Canada Must Repair Our International Image on the Issue of Palestine

Canada’s vote this month at the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) in recognition of Palestinian self-determination for the second year in a row was a sigh of relief for Canadians who have been longing for the return of a more principled Canada on the world stage.

Even though these 16 UNGA resolutions voted on every year are largely symbolic, as they are not tied to prescribed actions, it must be recognized that they are still crucial and Canada’s policy change from nearly two decades of “No” votes is significant.

Our support of Palestinians is the ethical thing to do and puts us in better alignment with the rest of the world.

The vote is a reversal of a stance that began in 2002 when Prime Minister Paul Martin and Foreign Minister Pierre Pettigrew announced a re-assessment of Canada’s UNGA votes, claiming that the resolution contained language which singled out Israel unfairly. The first signs of a shift occured in 2004 when Canada voted against two key resolutions on the basis of the claim that recognizing the right to Palestinian self-determination somehow negates the same right for the Jewish people. Nothing could be further from the truth. These resolutions do not take issue with Israel’s existence but with the continued deprivation of Palestinian rights, including the right to self-determination, to refugee restitution, return and compensation, and to applicable bodies of law in the Occupied Palestinian Territories such as the fourth Geneva convention.

These false claims were adopted by former Prime Minister Stephen Harper and Foreign Minister John Baird who accelerated the process of reversing Canada’s stance on supporting Palestine –  finally in 2011 voting against all resolutions but one in which Canada abstained to support UNRWA assistance. Until 2019 Canada maintained this policy of blind rejection of all resolutions on the question of Palestine tabled annually at the UNGA. Canada was among the United States, Czech Republic, the Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Nauru, Palau and Panama to reject Palestinian statehood –  an embarrassing blight on our international image.

For decades, Canada had branded itself as a peacekeeping nation, drawing on our long history of peacefully intervening in conflicts around the world. However, our current commitments are at a sixty-year low. Although Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s government made significant strides in repairing that global image with inclusive rhetoric, the time has come for Canada to act.

Last year, we lost our bid for a Security Council seat, in no small part due to the fact that Canada has joined very few countries in outright hostility against Palestinians. Much to our global embarrassment, all UN ambassadors received a letter signed by over 100 peace organizations and prominent advocates, describing how Canada “has consistently isolated itself against world opinion on Palestinian rights at the UN.”

Canada’s responsibility to Palestine is unique and is intimately tied to the United Nations’ own responsibility to the Occupied Territories. When the UN drafted its partition plan for Palestine in 1947, then-Supreme Court of Canada Justice Ivan C. Rand played a central role in developing the UN report proposing partition. Former Prime Minister Lester B. Pearson who was a senior Canadian diplomat at the time, became the chair of the UN sub-committee for developing the partition plan itself. The subsequent violence against the defenseless indigenous Palestinian population, abandoned by their British colonists, was nothing short of catastrophic – in light of which, the UN has since been scrambling to mitigate damage to little avail. The significance of Canada’s role in developing the 80 years conflict demands accountability in how we stand with Palestinians who have survived and inherited this trauma.

Trudeau understands the urgent need for this shift to support Palestinian rights noting that Liberals are open to reconsidering our stance on Palestine. Making necessary changes means facing the disappointment of our recent stances honestly, and committing to better future actions. It means addressing the false claims that these resolutions single out Israel, or that Palestinian self-determinaiton somehow compromises that of the Jewish people, and the claims that passing such resolutions is inherently anti-Semitic. It means understanding that failing to hold Israel accountable for ongoing documented human rights violations is, in itself, giving it unwarranted special treatment. Israel’s illegal occupation of Palestinian Territories should be subject to UN scrutiny in the same way that any violation of international law by any state should be subject to scrutiny.

To repair our international image, Canada must let go of the past and develop a principled plan in support of Palestinians for the future.

This article was originally featured on National Newswatch.