Harper's Policy On Gaza: The Canadian Toll

While the cost of the Israeli invasion of Gaza is almost incalculable in turns of human suffering and loss of life, there is another casualty in all of this, one that is far less obvious and, in the eternal scheme of things, I suppose, of lesser consequence: Canada's psyche and reputation, both of which have been perhaps irremediably scarred.

The Mound of Sound has written a great deal lately on the ongoing carnage, and he has been hard-hitting in his condemnation of the leaders of all three major Canadian federal parties. All have either overtly or implicitly consented to the slaughter of the innocents, and for the worst of all possible reasons: political expediency.

And by that complicity, they have compromised all Canadians as they invite us to share their warped perspective that Israel is committed to peace, and that the casualties in Gaza are solely the fault of Hamas's rocket fire. Of Israel's grossly disproportionate response to those rockets, nothing is said. "Harden your hearts" seems to be the message, one that will be received with gratitude by some and confusion by others.

As well, of course, our long-reputed neutrality and honest-broker reputation is in tatters internationally.

Earlier this week The Star's Thomas Walkom offered this evaluation of the Harper regime's position on the bloody conflict:

Canada’s bully-boy approach to Gaza may be politically expedient for Prime Minister Stephen Harper.

But in terms of bringing peace to the Middle East it is not helpful. If anything, it makes matters worse.

To this Canadian government, events in the Palestinian territory are black and white. On one side are those that Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird calls Hamas “terrorists.” They are uniformly bad.

On the other is the state of Israel trying to protect its civilians from Hamas rocket attacks. It is uniformly good.

There is no room for nuance and little for history. The Canadian government approach does not take into account the bitter war that led so many Palestinians to flee the newly created state of Israel in 1948.

Nor does it contemplate Israel’s equally bitter occupation of the West Bank since 1967, an occupation carried out in defiance of the United Nations Security Council.

Walkom, I believe, accurately and concisely gets to the heart of Harper's motivation:

This prime minister has two types of foreign policy. Both are short-term. Both focus on immediate, domestic political goals.

His first approach is to favour countries useful to Canadian resource companies. Resources explain Harper’s otherwise inexplicable free-trade deal with Colombia, a country of little importance to Canada except for the fact that Canadian mining companies operate there.

Not to mention, of course, Columbia's abysmal human-rights record, a pesky detail of no apparent consequence when it comes to Harper's promotion of mining interests.

It also explains Ottawa’s decision to focus foreign aid on Mongolia. Vancouver-based Turquoise Hill Resources (formerly Ivanhoe Mines) is majority owner of a gigantic copper and gold mine in that Central Asian nation.

Harper’s second foreign affairs strategy is to take hardline positions that will win favour with specific voting blocs in Canada. This explains his vigorous support of Israel. It also explains his equally vigorous opposition to Iran.

And so the Canadian people have become pawns and victims in Harper's unholy quest to bolster his sagging popularity and movtivate his base to turn out at the next election.

Domestically, you will be hard pressed to find another such transparent example of true evil than that.

Harper, Trudeau and Mulcair - Soft on Terrorism

Let's begin with the definition of "terrorism." Merriam-Webster offers up a fairly standard definition: "the use of violent acts to frighten the people in an area as a way of trying to achieve a political goal."

That sounds exactly like what is going on in Gaza right now. That is exactly what is going on in Gaza right now. It's terrorism. Deliberately planned and precisely executed terrorism. And our prime minister and his government and our opposition Liberal and New Democrat leaders and all their parties are just fine with it. Trudeau even praises the terrorist government for its "commitment to peace." Thanks, Justin, now sit down.

Israel tries to mask its terrorist campaign as "self defence." Harper, Trudeau and Mulcair parrot that line. The Gang of Four - Netanyahu, Harper, Trudeau and Mulcair - maintain that Israel is going after Hamas, not targeting Gaza Palestinians.

They don't want to connect the dots between Israel's attack on Lebanese civilians in 2006 and its working over of Palestinian civilians in Gaza in 2008/2009 and the sequel now underway. Yet they're all the same, all straight from the same IDF playbook. There's even a name for it, the Dahiya Doctrine. It was named after the Beirut suburb that Israel demolished in 2006.

This technique deliberately targets civilians. They are the intended victims - the old and the young, women and children, those least able to get out of the way. The attack on the civilian population begins by taking out their essential services - water plants (check), sewage plants (check), electricity plants (check). Then you go at the civilians directly by bombarding their homes (check), hospitals (check), schools (check), and markets (check). You really work them over and you just keep at it all the while pretending that you're really targeting someone else.

The steady reduction of Gaza is blatant, deliberate terrorism. Or maybe not. Maybe it’s something even worse. Maybe what Netanyahu has in mind this time is enhanced terrorism, 'terrorism plus', - ethnic cleansing. Maybe he wants to render Gaza uninhabitable. Already some 90% of what passes for freshwater (it's actually a mild brine) is unfit for human consumption. The destruction of the sewage system almost guarantees there'll be a cholera epidemic before long. Taking down the power grid is the icing on the cake. It's positively medieval.

