Michael Arria and Dave Reed speak with Michael Bueckert, the Vice-President of Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East. The organization just published a voting guide ahead of the upcoming Canadian elections. He updated us on the politics of Palestine in the Great White North.
SHOW NOTES:
- Follow Michael Bueckert on Twitter – https://twitter.com/mbueckert
- CJPME’s 2021 Election guide – https://www.cjpme.org/elections_guide_2021
- CJPME’s 2021 Election tracker – https://www.cjpme.org/election_tracker_2021
- Follow CJPME on Twitter – https://twitter.com/CJPME
- Follow CJPME on Facebook – https://www.facebook.com/230321560327198
- Follow the Anti-BDS Troll App Twitter account – https://twitter.com/AntiBDSApp
Jack Layton – the late Jack Layton, previous NDP leader – wouldn’t touch Palestine/Israel. It was a third rail. That’s changing. And Jack Layton didn’t wear a turban!
I was at an in-person event yesterday where someone described Israel as the only democracy in the Middle East. “If you’re Jewish!” I said. Someone said we shouldn’t talk politics. So supporting Israel isn’t political, but criticizing it is?
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https://www.jacobinmag.com/2021/09/canada-charities-israel-apartheid-west-bank-occupation
“Canadian Charities Are Funding Israeli Apartheid” BY YVES ENGLER
SEPTEMBER 5, 2021, JACOBIN MAGAZINE
EXCERPT:
“Under the cover of charity, organizations in Canada are bilking unknowing Canadian taxpayers out of public money and directing it to Israel. These charities support settlements in the West Bank and the Israeli military — they do not deserve tax exemptions.
“Canadian taxpayers are subsidizing charities that support the Israel Defense Services (IDF), promote racism against Palestinians, fund illegal West Bank settlements, and advocate for racial and religious purity in Israel.
“Canada is home to as many as three hundred Israel-focused registered charities. These charities are able to provide tax receipts for donations and are exempt from paying certain taxes. The wealthiest of these groups, United Israel Appeal of Canada, raised more than $93 million in 2018. Two or three times that sum is raised annually by other Israel-focused charities.
“Canadian charities raised about $3.5 billion in 2018 for international initiatives, with a quarter of a billion dollars going to Israel. In other words, around 8 percent of these donations went to a nation with 0.13 percent of the world’s population. Or, put another way, Israel received sixty times its per-capita share in donations from Canadian charities. Given that its GDP is, per capita, equal to Canada’s, it is hard to rationalize the massive sums doled out to it by the country’s charities.
“In a bid to shine a light on this important, if little discussed, subject, the Canadian Foreign Policy Institute recently hosted a webinar titled ‘Subsidizing Apartheid: How the Canada Revenue Agency Contributes to Palestinian Dispossession.’ It was part of a formal legal complaint submitted to the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) by Palestinian-Canadian refugee Khaled Mouammar and Rabbi David Mivasair regarding the charitable status of the Canadian Zionist Cultural Association (CZCA). The complaint details that organization’s support of the Israeli military in contravention of CRA rules. (cont’d)
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https://www.jacobinmag.com/2021/09/canada-charities-israel-apartheid-west-bank-occupation
“Canadian Charities Are Funding Israeli Apartheid” BY YVES ENGLER
SEPTEMBER 5, 2021, JACOBIN MAGAZINE
EXCERPT:
“Under the cover of charity, organizations in Canada are bilking unknowing Canadian taxpayers out of public money & directing it to Israel. These charities support settlements in the West Bank & the Israeli military — they do not deserve tax exemptions.
“Canadian taxpayers are subsidizing charities that support the Israel Defense Services (IDF), promote racism against Palestinians, fund illegal West Bank settlements, & advocate for racial & religious purity in Israel.
“Canada is home to as many as three hundred Israel-focused registered charities. These charities are able to provide tax receipts for donations & are exempt from paying certain taxes. The wealthiest of these groups, United Israel Appeal of Canada, raised more than $93 million in 2018. Two or three times that sum is raised annually by other Israel-focused charities.
“Canadian charities raised about $3.5 billion in 2018 for international initiatives, with a quarter of a billion dollars going to Israel. In other words, around 8 percent of these donations went to a nation with 0.13 percent of the world’s population. Or, put another way, Israel received sixty times its per-capita share in donations from Canadian charities. Given that its GDP is, per capita, equal to Canada’s, it is hard to rationalize the massive sums doled out to it by the country’s charities.
“In a bid to shine a light on this important, if little discussed, subject, the Canadian Foreign Policy Institute recently hosted a webinar titled ‘Subsidizing Apartheid: How the Canada Revenue Agency Contributes to Palestinian Dispossession.’ It was part of a formal legal complaint submitted to the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) by Palestinian-Canadian refugee Khaled Mouammar and Rabbi David Mivasair regarding the charitable status of the Canadian Zionist Cultural Association (CZCA). The complaint details that organization’s support of the Israeli military in contravention of CRA rules. (cont’d)
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“It is preposterous that people & organizations of conscience have had to attempt to end these subsidies by launching legal complaints against the CRA. These organizations shouldn’t have charitable status in the first place.
“Canadians have been raising funds for Israel for a very long time. In the early 1900s, Canadian Zionists sent millions of dollars to support the nascent colonial movement. In the late 1920s, Canadians put up $1 million ($15 million today) for what was at the time one of the most controversial settler-colonial projects: the purchase of land around Wadi al-Hawarith, consisting of 7,500 acres of coastal territory located about halfway between Haifa and Tel Aviv.
“The Jewish National Fund (JNF) acquired legal title to Wadi al-Hawarith in 1928 from an absentee landlord in France. They sought to have the British evict the Palestinians who’d been living on the land for centuries. The conflict at Wadi al-Hawarith became a lightning rod for the growing Palestinian nationalist movement….”
(For the record: National surveys have repeatedly shown that the majority or Canadians support the Palestinians in their struggle against Zionism.)