it -- being "adventurous" within the safe parameters of responsible and experienced oversight. However, the U.S. government got in the way of those plans with delay after delay with Joshua's paperwork. To say I was worried about arriving in Douala all alo...