By: Amanda Taylor, SFU Student
Content warning: mentions of the Holocaust and death.
On June 16, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau attended the Ukraine peace summit and said Russia is committing “an element of genocide.” This is true, and it’s important Canada stands for peace in Ukraine. However, along with other Canadian officials, Trudeau has continually shied away from calling Israel’s ongoing violence and occupation of Palestine a genocide, which shows a double standard. While there are many factors that influence who and what receives open support from governments, political power is at the forefront — and Israel is certainly not lacking in it.
The United Nations (UN) recognized genocide as an international crime in 1946, shortly after millions of Jews were killed or displaced during the Holocaust. Two years later, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) brought forth the Genocide Convention, which has been agreed to by 153 states. Even states that have not agreed to the Convention are still bound by it, according to the ICJ. The Genocide Convention defines genocide as “any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial, or religious group.” Some of these acts include “killing members of the group, causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group,” and “deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part.” Israel is committing many of these acts in occupied Palestinian territories. And yet, the Canadian government doesn’t find the truth convenient enough to admit.
This January, the ICJ reported it’s “plausible” that Israel has violated the Genocide Convention. They voted near-unanimously that Israel must take “‘immediate and effective’ measures to ensure the provision of urgently needed humanitarian aid and basic services.” One month later, Israel made it clear they had no intention of complying with this demand. According to Amnesty International, they “have failed to ensure sufficient life-saving goods and services are reaching a population at risk of genocide and on the brink of famine.” Since October 7, 31 of 36 hospitals in Gaza “have been damaged or destroyed.” In recent months, Israel has begun targeting refugee camps in Rafah, killing “at least 45 Palestinians” in one day and putting even more at risk of illness. The number of Palestinians killed since October 7 surpassed 30,000 in February, with reports that the actual number was likely higher. As of June 20, at least 37,431 people have been killed in Gaza alone.
This January, Canada froze arms export permits to Israel due to the risk of weapons being used to violate international law. In March, they announced they were extending this restriction until they “can ensure the weapons are used in accordance with Canadian law.” There are no excuses for supporting a militia that’s provenly committing genocide — no amount of time passed during a “freeze” will make it OK.
Canada should also be concerned with the disturbing level of Israeli lobbying that undermines any façade of political neutrality.
It’s unsurprising that Trudeau was willing to call the Russian invasion of Ukraine a genocide, yet avoided the word when asked about Gaza. It’s easy to criticize Russia, a country with weakening diplomatic ties to the US and Canada. Israel, on the other hand, is one of the US’ largest economic and military allies, receiving billions of dollars every year in assistance. Canada, with close military and economic ties to the US, has notably stayed silent when it comes to calling the Palestinian genocide what it is: a genocide.
Despite fewer ties to Israel in comparison to the US, Canada is not immune to anti-Palestinian lobbying. Last year, The Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA) hosted a conference on antisemitism which was attended by Justin Trudeau, Pierre Poilievre, and Jagmeet Singh. According to The Breach, CIJA formally requested that the Canadian government “‘officially recognize’ that anti-Zionism is a form of antisemitism.” Zionism is a “Jewish nationalist movement” that supports the forced establishment of a Jewish nation state in Palestine. Independent Jewish Voices, a Jewish organization that supports justice in Palestine, responded: “There is every reason to be concerned about the rise of Jew hatred . . . but we cannot allow efforts to combat these social scourges to be hijacked by those whose purpose is to justify and defend the racist policies of the state of Israel.” The Maple also reported that CIJA has engaged in lobbying with “at least 56% of MPs or their office assistants,” including “taking MPs on fully paid trips.”
While the Canadian government should absolutely take action to tackle antisemitism, that doesn’t equate to unyielding support for Israel’s crimes. Canada should also be concerned with rising anti-Palestinian sentiment, and the disturbing level of Israeli lobbying that undermines any façade of political neutrality.
For a country that proclaims its supposed commitment to Truth and Reconciliation, the safety of Indigenous Peoples in other nations appears to be a low priority. Numerous countries and organizations have condemned Israel’s attack on Palestinians, including the UN and ICJ. Nonetheless, Justin Trudeau has the gall to call attention to one genocide while undermining another that is the “deadliest rate of conflict of the 21st century” so far. The question is not if Israel is committing a genocide, but how. It’s not enough to support a ceasefire once it’s convenient, after many other nations have already done so. When the Canadian government looks back on the Palestinian genocide one day, there may be some temptation to believe they were on the “right side” of history — but silence is complicity. Delayed support is complicity. Pandering to lobbyists is complicity, and complicity in genocide is just shy of support for it. Never forget that Canada sat back when their support was direly needed.