If you're a Liberal or a New Democrat, this is on you too. It's your party that is supporting this, absolving Israel of its campaign of terrorism, condoning the reduction of Gaza that will lead, must eventually lead to the ethnic cleansing of the Palestinian population from the Gaza strip.


MoS, the Disaffected Lib

Dahiyeh - It's How Israel Wages "Peace"

“We will wield disproportionate power against every village from which shots are fired on Israel, and cause immense damage and destruction. This isn’t a suggestion. This is a plan that has already been authorized.” - Major-General Gadi Eisenkot, IDF.



That was Israeli strategy in the 2006 invasion of southern Lebanon. It's Israeli strategy today in Gaza. Disproportionate power.. immense damage and destruction... by plan. It's a strategy not targeted at an armed opponent. This is a strategy targeted directly at civilians - the young, the elderly, women and children - the cannon fodder that are least able to get out of the way when you come calling.

C'mon, Justin. Remind me again about Israel's "commitment to peace."

There's even a name for it. It's called the Dahiyeh Doctrine, named for the Beirut suburb that Israeli warplanes carpet bombed.

It's all about inflicting civilian casualties, destroying their homes and depriving them of essential services - electricity, water, sewage plants - hospitals, schools - all of which Israel has destroyed in the past month in Gaza as part of its "commitment to peace."

Israel waged this sort of peace in Gaza before and it became the subject of the 2009 Goldstone Report commissioned by the UN Human Rights Council. I expect our parliamentary greaseballs - Steve, Justin and Tommy Boy - never got a copy. That the very same doctrine is happening again - today - according to the very same game plan - is no coincidence. It's also a war crime unless, that is, your name is Harper, Trudeau or Mulcair.

MoS, The Disaffected Lib

Harper's Reign Of Terror - Part Five

As in the previous installments, this post examines the Harper regime's unrelenting attacks on nonprofits that in any way oppose or criticize its agenda. The latest target is CoDevelopment Canada (CoDev), whose website lists the following as its mission:

CoDevelopment Canada is a B.C.-based NGO that works for social change and global education in the Americas. Founded in 1985 by a group of activists who wanted to go beyond financial aid, CoDev builds partnerships between like-minded organizations in Canada and Latin America to foster learning, social change, and community empowerment. These partnerships educate Canadians about Latin America and allow them to directly support the region. Such connections build solidarity, mutual understanding and ultimately improve prospects for a fairer global order.

For most people, those would seem to be commendable and progressive goals. For Stephen Harper and his cabal, they are reflective of a subversive organization that needs to be frightened into silence.

As reported in today's Star, CoDev has passed its two recent CRA audits, one in 2009, its first in 25 years and one last year, the latter conducted by three auditors — two of them political-activity specialists. Both appear to be part of the pattern discussed in previous posts:

Many of the charities under audit have been critics of government policy, including CoDev, a trade union-funded group that has raised questions about Canada's free-trade deal with Colombia, among other issues.

Indeed, on its website, CoDev offers a trenchant critique of Canada's free-trade deal with both Honduras and Colombia entitled Honduras deal: Another example of Canada’s poor record on trade and human rights

So is CoDev in the clear, after passing two audits? Not at all. Here is the latest cudgel from the Harper toolbox of intimidation as it continues its direction of the CRA investigations:

[CoDev] faces the crippling prospect of translating every scrap of paper it receives from 17 partners in El Salvador, Nicaragua, Honduras and elsewhere from Spanish into either English or French.

The demand, set out in a January compliance letter from the CRA, will start to bite this fall as the tiny four-person shop begins to receive banker's boxes full of Spanish-language documents from its Latin American projects, including taxi chits and bus fare receipts.

The group's executive director, Barbara Wood, says the newly imposed requirement will drain away scarce resources, yet must be carried out or CoDev risks losing its charitable status.

The CRA demands suggest the vexatious nature of the persecution:

Among CRA's new demands: the official CoDev mission statement had to be rewritten to cite each human rights law in all 11 Latin American countries that CoDev's partners try to uphold. That meant a lengthy four-page annex to the statement, in English translation.

But the most onerous condition, Wood said, is the major translation project ahead, which involves thousands of receipts.

“The amount of work is unbelievable,” she said. “The rules seem to have been applied differently in 2009 than they were now . . . We're a really small team and this is a huge amount of work.”

Typically, the CRA has turned aside inquiries, citing the confidentiality provisions of the Income Tax Act.

For anyone following the Harper pattern of harassment and intimidation, no further explanation is needed.

The Blinkered Worldview of Stephen Harper

Recently, I wrote a series of posts on Stephen Harper's misuse of the Canadian Revenue Agency through the orchestration of audits on nonprofits that criticize his policies. For Dear Leader, life is uncomplicated: you are either with him or against him, and if you fall into the latter category and have a certain public prominence, the knock on the door may not be far off.

