Addressing The Horrors

The horrors in Gaza - none of us can claim to be unaware of them.  Even harder, despite the efforts of Israel's apologists, is to adhere, with any conviction, to the official line that the carnage and destruction inflicted by the Jewish state is justified in its 'war' on Hama. As I have said before on this blog, there is only one word to describe the atrocities: genocide.

In an article that will no doubt elicit outrage from those who justify Israel's depredations, Beisan Zubi places the carnage in the context of the Canadian election. 

As a Palestinian Canadian, Gaza feels like the best test I can use to gauge a politician’s actual commitment to human rights. The core principle behind human rights is that they are universal (apply to everyone) and inalienable (cannot be taken away). Over the past 18 months, I have watched Israel violate just about every human right that I learned about in school, while so many Canadian politicians stayed silent. 

 I would argue a politician’s stance on Gaza says volumes about their commitment to a range of domestic issues, and not just Canada’s responsibility to uphold international law.

Zubi draws a compelling test to measure our politicians, asserting if they are for certain things. they have to be for them universally. 

How can I trust a politician will defend women’s rights in Canada if they haven’t said anything about the fact that there are an estimated 48,000 pregnant women in Gaza facing famine? Israel’s ongoing blockade of essential medical supplies means that unmedicated C-sections are no longer the plot of horror movies, miscarriage rates in Gaza are up an estimated 300 per cent...

How can I trust a politician will protect Canada’s health care system if they aren’t outraged that Israel has decimated a health care system serving over two million people, by conducting a reported 136 strikes on at least 27 hospitals, destroying the main IVF clinic in Gaza along with an estimated 4,000 embryos, and killing over a thousand Palestinian health care workers...

How can I trust a politician will fight for disability justice in Canada if they haven’t condemned the mass disabling event still underway in Gaza, where the disabled, elderly, and injured are bombed in tents, forced to flee hospitals under attack in wheelchairs or carried by siblings, the cruel killing of a young man with Down syndrome by an Israeli military dog, that 15,000 deaf Gazans can’t hear evacuation warnings before bombs drop around them, or even that Gaza now has the largest per capita population of child amputees in the world, many of whom are also orphaned.

How can I trust a politician will treat infrastructure and adequate housing as a human right when they haven’t said a thing about the UN reporting that 92 per cent of all homes in Gaza have been damaged or destroyed, or that vital infrastructure like water desalination plants and waste management sites have been forced to shutter, leading to infectious diseases spreading and a looming environmental catastrophe?

Speaking of the environment, how can I believe a politician actually cares about this planet if they don’t speak out about ecocide in Gaza? A Yale School of the Environment report published in February warned us that more than two thirds of Gaza’s farmland has been destroyed, 80 per cent of the tree cover in Gaza is gone, up to 3.5 million cubic feet of raw sewage are leaking into groundwater and the Mediterranean Sea every day...

And of course, how can we believe a politician actually cares about Canada’s territorial integrity amidst threats from Donald Trump to annex our country if they haven’t spoken out about Israel’s ongoing dispossession and theft of Palestinian land in Gaza and the West Bank?

These are all questions that demand real answers. Unfortunately, given that any criticism of Israel is the third rail of politics, I expect none will be forthcoming.

Say It By Its Proper Name: Genocide

Genocide is violence that targets individuals because of their membership of a group and aims at the destruction of a people. Raphael Lemkin, who first coined the term, defined genocide as "the destruction of a nation or of an ethnic group" by means such as "the disintegration of [its] political and social institutions, of [its] culture, language, national feelings, religion, and [its] economic existence".

Wikepedia

I wasn't planning to write a blog entry today, but I came across a story that so egregiously outrageous that for the sake of my own health, I had to put it down in words.

If you have read some of my recent posts, you will see I am always quick to hold to account the atmosphere of fear and censorship that is becoming increasingly common in the U.S., especially with regard to students demonstrating support for Palestinians. Today's post, however, hits closer to home. To understand the obscene nature of what has happened, here is a bit of context about Tareq Hadhad. a Syrian refugee who settled in Nova Scotia and became a Canadian success story as well as a Canadian citizen in 2020.

