SoVote

Context: House Hansard - 290 - Mar/18/24

Ms. Leah Gazan (Winnipeg Centre, NDP)

Mar/18/24 5:23:45 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I just want to acknowledge, as somebody with a similar history, that what is going on right now in Palestine and in Israel is very painful and brings up for me a lot of intergenerational trauma. I want to acknowledge that as a fellow human being in the discussion. One of the comments the member made was in response to providing military arms and technology to Israel on a case-by-case basis. I have a problem with that, because Israel is currently being investigated by the ICJ for genocide. Can she explain her rationale for providing arms to Israel when it is being investigated for potential genocide?

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Context: House Hansard - 290 - Mar/18/24

Mr. Brian Masse (Windsor West, NDP)

Mar/18/24 5:59:18 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I appreciate the opportunity to rise in this chamber on this very serious issue. I am proud to have a party that is not afraid and that would not run away from the difficult discussions that have to happen on the fact that this country can play a role of positive influence. Like many people, on October 7, we were horrified to see what Hamas had done. The continued killing of hostages is something we can never recover from in any respect, whatsoever, for the people of Israel, who are continuing to suffer from the loss. We know there has been a political movement, even in Israel itself, to free the hostages as a primary element. I can say that, as horrifying as that day was, further killing is not going to bring back the victims. One really important thing to keep in mind in this debate is that in the past, Canada has made, and can make, a difference. This is a discussion that is happening in many chambers across the world, including the United States most recently, where Senator Chuck Schumer intervened on the issue of Netanyahu, calling him a “major obstacle to peace”. Therefore, it is important to recognize the responsible motion that we have put forward here, calling for several objectives that could make a difference for the victims. I am thinking of my area in Windsor-Detroit where, outside of the Middle East, we have the largest Muslim population and many Palestinians and others. I am thinking of my friend Rashida Tlaib. Every time we have touched base on this issue and on other things, it has always ended with “save lives”. I had a chance to visit with her in Washington, D.C., this past week, and I can tell members again that the message right now is how we can continue to save lives. What Canada needs to do right now is to put further pressure to see this happen. I have been in this chamber and have seen what can take place when Canada goes to the roots of its democracy in this chamber and how it can make a difference. I had a motion on the genocide in Srebrenica that was passed in this chamber. It was done with the Conservatives at that time. Lawrence Cannon, the minister of transport at the time, also took an interest in this. We passed a motion that recognized Srebrenica as a genocide. The reason I raise this as an important factor is that I went to Bosnia and later to Sarajevo. In Sarajevo there is the monument that recognizes the children who were murdered. It has two pillars on the inside and also has an area that goes around it with the footprints of children to recognize their lives that were lost. I went to the Srebrenica–Potočari Memorial. Right now, it recognizes 8,372 victims who have been identified, and each year, 25 years later, there are still more bodies being found and identified because there are 7,000 or more missing. At that time, there were 8,000 Muslim boys, men and youth murdered and massacred in eight days. The world did not act enough at that time, so now it has been called the biggest forensic puzzle in the world. I remember going there after we passed our motion. It is actually recognized in the Canadian Museum for Human Rights. I felt ashamed, basically, that all we could offer at that time was recognition of their suffering as they continued to grieve. I will never forget meeting with the mothers of the genocide victims down at the site. I will never forget when one of them grabbed my arm and thanked me. Meanwhile, that day, she was burying her son and her husband, and all that was left of them were pieces of their arms and shoulders. That is all there was to identify them. She thanked me and presented me with the flower of Srebrenica, which has 11 petals in recognition of that day in July. What happens every year on July 11 now is unbelievable. When I went there, I had to have a bodyguard with me. When that bodyguard went to pray, I had to go into a bunker because of concerns and issues that still take place. There are thousands of people in this graveyard, over 8,000 already, and small coffins are identified. There were over 500 the day I was there, and they are draped. The people refuse to take money from the United Nations or other organizations, and they do this every year. The coffin is passed above the heads of the people standing there. One does not move; the coffin moves. It makes its way, all the way, to the gravesite. I am raising this because lives do matter here, and acting and doing something is more. The longer we wait, the longer we call for a ceasefire, the more suffering there is, and that is not going to bring anybody back. That has to be the primary concern right now. The motion that we have is consistent with what we, as New Democrats, have been calling for since day one, which is to call for the ceasefire. That was, in the days of old, the usual position for Canada, to use our weight to help move others toward more peaceful solutions than what exist right now. Sadly, I know of families who have lost dozens of people in my riding and in other places because they lived together. To get the idea, Gaza itself is the size of Detroit. There is just nowhere people can go to be safe. We know now that starvation issue is at a high-water mark in many respects. People have resorted to eating pigeon food and grass. We have seen a rise of anti-Semitism in the past in this country, and I want to note that. I understand the pain and suffering because I have seen it in my own community, even long before this, when swastikas were painted on sidewalks or in front of people's homes. All that still exists in our society, and it is something we have to continue to fight against every single day. However, we are not going to be able to fix anything until there is a ceasefire. If we could help move other countries in that direction, then we could save lives. That is the most important thing I will continue to resort to in that regard. I have seen pictures of children in Egypt missing limbs, and some in our community are trying to see if they could bring them back here because they now have no other relatives; maybe they have a cousin here. The 1,000 cap is just unbelievably cruel. It is unbelievably cruel to give false hope for even those 1,000 people as they scramble, and we cannot get anybody over here. We talk about the people we are trying to bring here. Just like in the past, who are the Palestinians in my community? They are doctors, lawyers and health care professionals. They are also teachers, and workers. Those are the people contributing right now. The frustration of being helpless in this is very difficult for them and for their families. There is a guilt factor, especially with Ramadan right now. Here, they have access to fasting and have water and food later on. Their relatives or family friends do not know if they can contact them tomorrow, because if there is no cell phone or Internet service, they may not be able to connect with them. It brings me to an important point when it comes to civil society and collectivity, not only here. We have people like Donald Trump saying things like “finish the problem” versus what we have seen in the past, which was Canada using its weight to push the United States to call for ceasefires at different points in time. If we do not exercise that ability here in this chamber with this motion, then what do we stand for? We stand for, basically, calling ourselves out of the international equation of humanitarian relief. We have witnessed churches, synagogues and a mosque being vandalized over the last number of years. If we turn away from this now, as well, we are also going to witness Canada distancing itself from international responsibility where we can help out. Unfortunately, the sad thing about this, as a return, is that we cannot stop the damage done, but we can stop more. That is why I went to Srebrenica, and I want to finish with this. Senad was a Canadian who was from Bosnia and who served in the hospitals. He worked with me on this bill. Sadly, he died of leukemia. When we went there, the strongest message we heard, in our humility, was that at least Canada had a voice and that at least Canada did something. That was better than nothing. It was important enough for them to say thanks.