One of my readers, Troy Thomas, made the following comment:

You know, this is how First Nations have been treated for decades, so I'll share what usually happens to First Nations.

Audits aren't the end. They're a means.

A First Nations band which is getting uppity, i.e. publicly complaining about not getting properly funded or complaining about interference, will get audited.
The auditor, that bribe-able one from the USA, Delasomething, [Deloitte] will find in its report what the government asked for it to find.

The government, using the fictitious audit as an excuse, will force the uppity First Nations band to take on the expense of the audit, and then force the uppity First Nations band to take on the expense of a private for-profit third-party firm, which will do what the band used to do for a third or a quarter of the cost.
So, from experience, expect more than the audits. Expect the government to slide its own people into these charities, by using the audits as its reasons: "Oh, these charities are improperly run! They need experience from the private sector in order to do as they're supposed to!"

Something like that.

It now appears that Mr. Harper has yet another weapon with which to further undermine opposition and divide Canadians even further: the new First Nations Financial Transparency Act, which, as reported in The Toronto Star, requires First Nations communities across the country to publish a range of annual business and financial records, including salaries and benefits.

The communities were previously only required to submit these records to the government without sharing them with the public.

While the average remuneration reported is quite modest, there are exceptions:

- the Snuneymuxw First Nation in B.C., revealed that Eric Wesley, a councillor, received $307,201 in contracts for construction related services in the last fiscal year from his own community.

- Chief John Thunder of the Buffalo Point First Nation in Manitoba earned $129,398 for the year in salaries and benefits. The community he represents is made up of less than 200 people.

So what might be the strategic value of making this information public, as opposed to simply making it available to band members?

Given the government's distasteful paternalism toward aboriginals, vilification of their leaders will create even greater disharmony than already exists within their communities; the greater the disunity, the less chance of speaking with one voice.

Given First nations' concerns over Harper's pipeline obsession and his total disregard for environmental concerns, undermining aboriginal leadership will work in favour of the Prime Minister's monomania.

And how have First Nations' people reacted to this latest attempt to discredit them?

“Everything points to (an attempt) to build on the propaganda that aboriginal governments are dishonest,” said Ghislain Picard, interim chief of the Assembly of First Nations, in an interview. “That’s the thinking that’s out there and that’s what they keep building on.”

Picard said the government is always trying to find ways to discredit First Nations people in Canada.

“It reflects the ideology of this government since 2006,” said Picard. “They’re already working very hard to find that one community that might be outside what they would (describe) as the model First Nation and then just pass that brush over to all First Nations.”

While Stephen Harper insists it is all about transparency, about the only thing really transparent here are his motives.

A New Update: I Felt A Chill As I Read This

A week ago came the report of a giant crater in the Siberian permafrost discovered by a Russian helicopter crew. Russian scientists concluded the crater, about 80-metres across, was not the result of a meteor strike but probably was caused by a sub-surface methane explosion.

At the time I speculated whether this was a fluke or whether we'd be seeing more of these things in the high north before long. We didn't have to wait long for the answer.

The Siberian Times reports that reindeer herders have come across two more of these craters.

No word yet on whether anything similar is happening in the Canadian north.

MoS, the Disaffected Lib







UPDATE: Here's an update from Scientific American


A NEW UPDATE: Large spikes of methane being released into the atmosphere above Siberia may be tied to the mysterious craters which have appeared in the landscape, according to a US scientist.

Dr Jason Box, a professor in glaciology at the Geological Survey of Denmark and Greenland, has highlighted increased levels of methane above the landscape.

The geologist's blog links the craters to climate change, as the melting Siberian permafrost is allowing the greenhouse gas to escape and create the enormous holes.

Using data from a ground-based climate observing station in Tiksi, a small town in the Sakha Republic on the Arctic Ocean coast, Dr Box discovered "high end" levels of methane. The readings were backed up by data from similar stations in Alaska and Canada, according to News.com.au.

The spikes, which Dr Box calls "dragon breaths", may well be connected to the unusual holes that have appeared in the Siberia landscape over the last month.

Three craters have been discovered so far. The first 80m-wide hole was spotted 1,800 miles east of Moscow in a barren permafrost stretch of the Yamal Peninsula, an area that translates as "the end of the world".

If All You Had Were Useless Rockets, Would You Be Firing Them?

A timely and invaluable reminder of what it means to be a Palestinian in Gaza under the yoke of the Israeli military. This is a report of a calculated and brutal murder of a 13-year old Palestinian girl by Israeli troops outside a refugee camp in 2004. As I recall, the officer who finished off the girl with two shots to her head was never punished for the murder.

How would you react if this girl was one of ours?

As for today another UN school, this one designated a refuge for Palestinian civilians. 15-dead, 90-wounded as three artillery rounds slam into the shelter.

You're dead on, Justin. That's some "commitment to peace."

MoS, The Disaffected Lib