Do we side with democracy and peace, or do we capitulate to the demands of terror?
It’s become crystal clear why there have been four ministers of foreign affairs in the past five years under the Trudeau government: it is are a rudderless ship with no vision for how Canada should be represented on the world stage. The prime minister’s leadership has been catastrophic for Canadian foreign policy.
The Liberals have failed to meet our NATO commitments, leaving our allies questioning our ability and our resolve. They’ve failed to stand with our Israeli allies, who are facing an existential threat. They’ve left Canada’s image degraded, tarnished and nearing the point of total collapse.
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It seems that their only foreign policy goals are to win domestic favour. When I was head of JSpaceCanada, a Canadian diplomat told me that Global Affairs Canada’s direction to new postings in Israel or Ramallah was that their job in the region wasn’t to manage Canadian foreign policy — it was to mitigate domestic politics.
It has indeed been a failure of leadership on every level. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s failure, and it is his to bear, has been a failure to provide clear moral leadership. In doing so, he has created a vacuum. Nature abhors a vacuum. So do voters. So they fill it. In this case, it’s being filled by radical politics more akin to the Soviet Union’s foreign policy of the 1980s than our liberal democratic allies of today.
The NDP’s motion on Canadian policy toward the Israel-Hamas war, which will be up for a vote in the House of Commons on Monday, isn’t just a minor product of this failure, it’s a catastrophic one — a seismic shift that threatens to upend 50 years of Canadian foreign policy grounded in the pursuit of peace through a negotiated settlement over the Israel-Palestine conflict.
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This isn’t mere political manoeuvring, it’s playing with fire — a gamble with stakes too high and outcomes too grim to contemplate. Let’s be clear: no one desires war. Israel, our steadfast ally in a tumultuous region, least of all. This war is with Hamas, not the Palestinian people — a fact that Israel does not equivocate on.
The horrors of conflict and the suffering of Gazans under the yoke of Hamas’s belligerence are tragedies that cannot be overstated. Yet, amidst this turmoil, Israel is committed to increasing aid. The expedited construction of a roadway in northern Gaza to facilitate aid, collaboration with Jordan and Egypt to expedite assistance and the convening of aid organizations for efficient delivery, all attest to Israel’s earnest efforts to mend the wounds of war, not deepen them.
However, the NDP’s motion undermines these noble endeavours, misguidedly championing a unilateral recognition of a Palestinian state — a gesture that serves as a trophy to Hamas’s campaign of nihilistic violence.
Such a move doesn’t just reward terror, it legitimizes it, emboldening Hamas as the de facto voice of the Palestinian cause, to the detriment of the Palestinian Authority’s already waning influence. This isn’t support for peace, it’s an endorsement of Hamas’s strategic objectives, an action that’s diametrically opposed to the assertion that Hamas, a recognized terrorist organization, must never be allowed to lead.
Further complicating this debacle is NDP MP Don Davies’ tweet suggesting there is an equivalence between the innocent Israeli civilians who are being held under barbaric conditions by Hamas and the Palestinians who are being held by the Israeli justice system on terrorism charges.
There is no justifiable comparison between perpetrators of terrorism who were arrested under Israeli law, and toddlers and the elderly taken hostage by Hamas on Oct. 7. Israeli prisoners have the right to access lawyers, to contact their families, to health care and to a trial in a court of law — none of which are afforded to the Israeli hostages being held in Gaza.
This isn’t foreign policy, it’s laundering Hamas propaganda through the halls of Canadian democracy, a dangerous false equivalency that dehumanizes the victims of the Oct. 7 massacre and emboldens the terrorists who are responsible for it.
And where does the Liberal government stand amidst this unfolding saga? Its tepid response is a far cry from the robust support one might expect for an ally in distress. If the Liberals stand for anything, this must be their red line. The Canadian public watches closely, their judgment poised to weigh heavily on a government that folds when its principles are tested.
The crux of the matter, the heart around which all else orbits, is the precipice on which Canadian foreign policy teeters. For half a century, Canada has championed a two-state solution brokered through dialogue and mutual concessions. This motion, if passed, doesn’t just tilt at windmills, it dynamites the very foundation of this longstanding policy, granting a victory to terrorists and making this beleaguered Liberal government look weak.
This decision transcends partisan lines and political calculations. It’s a question of who we are as a nation and what we stand for on the global stage. Do we side with democracy and peace, or do we capitulate to the demands of terror?
The answer must be clear, resolute and unwavering: MPs must reject this motion, affirm our alliance with Israel and uphold the principles of negotiated peace that have guided our foreign policy for decades. Anything less is a concession to terror, a betrayal of our values and a dark omen for the future of international diplomacy.
National Post
Joe Roberts is managing director of Winston Wilmont Public Affairs and chair of Meretz Canada.
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