44th Parl. 1st Sess.
October 16, 2023 11:00AM
- Oct/16/23 11:12:24 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, there is only one way for me to start my intervention tonight, and that is by taking a moment to reflect on the victims of the violence over the last few days. I am talking about both Israeli and Palestinian victims, on Israeli soil and Palestinian soil and elsewhere in the world. I will come back to that second aspect.
Alongside my colleagues in the House who have spoken with one voice, I, too, send my condolences to all those who have lost a loved one in the violence. My thoughts go out to those who have been kidnapped and injured, and to all those who still fear for their lives. Yes, it has been said many times already, but it cannot be said too often.
Similarly, everyone in the House has stressed the importance of condemning the actions of Hamas. Again, it bears repeating. Again, it cannot be overstated. Hamas is a terrorist entity. Canada has designated it as such, and the Bloc Québécois supports that designation. Indiscriminate attacks against Israeli civilians, women, men, the elderly, children and babies, are in no way justifiable.
From the perspective of a Parliament that is speaking with one voice, I commend the leader of the Bloc Québécois for taking the initiative to ask for periodic meetings between the leaders of the different parties in the House so that they can ensure that the different political entities' messaging is as aligned as possible and that the current conflict does not become a source of partisan polarization.
Speaking of messaging, I admit that one of my biggest fears right now about what is going on in Israel is that the positions taken by various members will be polarizing. I hope that, here in the House, we will do our best to avoid taking a black-and-white view of the conflict. On the contrary, I hope that we will all be able to have a nuanced discussion.
Again, I commend all parliamentarians who spoke this evening. They all denounced the fact that there are civilian victims on both sides. They all denounced the actions of Hamas, and they all called for a humanitarian corridor to be established in order to avoid causing more civilian casualties. Listening to this evening's speeches, we could sense the members' genuine empathy for all those who are suffering because of this conflict, regardless of their origins or their religion.
This all-encompassing, unconditional empathy can only come from a nuanced discourse, which I hope will help us set an example for the public and put a stop to demonstrations of hatred directed against either group. Unfortunately, we have seen such acts in France, and in the United States, for example, where a six-year-old child was just murdered. We saw it again earlier today in Belgium. They are all collateral victims of the polarization of the situation. The onus is on every single one of us to condemn the hatred that exists outside Israeli and Palestinian territory. We must not fan the flames.
There was a Radio-Canada article this week with the headline Sale temps pour les pacifistes, hard times for pacifists. It recounted stories of long-standing friendships, unlikely friendships between Israelis and Palestinians living in Quebec, friendships driven by the desire to see the two nations one day live in peace. Unfortunately, these friendships are currently being put to the test. Clearly, it is because of the situation on the ground in Israel and Palestine, but it is also because of the hateful demonstrations happening elsewhere in the world that deserve condemnation. The longer the situation in Gaza drags on, the more civilians will lose their lives, and the more I fear that polarization will get worse, bringing even more hatred in its wake.
We all know that it is futile to make any demands of Hamas. A terrorist organization that uses its own people as a human shield has no regard for civilian lives. It has committed unspeakable massacres. War may be an ugly thing, but it has rules, and Hamas has not complied with any of them. Its attack in no way resembled a military intervention. It was pure carnage, a wanton act of brutality calculated to sow terror.
That is why, this evening, members are primarily addressing their requests to the Israeli government, urging it to set up a humanitarian corridor.
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said earlier this week that Israel has the right—indeed it has the obligation—to defend itself against these attacks from Hamas and to try to do what it can to make sure that this never happens again, but he added that the way Israel does this matters. As democracies, we are held to higher standards.
Tonight, the Israeli government is being called upon to respect the rules of international humanitarian law, as any democracy must do.
For one thing, the protection of civilian lives is obviously at stake. If nothing is done in the short term, the complete siege of Gaza with no possibility of delivering aid will inevitably result in more loss of life. Because of the blockade, electricity cannot be produced at Gaza's only power station, which has cut the supply of drinking water. Forced to drink sea water, Gazans will see their mortality rate rise sharply.
Without a humanitarian corridor, medical personnel no longer have access to medical equipment to treat the wounded, and the wounded no longer have access to pain medication to ease their suffering. Even though breaks in the bombardments are announced on stretches of roads intended to evacuate civilians, the absence of telephone and Internet networks in the Gaza Strip means that people are not necessarily notified in time for these breaks, or may not be notified at all.
It is also unlikely that the people of Gaza can travel the required distances within the allotted time. Children and seniors cannot travel very quickly, and injured people who are hospitalized and babies in incubators, for example, cannot easily be moved. Adding to these difficulties is the fact that Hamas is holding back the people of Gaza and preventing them from leaving, once again using them as hostages and human shields. The Israeli government cannot ignore these factors when considering its respect for international humanitarian law.
