'Independent Jewish Voices'

"Our politicians cannot be complacent in these marble hallways while Israel continues to burn Palestinians alive in their tents."

"Canada's ongoing arms exports and diplomatic support make it complicit in these atrocities."

Niall Ricardo, Independent Jewish Voices Canada 

"Their actions represent an egregious distortion of Jewish values and a calculated attempt to hijack Jewish identity to serve a hateful anti-Zionist and antisemitic agenda."

"We refuse to remain silent as Independent Jewish Voices and their partners recklessly endanger Jewish Canadians by perpetuating lies and fomenting hostility."

"Their shameful antics today, which trivialize genocide and vilify Israel, undermine Jewish safety and foster the very antisemitism they claim to oppose."

Joint statement of  19 Jewish groups in Canada

Members of the Parliamentary Protective Service and Ottawa Police Service detain members of an antiwar protest that occupied the lobby of the Confederation Building on Tuesday morning. The building houses MPs' offices. (Raffy Boudjikanian/CBC)

 

Canada's exports of arms and military equipment to Israel has never been other than peripheral to actual military equipment as in lethal weaponry. Months ago, Melanie Joly, Canada's minister of foreign affairs announced that her government was placing all such 'military equipment' on hold until the cessation of the Israel-Gaza/Hamas conflict. "Our policy has been clear," she said. "Since Jan. 8, we have not accepted any form of arms export permits to be sent to Israel."

 

Weapons permits by non-governmental weapons producers in Canada have also been suspended. Canada's Liberal government is quite a bit ahead of these shameful 'Jewish' action groups demanding that Canada completely isolate Israel from Canadian military exports. Canada through this Liberal government abandonment of an ally at war, has nothing to be proud of. Perhaps they chose to overlook that Canada buys missiles manufactured in Israel, along with indispensable radar equipment.

“For some reason, (Foreign Minister Melanie Joly) forgot that in the last decade, the Canadian Defense Ministry purchased Israeli weapon systems worth more than a billion dollars,” according to an analysis by the Jerusalem Post, which noted that Israeli military technology is “protecting Canadian pilots, fighters, and naval combatants around the world.”

National Post

A member of the Swiss army walks past an Israeli-made Spike LR2 Long-Range Missile on March 21, 2024. A version of the Spike LR2 was recently fast-tracked by Canada for its troops in Latvia. Photo by STEFAN WERMUTH / AFP

This past Tuesday a group calling itself Jews Say No To Genocide Coalition, took Parliament Hill hostage to its campaign, with an occupation it vows to continue until the government accedes to its demands. A group estimated to number 100, of anti-Israel protesters rushed the lobby of the Confederation Building in Ottawa, housing the offices of Members of Parliament. Parliamentary Protective Services and Ottawa police responded, and 14 protesters were arrested, then released.

The coalition stated through a news release that its membership is comprised of Jewish Canadians, announcing its intention to occupy the building indefinitely, with "MPs and staff blocked from business as usual". Which led a group of 19 mainstream Jewish groups that include B'Nai Brith Canada, the Tafsik Organization, the Canadian Antisemitism Education Foundation, Allied Voices for Israel, Canadian Women Against Antisemitism, the Canadian Institute for Jewish Research, and groups representing Jewish lawyers, doctors and educators to decry the protesters, standing in direct opposition to the values of the entire Jewish Community in Canada.

An estimated 91 percent of Canadian Jews believe that Israel has a right to exist, stated the group of 19 organizations. Numbers from the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance were cited in support of their contention that connection to Israel is a core part of Jewish identity. They urged Parliament and Canadians to view the protesters as "fringe activists operating outside the mainstream Jewish community."

Jews Say No To Genocide Coalition demanded that Canada must end "its active participation in Israel's genocide", an astonishingly egregious statement falsifying the entire conflict history between Palestinians and Israel of over a century, culminating in the atrocities committed in southern Israel when thousands of Palestinian terrorists swept through farming villages and kibbutzim to rape, burn families alive, torture and slaughter infants, the elderly, women and men, civilians all. Israel still awaits the return of the 101 hostages remaining in Gazan captivity by Hamas.

In the choice of that estimated 100 Jewish protesters to  make their demands and stage their dramatic storming of Parliament buildings, the Canadian Jewish community, already under huge duress by pro-Hamas instigators of violence against Jews, knowingly and deliberately add to the uncertainty and insecurity experienced by Jews in Canada. That tight little group of 100 Jewish dissidents chose to support Palestinian terrorism over Israeli existence. Absolutely not to be believed!

Dozens of antiwar protesters that occupied the lobby of the Confederation Building in Ottawa early Tuesday have now been removed by police and security services. (Raffy Boudjikanian/CBC)