Transcript
Speaker: Hello and welcome to today's episode of Red Eye. I'm Jane Williams. In this episode I'm joined by Thomas Woodley of Canadians for Peace and Justice in the Middle East to talk about Canada's silence about the bombardment of the civilian population in Gaza.
Speaker: Israel has declared war on Hamas following a surprise attack on Israel last Saturday. Hamas fired 5 ,000 rockets and used ground fighters to capture areas in Israel, resulting in over 900 Israeli deaths, 2400 wounded, and as many as 150 people captured.
Speaker: Israel retaliated with a total siege of Gaza and a bombing campaign against Gaza and the occupied West Bank, killing and wounding thousands of Palestinians. Members of the Trudeau government and the Prime Minister himself have expressed full support for Israel and remained silent on the devastating airstrikes on the Gaza Strip.
Speaker: I'm joined now by Thomas Woodley, President of Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East. Hello, Tom, and thanks so much for being on the show today. Great to be here, Jane. Thanks for having me. Let's start with the Canadian government. What has it been saying about the attack on Israel?
Speaker: Well, as you mentioned a moment ago, there have been a number of tweets and an official statement from the Prime Minister, where indeed he commits full support to Israel. And he says, Canadians stand with you. Canadian government stands ready to support Israel. Our support for the Israeli people is steadfast and things like that. Melanie Jolie has echoed similar sentiments, as has Christia Freeland, the Deputy Prime Minister.
Speaker: But so far, not a single statement about the Palestinians or about protection of the Palestinians or a de -escalation of the siege of Gaza. Now, the CJPME says that both Hamas and Israel have committed grave violations of international law. Could you say more about that?
Speaker: Yeah, so under international law, resistance movements are allowed to carry out armed resistance against colonial domination or foreign domination. This is law that was established in the 60s and 70s and 80s whereby you had a lot of countries that were still colonial dominions and they were seeking freedom from those dominions.
Speaker: So Hamas or any other resistance group does have the right to carry out armed resistance, but it must be focused on military targets. So when Hamas exited Gaza and attacked military installations, it wasn't a violation of international law. However, when Hamas then went into towns and villages and started killing civilians and started taking hostages, that is obviously strictly against international law, obviously deserves to be condemned.
Speaker: Israel as a state actor likewise has obligations on international law and even when you're acting in self -defense, as Israel is saying it is doing, there's a number of principles, the most important two of which are perhaps what they call the principle of discrimination, where you need to discriminate between combatants and civilians.
Speaker: And the second is proportionality. So Israel and its retaliation against Gaza has, to all appearances, not discriminated between civilian targets and combatants. I've heard phrases in the media, entire neighborhoods have been leveled, residential buildings have been brought down, apartment buildings have been brought down. So it's clearly not a military offensive, which is trying to discriminate between civilians and militants.
Speaker: with the proportionality of, you know, if history is any indicator in past flare -ups of violence, there have been between 10 Palestinian deaths for every Israeli death and up to 100 Palestinian deaths for every Israeli death. If we look at past conflicts, Operation Cast Lead in 2008, 2009, Israel's War on Gaza in 2014, so if the history is any indication, we could be in the
Speaker: thousands, if not tens of thousands of Palestinian deaths. And this is just, you know, this type of retaliation, just blind retaliation is just obviously very much in violation of international law. What does the Geneva Convention say about civilians who are trapped in a conflict zone like the people in Gaza, the people in the West Bank? For Geneva Conventions, of course, they are international law, which apply during times of war and occupation.
Speaker: A lot of the fortunately conventions apply to civilians and protection of civilians. And so under situations of war and occupation, civilians are supposed to be allowed to flee the hostilities. In the case of Gaza, it's an enclosed enclave. Neither Egypt nor Israel will allow them.
Speaker: to leave either by land or by sea. They're also supposed to be able to have continued access to the necessities of life, food, water, medical assistance, and so on. Israel so far has not allowed that. They're talking about total siege. They've literally said we will not let water, food, fuel in. So that's very much a violation of the principle of protection of civilians during times of war and occupation.
Speaker: What's the political context within Israel and within Palestine that these attacks and the retaliation are happening in?
Speaker: Quite often when these things happen, the media sort of take an approach that history just started yesterday. Of course, the history goes back several decades. A good reference point would be 1948 when the UN voted to allow the creation of a Jewish state in historic Palestine. But in creating, and some people now refer to Israel as a colonial state because while there were Jewish people living there, the population at the time was predominantly Palestinian indigenous Palestinians.