Also, if the Government of Israel refuses to set up a corridor, I am concerned that the resulting losses will serve to breed more hate. As it has been mentioned, Hamas must be eradicated from Gaza because, otherwise, there will never be any political peace in the region and it will be impossible to negotiate a two-state solution. It is one thing to wipe out Hamas's military capability, ensure that its leaders are eliminated and annihilate its power for physical destruction, which is the objective announced by the Government of Israel, but we also need to ensure that the very idea of Hamas, its disembodied form, is eradicated. If civilian casualties continue to multiply in Palestinian territory, that will only fuel the beast. Hamas, although it cares nothing for civilian life, could fuel the narrative of non-compliance with international humanitarian law in order to breed hate for Israel. It would not be the first time. We might then fear that October 7 was just the beginning or that the unfortunately all-too-familiar cycle will start all over again in four or five years.
Israel has just experienced a tragedy of immeasurable proportions. I cannot even begin to imagine the pain. Tonight, for the sake of the civilian lives that may yet be spared and the possibility that the region may one day live in peace, Canadian parliamentarians are calling on the Israeli government to abide by international law and establish a humanitarian corridor.
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- Oct/16/23 11:22:09 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I think that any measures that will spare civilian lives must be considered and, ideally, implemented by Israel, because Hamas cannot be expected to do so.
I nevertheless remain realistic. If we want to prevent this from happening again in the future, if we want to entertain the prospect of peace, Hamas also must be eliminated. If there were some way to do this without any loss of human life, it would have been done by now. That is why I am calling for Israel to conduct the strictest possible analysis of everything that can be done to minimize civilian casualties in accordance with humanitarian law.
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- Oct/16/23 11:24:32 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Edmonton Strathcona for her question and for her always rousing pleas on behalf of civilians and all those who are in difficult situations, who are experiencing war. I know she cares a lot about that, and I thank her for her work in that regard.
I do not claim to have an answer for her, unfortunately, and I think that it would be wrong for anyone, particularly any outsider, to claim that they have an answer to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which did not start just a few days ago but has been going on for a long time now.
In this context, I cannot imagine, as an outsider myself, coming in and imposing a solution. That is why I was careful not to do so in my speech. I was careful not to impose a solution but to instead suggest limits for a government. I want to make the distinction here between the Government of Israel and the people of Israel because, right now, as we know, the government is more right-wing than it has ever been.
We can hope that, in the near future, both Hamas and the Government of Israel will have to make changes. In that context, I was careful not to suggest a solution. I think it would be presumptuous on my part to do so. Instead, I chose to make suggestions that would set limits on the actions taken by Israel. What we are asking Israel to do is to minimize as much as possible anything that could lead to the loss of civilian life. If that involves a ceasefire, then all the better.
I hope that the analysis will be done because I would like to believe that Israel, unlike Hamas, takes absolutely no pleasure in killing innocent civilians. That is why I am not responding directly to my colleague's question. I am sad to do so because, personally, I was hoping for a ceasefire. However, I am not in a position to impose a solution to a very complex conflict.
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- Oct/16/23 11:28:25 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, the short answer is yes. From the outside, the two-state solution is the one I see as the best, but, once again, this is with all the nuance and reserve one must have when perceiving the conflict from the outside. As has been said several times this evening, the two-state solution is not possible as long as Hamas still exists, hence the importance of eliminating Hamas.
To build on a point from the previous question, one of the fears associated with an immediate ceasefire, for example, is that the problem will simply be put off until later. If steps are not taken to eliminate Hamas and ensure that there is fertile ground for political negotiations, which cannot happen with Hamas, human lives may be saved in the short term, but the body count could be even higher in the long term. This is a perfect example of a catch-22. There is no ideal solution to the current conflict. If there were one that would eliminate Hamas while preserving all human lives, it would already have been implemented.
I feel a bit pessimistic with that answer, but at the same time I am perhaps somewhat realistic as well. Unfortunately, realism cannot go by the wayside when we are looking at situations such as this one here tonight.
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- Oct/16/23 11:30:51 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, as I mentioned a little bit in my speech, I think that two of the actions that can be taken have already been taken by parliamentarians. The purpose of the question was to determine what parliamentarians can do. On the one hand, we must condemn the situation, which we have done unanimously. We must condemn the hateful demonstrations that occurred in various places and the individual hateful comments that are made by the public. We must transcend the debate and lead by example, which I believe we more or less achieved this evening. For the most part the remarks were nuanced and the violence was condemned, and there is a will to protect all civilian lives, regardless of whether they are Palestinian or Israeli and regardless of their religion. I think that is a step in the right direction.
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