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Context: House Hansard - 290 - Mar/18/24

Ms. Leah Gazan (Winnipeg Centre, NDP)

Mar/18/24 6:55:40 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I rise today to speak on a human rights and humanitarian crisis in Palestine and Israel. I thank my colleagues for tabling this motion. I encourage all members in the chamber to not turn a blind eye to the current ethnic cleansing happening and the serious violations of international law in Palestine. As members of Parliament, we cannot forget that our decisions have wide-reaching consequences and can often make the difference between life and death. The death toll in Gaza, caused by Netanyahu's bombardment and ground offensive, has now climbed to over 30,000 people since October 7. It is estimated that over 70% of them are women and children. When we treat the loss of human beings as mere casualties, as numbers to be forgotten, we lose our own humanity. It is a testament to the compassion of so many people in Canada and their sustained advocacy all winter that we are here today, calling on our leaders not to remain complicit in the face of what is being investigated as a potential genocide in the International Court of Justice. The horrific terrorist attack of October 7 by Hamas, and Netanyahu's response to collectively punish the people of Gaza, who bear no responsibility for the terrorism of October 7, must be condemned. I am proud of my Jewish heritage, and I am lifting up calls for peace along with other Jewish voices, like the heroic Vivian Silver, a 74-year-old Israeli Canadian peace activist who spent her life working towards a just peace in Palestine, provided specialized medical care in the West Bank and Gaza, and tragically lost her life during the October 7 attack in Israel by Hamas. Like her son, Yonatan Zeigen, I never lose sight of continuing the legacy of my father, Albert Gazan, a Holocaust survivor from Holland, who fought for a just peace and a livable world where all people are able to live in dignity and with human rights. I echo what Yonatan shared so powerfully when asked what his mother would think about what was happening in Gaza. He said, “She would be mortified, because you can't cure killed babies with more dead babies. We need peace. That's what she was working for all her life.” Like his mother, my father spent his whole life working for peace, and he would have agreed with what Yonatan Zeigen shared, because he understood that no amount of killing would have ever healed the trauma and loss that he experienced as a result of the Holocaust. The only thing that would relieve his pain was to know that what happened to him would never happen again, but it is happening again. In fact, his cause for a just peace was so profound that, just before he died, he sat down with my adopted uncle, Jim Kinzel, to help write his eulogy. He wanted to ensure he would leave the world sharing his final teachings about humanity, human rights and peace. I share his words with the House today. Being born to Jewish parents in Holland, my father was just two years old when the Nazis invaded Holland and was soon separated from our family and forced into hiding for years. He had to take on a new name and relocate several times. By the end of the Holocaust, of the hundred or so of our extended family members, only five survived. I will never forget the story of when my father visited his uncle in the hospital shortly after the war. His uncle, who had lost his pregnant wife and all five children, began screaming and crying uncontrollably upon seeing my father. He could not live with the fact that he had survived and they had not. I think about the thousands of Palestinians who will never see their loved ones again, many of whom will grow up almost devoid of family as a result of genocide, as my sister and I did. It was very lonely. My father was also an advocate of peace. At six years old, while alone and in hiding, he threw a rock at a sparrow and killed it. He immediately felt terrible and realized that was wrong, pledging to never kill again. He knew that nothing could justify the death of an innocent being. He carried this belief with him throughout his life, and while he hated Germany for the genocide it committed against our family, his retribution was to beat the German boys at soccer. When later asked his opinion on what was happening in Israel and Palestine, he talked about injustices on both sides and did not fear criticizing the State of Israel. “The only way to leave Auschwitz behind me was to become a citizen of the world,” he said. He would not kill the sparrow, regardless of what it looked like. Today, Palestinians are being