Speaker: The UN partition plan had actually said that any Arab living in what was to become the Jewish state could remain, and any Jew living in what was to become the Arab state could remain there. But of course, there was war, and 700 ,000 Palestinians became refugees. Many of them lost their homes. The Palestinians that remained in Israel became second -class citizens. So this has gone on for decades. In 1967, Israel invaded the West Bank and Gaza. They were previously held by Jordan and Egypt.
Speaker: So palestinians have lived literally for decades under israeli military occupation and it's not benign occupation you have checkpoints and closures and road crossings and israeli military everywhere and i actually there was a young man palestinian man who is living in nablus who came and visited us several years ago and he was in a program at mcgill university where they were there along with
Speaker: students from Israel and students from Jordan. I said, what's it like to meet Israeli students? And he said, you know, the only Israeli I've met in my life is an Israeli soldier. And so it's in that context of Palestinians want their freedom. They want their human rights. There are all sorts of violations, day -to -day violations of Palestinian human rights. They're not allowed to move freely the way they want. They're not able to import and export.
Speaker: And Israel has been establishing what they call settlements, basically colonies in these Palestinian territories. It's not something that happened 50 years ago or 70 years ago and something that's happening every single day where Palestinians continue to lose their land. They continue to not be able to exercise their political rights and their civil rights and their human rights. And so obviously this creates a lot of frustration, a lot of anger. And so that's sort of what Palestinians face on a day -to -day basis.
Speaker: What are you calling on the Canadian government to do at this point? Obviously, we're asking Canada to put pressure on Israel to respect international law as they pursue whatever military offensive they plan on pursuing, to discriminate between civilians and militants, to make sure that their response is proportional.
Speaker: very much afraid on both of those points. And just earlier this afternoon, we issued a press statement calling on Canada to push for an ICC and ICJ investigation in Palestine, Israel.
Speaker: an ICC, so the International Criminal Court, the ICC, an investigation was launched in 2021, and Canada has opposed that. The ICC is there to pursue the actual leaders of, whether it's a country or a militant group, actually hold those leaders accountable for whatever crimes they may have authorized.
Speaker: So the ICC was asked to investigate the 2014 Israeli war on Gaza, and not singling out Israel, but investigate potential war crimes and war criminals on both sides. So it wasn't partisan, it was on both sides.
Speaker: And Canada had actually wrote to the ICC and they said, we don't think you should pursue this investigation. I don't know why Canada would be against the investigation unless they just unilaterally wanted to protect Israel from those guys because it wasn't protecting the Palestinians. It was both sides. Then similarly, late last year, the UN Commission of Inquiry on Israel -Palestine
Speaker: suggested that the UN General Assembly asked the ICJ to provide an advisory opinion on Israel's occupation of the Palestinian territories and whether or not the occupation was illegal. Now, it may sound unusual to your listeners as to why we're saying, is the occupation illegal? Because so often people hear, oh, the occupation is illegal.
Speaker: Well, so occupation is allowed under international law, but it's meant to be temporary. I mean, the United States and the allies in World War II, they temporarily occupied Germany, but they're not still there 70 years later. In Israel's case, they occupied the Palestinian territories in 1967, and they're still there, and they have no intention of leaving, it seems, and they're establishing colonies there. And so, whereas there's a certain acceptance of occupation after it becomes so prolonged, then you start saying, well, this actually doesn't sound like occupation, this sounds like annexation.
Speaker: and annexation is against international law. The acquisition of territory by force is against international law. So the ICJ has been asked to look at that and determine whether or not that's illegal and what course of action the international community should take. So just earlier this afternoon, we asked that Canada actually
Speaker: express its support for an investigation by each of these bodies. Again, with the ICJ investigation, Canada wrote a letter to them saying, we don't think you should investigate. From CJPME's perspective, we're about international law and equal expectations of all. The rules apply to all, friend or foe. So let's have the ICC go in there, let's have the ICJ go in there, and let's let these legal experts tell us who's done wrong and who hasn't and what should be done, who should be sanctioned, who should be brought to trial.
Speaker: Well, thank you so much, Tom, for speaking with me today. And I'll point people towards your website so that they can check out for more information there. Thank you. It's really been a pleasure speaking with you, Jane. Thanks for having me. I've been speaking with Thomas Woodley. He's president of Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East. And their website is cjpme .org.
Speaker: The Red Eye Collective is based in Vancouver. You can check us out at coopradio .org slash redeye.
