The Government of Canada continues to maintain its strong support of Israel, in the face of growing sympathy for the terrorists, not just among the expected segments of the population, but also from rival political parties, whose hysteria continues to increase with each passing day.
Harper rejects moral equivalence between Israel and terrorists
Prime Minister Stephen Harper delivered a strong message of support for Israel last week and rejected criticism his government had shifted Canada away from its traditional role as an honest broker between Israel and its adversaries.
Paraphrasing on several occasions a statement by former British prime minister Winston Churchill, Harper said Canada would not remain neutral between a fellow democracy and a terrorist organization.
“What we refuse to do is to be drawn into a moral equivalence between a pyromaniac and a fireman,” Harper stated in a telephone interview with [the Canadian Jewish News].
Israel is well within its rights to defend itself from Hezbollah, a terrorist organization bent on using violence to destroy Israel. If a terrorist organization crossed Canadian borders, kidnapped our soldiers and hurled missiles at our population centres, Canada would do the same as Israel, “fight back,” the prime minister said.
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He said Canada should not treat a democratic state like Israel the same as terrorist organizations such as Hezbollah and Hamas...
It is unreasonable to engage in dialogue with Hamas and Hezbollah as if they were democratic states. “Hamas and Hezbollah resort to violence not as a tactic, but as a matter of principle,” Harper said
Asked if he stood by his comments that Israel’s response to the Hezbollah attack was “measured,” the prime minister said that statement was made early in the crisis, which has turned into “a full-blown conflict.” Speaking before the attack on Qana, in which at least 54 civilians were killed, he said Israel has the right to respond to Hezbollah attacks and defend itself.
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Opinion polls released over the weekend suggest the Conservative Party has lost political support in Quebec, British Columbia and Atlantic Canada, likely as a result of Harper’s position on the Middle East.....
Harper said the government’s position on the Middle East was “principled and in the best interests of this country. We’re not concerned with opinion polls. We take what we feel is the right position.”...
Tension over Harper's unequivocal stand seems to be greatest in the province of Quebec, long a bastion of anti-semitism in Canada. The separatist provincial party, Le Parti Quebecois, along with Le Bloc Quebecois, the "national" separatist party, which sits in Ottawa and plots to sever our nation, are taking the leading position in Canadian politics anti-Israel's sweepstakes: which party can make itself the most attractive to Canada's (and in this case, Quebec's) unrepentently anti-semitic voters?
Montreal Demonstration Takes On Anti-Israel Tone
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Members of Montreal's large Lebanese community joined a coalition of 60 groups representing labour, student, ethnic and human rights organizations and several high-profile politicians in calling on Prime Minister Stephen Harper to join other G-8 countries in demanding an immediate ceasefire on both sides
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Some carried placards in support of Hezbollah and the group's leader Hassan Nasrallah, and others chanted "Vive Hezbollah."
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Estimates put the crowd at between 15,000 and 25,000. Speakers included Bloc Quebecois Leader Gilles Duceppe and Andre Boisclair, head of the Parti Quebecois....
....The three opposition parties have made Harper's foreign policy the centre of attention, lending support to protesters who oppose the government's support of Israel.
On Parliament Hill on Saturday, Bloc Quebecois MP Richard Nadeau joined marchers and compared Israel's recent actions in the Gaza Strip to "genocide."
"As far as I know, in Gaza, there's one victim, one group of people who are victims, at present," Nadeau said. "One would only have to take a trip there, to see who the victims are and see who is perpetuating this military force that is completely disproportionate."
"You just can't make up stuff and talk in code," Harper said. "If the opposition wants to talk in code and is neutral about Hezbollah, let them say that."
Each day it seems that our fight for what is right reveals ever increasing odds, but what an inspiration it is to have a leader who is actually **on your side** in this fight!
I'm just not used to stark moral clarity in a Canadian political leader anymore.... God Bless Stephen Harper, Prime Minister of Canada.
Everyone knows that the road to Harper's hoped -for majority goes through Quebec where he has to pick up more seats next time. So to stand clearly with Israel, when most politicians would hem and haw to please the Quebecois is the sign of a man with a moral backbone. Harper knows that the free nations have to act as securities for each other in a war that is as much about destroying leftist imperialist White Guilt as it is the Jihadists. In this he shows much more courage and sense than anon. And he is doing much more to prepare our culture for the war that has come to us than our false tough guys/ false realists with vulgar tongues. As someone smarter than I said the other day, the surest way to lose touch with reality is to become a realist (here). Harper is acting into and engaging reality, and that is always sure to get many Canadians in a flap.
ReplyDeleteInteresting that the article claims the death toll at Qana was "at least" 54- NOT the actual confirmed figure of 28.
ReplyDeleteGotta slip that Hezbollah propaganda in there somewhere.
Anon,
ReplyDeleteIf you'd like to "see those jihadi fuckheads die in the thousands" then why are you using the typical Candian insulting language about Bush "playing cowboy?"
Maybe the answer for Canada is to build and army and start learning to play cowboy like a responsible nation. You know, in any other time in the history of man, a nation which could not defend itself would be looked down upon, and likely taken over by a larger nation. In our current time, nations who can't take care of themselves are held up in high esteem, and they proclaim their weakness as high moral authority.
Do you feel good about that?
One small step at a time; first we have to believe in something worth fighting for, then can come the armed forces prepared to fight for it.
ReplyDeleteWe mustn't become like the left, so lacking in faith in ourselves and our fellow human beings, that we sanctify our beliefs only through number of fellow travelers. Sometimes right is right, even if there are only a few who believe it; even if there's only one. I'm sure the brave souls who sheltered Jews from the nazi death machine didn't do a headcount in their town or village before deciding to do right. They risked their family's necks as well as potentially putting their own head in a noose, such was their faith in the righteousness of their cause.
Anon, you can't really believe our cause is right if you're so willing to abandon it, and so unable to appreciate a positive step in the right direction to bring us closer to victory.
And vulgarity is no shortcut to persuasiveness, by the way...