killed indiscriminately with weapons provided by many countries, likely including military goods and technology made in Canada in violation of our obligations under the Arms Trade Treaty. The people of Gaza are starving in part because the Canadian government suspended aid and refuses to push Israel to allow life-saving aid trucks in. I am reminded of what my father always said about refusing to share resources with people in need, “Stop the dialogue if anyone suggests that there is not enough room in the lifeboat for everyone, because the next thing to discuss is who gets thrown out. And then we are back on the road to Auschwitz.” It is the memory of my father, Albert Gazan, that inspires me to support this motion to end the injustices being committed in Palestine through the following measures: an immediate ceasefire and release of all hostages; suspending all trade in military arms and technology with Israel and increased efforts to stop the illegal trade of arms, including to Hamas; ensuring long-term funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency in Palestine; supporting the prosecution of all crimes and violations of international law, including by the International Court of Justice and the International Criminal Court; ensuring that the Canadians trapped in Gaza are safely evacuated and lifting the arbitrary limit of 1,000 applications under the temporary resident visa; demanding the supply of continuous humanitarian aid to Gaza; banning extremist settlers from Canada and imposing sanctions on officials who incite genocide; advocating an end to the occupation of Palestine; and officially recognizing the state of Palestine. In memory of my father, I am saying, “Not in our name.” I urge others with common histories of genocide to not let our pain overshadow our shared humanity. I ask my fellow parliamentarians to vote in favour of this motion to put an end to the violence and work for peace and justice for all people in Palestine and Israel. “Never again” means never again for everyone.

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Context: House Hansard - 290 - Mar/18/24

Ms. Leah Gazan

Mar/18/24 7:04:34 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, I actually visited Anne Frank House when I was in Amsterdam. My dad was a Dutch Jew from Holland, and when I went, a number of years ago, to visit Anne Frank House, I was really moved. Human rights are human rights; human beings are human beings, and the suffering of one is the suffering of all. I cannot discriminate between whose suffering was worse, that caused by the Holocaust or what we are seeing now. “Never again” means never again. I do not like the fact that I know there are going to be so many Palestinian children who are going to grow up lonely, like I have. I have no family because of genocide: five relatives, including my father. It is lonely. There are no big holiday dinners. That is what I am thinking about, not whose fault it is. Genocide is genocide. The rule of law is the rule of law. Following international law is following international law. I know that in the Jewish community we have differences that come from a place of deep pain and loss. I lift that pain up and I carry it every single day, but we need to come together in our collective humanity. When is this going to end in the world? When are we going to stop killing each other in the name of victory? I support my father, Albert Gazan. I am proud to be his daughter, and I am proud to stand today in support of a free Palestine and in support of a just peace for all people throughout the world. I am Albert Gazan's daughter.

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Context: House Hansard - 290 - Mar/18/24

Ms. Leah Gazan

Mar/18/24 7:07:56 p.m.
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Mr. Speaker, that is one of the reasons we are calling for an immediate arms embargo. Why are we providing arms to a state that is being investigated for a potential genocide? I know what genocide feels like. I know what genocide feels like because of my father, because of my grandmother, who survived Auschwitz. It destroys families. It rids people of histories. I know what genocide looks like in Canada. It rids one of one's family. It creates this space of loneliness, and for what? Who is winning here? All I see, when I look at both sides, are people dying, kids starving to death and sexual violence. It is bad. It is wrong. I see, daily, a violation of international human rights law. We are talking about human beings. I do not care. These are human beings, deserving of freedom, love, dignity, safety and peace. Free Palestine.

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