You are on page 1of 3

[This letter was widely circulated in July 2014, but has not previously been published.

[Index: Canadian politics, Israel, Palestine]


[Date: July 2014]

Letter to the New Democratic Party on Israel's Attack on Gaza


17 July 2014

Michael Keefer

The Hon. Thomas Mulcair,


Leader of the Opposition,
Leader of the New Democratic Party,
thomas.mulcair@parl.gc.ca
Paul Dewar, MP,
Foreign Affairs Critic,
New Democratic Party,
paul.dewar@parl.gc.ca

Dear Mr. Mulcair and Mr. Dewar,


I am writing to express my dismay over the utter inadequacy of the New
Democratic Party's July 14 statement on the subject of Israel's ongoing attack on Gaza.
This statement gives a grotesquely false impression of the responsibility for the
present violence. You cannot be unaware that in recent months the Israeli government
rejected even the feeble and disingenuous peace proposals advanced by the US Secretary
of State; that Mr. Netanyahu responded with aggressive provocations to the ensuing
announcement of Palestinian unity; and that he withheld the fact that the three kidnapped
Israeli youths had been almost immediately killed both from the public and from their

familiesand did so in order to be able to carry out, under false pretences, a savage
program of repression under the guise of a supposed search for the youths. You must also
be aware that the appalling murder of these three young Israelis was both preceded and
followed by no less appalling murders of Palestinian youths and children, carried out
both by settlers and by the Israeli military.
The launching of home-made Hamas rockets from Gaza into Israel should indeed
be condemned, as should any attack on civilians. But the launching of those rockets was
precededas you know or ought to knowby Israeli attacks on Gaza carried out under
the pretext (for which no evidence has been provided by the Israeli government) that the
Hamas authorities in Gaza were responsible for the murders of the three settler youths in
the West Bank.
Your statement provides no whisper of historical context, and no indication that
the present massacrein which the death toll currently stands at more than 200
Palestinians to one Israelistems from Israel's illegal occupation of Gaza and the West
Bank; its ongoing illegal programs of settlement, colonization, theft of land and
resources; and its brutal treatment of the population held under occupationin conditions
that Professor Eva Illouz of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, who is one of Israel's
most distinguished sociologists, has forcefully argued amount to conditions of slavery.
Would it not have been relevant to mention, at the very least, that since 2006 Israel, with
the Harper government's full-throated support, has subjected the population of Gaza to a
barbarous and illegal blockade?
Your statement does not so much as hint at the illegality under international law of
Israel's airstrikes against the population of Gaza. (On this subject, please read the report
of Human Rights Watch, Israel/Palestine: Unlawful Israeli Airstrikes Kill Civilians [July
15, 2014], which makes it clear that war crimes are being committed.) Nor do you seem
aware that, as on other occasions (most notably the 'Cast Lead' assault on Gaza in
December 2008-January 2009), the Israeli military has deliberately targeted Gaza's
already desperately inadequate water supply and sewage treatment facilities.
Since one foreseeable consequence of this targeting is going to be an increased
mortality among pregnant women, infants and young children in Gaza, it is arguably
genocidal in its implications. I refer you to Article 2 of the UN Convention on Genocide,
in which the imposition of measures calculated to bring about [a group's] physical
destruction in whole or in part, or intended to prevent births within the group,

constitutes a part of the definition of the crime of genocide.


I am forcibly struck by the contrast between the reactions of Canadian and of
British parliamentarians to this crisis. It is noteworthy that in Westminster, members not
just of the opposition Labour Party, but also of the governing Conservative-Liberal
Democrat coalition, have risen in the House of Commons to denounce the illegality and
barbarism of Israel's policies, and in some cases to demand sanctions against the state of
Israel.

(See

Israel

accused

of

war

crimes

[UK

Parliament],

YouTube,

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v-AJWNE83j__k.)
Is the New Democratic Party no longer willing to take a stand on issues of
fundamental human rights, justice, and international law? Has the Opposition in our
parliament been so intimidated by the sleaze machine operated by Mr. Harper's
government and its media allies that it is afraid to speak out on matters that have touched
the conscience of decent people worldwide?
Yours sincerely and respectfully,
Michael Keefer
Professor Emeritus, University of Guelph
mkeefer@uoguelph.ca

You might also like