Harper tilts Canada to Israel

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      The photograph right comes from a southern suburb of Beirut, where Israel has conducted an extensive bombing campaign. Pictures of death and destruction are also coming out of Northern Israel, where Hezbollah rockets have fallen on an apartment block, a train station, and other civilian targets.

      As the Georgia Straight went to press, there were more than 400 deaths in Lebanon and 40 deaths in Israel since hostilities began. A Canadian was among the four United Nations military observers killed in an Israeli air strike on July 25.

      The United Nations' emergency-relief coordinator, Jan Egeland, told the British Broadcasting Corporation on July 20 that one-third of the dead and injured were children. Independent journalist Dahr Jamail reported on July 25 that 55 percent of all casualties at the Beirut Government University Hospital are children 15 years old and under, according to hospital records.

      UN Secretary General Kofi Annan has called for a cease-fire and talks involving all the parties, including Iran and Syria. So far, Canada has refused to back the plan. Prime Minister Stephen Harper initially described Israel's actions as a “measured response”  to Hezbollah's kidnapping of two Israeli soldiers and the killing of eight others. Harper has continued to side with Israel even after it bombed the Beirut airport and destroyed Lebanon's transportation networks. On July 25, Harper told reporters that he hopes the international community will deal with non-state actors who stockpile weapons and launch attacks in the region.

      Not everyone is impressed. Former Liberal foreign-affairs minister Lloyd Axworthy claimed in a recent Globe and Mail article that Canada “showed reluctance in discharging its basic responsibility to protect thousands of its own citizens trapped by the fighting in Lebanon”  by refusing to endorse a cease-fire. Others have claimed that Harper has abandoned Canada's tradition of maintaining a balanced stance on the Middle East.

      However, there are signs that Harper is articulating a position that was already developing under former Liberal prime minister Paul Martin. In October 2004, Globe and Mail columnist John Ibbitson claimed that unnamed senior government officials were “increasingly angry”  about a “surreptitious shift”  in foreign policy in the Middle East. “Canada, they say, is moving away from a balanced approach in the Middle East in favour of explicit and virtually unqualified support for Israel,”  Ibbitson wrote.

      During Martin's reign, Conservative foreign-affairs critic Stockwell Day repeatedly attacked the Liberal government for not supporting Israel strongly enough. Under Martin, Canada abstained from a UN vote on a resolution criticizing Israel's decision to build a security wall extending into the West Bank.

      A recent Ipsos Reid poll for CanWest News found that 45 percent of Canadians agreed with the statement that Harper's position is “fair and balanced and completely appropriate” , and another 11 percent felt that Harper hasn't expressed enough support for Israel.

      A Pew Research Center survey of residents of 15 countries from March to May of this year demonstrated that Americans had the most sympathy toward Israel. Pew analysts Jodie T. Allen and Alec Tyson recently wrote that 48 percent of Americans supported Israel, compared with just 13 percent of Americans who supported the Palestinians.

      One in three Americans said their support for Israel arose from their religious beliefs. White evangelicals who described themselves as political conservatives were more than three times as likely to back Israel as self-identified “moderate”  evangelicals. A Pew survey in 2003 found that 36 percent of U.S. adults believe that the creation of the state of Israel is a necessary precursor for the second coming of Jesus Christ.

      The recent Pew survey showed that Britons and Spaniards were more supportive of the Palestinians, whereas Germans and Russians were more sympathetic to Israel. The French were evenly divided.

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