Hadhad’s family had made chocolates in Syria for more than 20 years, but their factory was destroyed in a bombing that forced them to leave the country in 2012.

Peace by Chocolate opened for business in 2016 and now ships its confections around the world. The company employs locals in Antigonish and newcomers to Canada.

Hadhad said Canadians are respected around the world for “values that stand for peace, for love, for kindness, for inclusion, for welcome, for friendliness, for social justice.

In addition to employing a significant number of people, Hadhad donates a percentage of the profits to peace initiatives.

Upon becoming a citizen, he said,

“I feel that I’m Canadian. I feel that I’m free. I feel that I belong. And I feel that I am so proud to be part of this big family of 37 million Canadians from coast to coast to coast.”

Hadhad may have to revisit that assessment, given the contempt a Canadian legal association has shown him.

The Advocates’ Society informed its members in an email last week that it would be uninviting Tareq Hadhad, a Syrian refugee turned Canadian entrepreneur, as the keynote speaker at the prominent legal group’s annual “End of Term Dinner,” at the Metro Convention Centre in June.

The decision comes after some members expressed concern about Hadhad’s public social media posts touching on the Middle East, the email explained. “While it was never our intention for Mr. Hadhad to speak about the conflict, with regret, we concluded that this is not the right time or event for Mr. Hadhad to address our members,” it read, adding: “We also recognize that many of our members will be harmed and feel unwelcome because of our decision not to proceed with Mr. Hadhad.”

Exactly what was the 'offence' that prompted this anti-Arab racism? Well, it seems that certain members of the society poured through Hadhad's social media posts, and, spoiler alert, Toronto lawyer Jonathan Lisus found nothing.

He said he saw an absence of commentary on the [October 7 2023] kidnappings, murder and other atrocities committed [against Israelis] by Hamas; nor, he said, could he find Hadhad calling on Hamas to release hostages or renounce its call for the destruction of Israel.

Also, Lisus found that Hadhad had used the G word: 

In May 2024, Hadhad wrote: “Just looking at this and thinking of all the children that we failed everywhere and continue to fail in Rafah and all of Gaza. This genocide must be stopped. Children should wake up to the sounds of birds not the sounds of bombs.”

“Sadly, Mr. Hadhad’s record of public statements makes a strong case that while expressing understandable concern for civilian deaths in Gaza he is unsympathetic, and certainly indifferent, to the harm and suffering of Jewish people and the Jewish state,” Lisus wrote in his email to the Advocates’ Society.

Compounding this cowardly injustice, Hadhad made it clear that his was to be a non-political address:

“My intended remarks focused solely on the values that unite,” the statement said. “There is a lot of division already in our world — I don’t want to contribute to it further. My role is to bring people together, not further divide them, and I remain proud of my story and the message I share across Canada and internationally.”

Night after night the news shows us the dire injury, death and devastation Israel is inflicting on Gaza. Yet somehow our sympathies are supposed to be reside solely with the Jewish state. Somewhere, George Orwell must be nodding ruefully and knowingly. 

 

We Are All Complicit

There are still many who both turn a blind eye to the ongoing genocide in Gaza and justify israel's atrocities as mere self-defence. If you believe that fiction, all I can say is your critical-thinking skills are grossly deficient. 

But even if we are rightfully appalled by those atrocities, most of us, in our own ways, are complicit in them. We do not openly protest the carnage; we do not write letters decrying it; we continue to elect people who will only worsen the genocide; we do not demand that Canada stop being an echo chamber for American Middle East policies that only enable and embolden the destruction of countless lives.

The following is very, very difficult to watch. If you choose to view it and are subsequently still staunch advocates of Israel's actions, I don't know what to say to you.

Today is the start of a new year. I wish it were a new start for humanity as well, but I suspect that is not in the cards.