HuffPost Canada closed in 2021 and this site is maintained as an online
archive. If you have questions or concerns, please check our
FAQ or contact
support@huffpost.com.
idf
Our silence, a clear nod of deference to the U.S. and Israel, highlights the purely political nature of when we speak up and when we look the other way.
The journalists that pressured the Canadian Journalists for Free Expression into censorship should be ashamed of jeopardizing their work.
In its silence, Canada has chosen complicity with violations of human rights and international law, and violence over peace.
I will stand with those who support the right of peoples in the Middle East -- Israelis and Palestinians alike -- to live in peace and security, free from any threats or acts of force, a cornerstone of UN principle and Canadian foreign policy; and I will oppose all those, like Hamas and its patron Iran, who seek the destruction of any people or state in violation of the UN Charter.
Hamas and Israel are at war and the land beneath their citizens' feet is crying. As it does, an incredible marvel -- while not entirely new-- is happening, and that is tweeting behind the lines. The idea that Palestinians and I, a Jewish community worker in Toronto in 2014, are bantering back and forth while bombs and missiles fall in Israel and Gaza is astounding.
In old age, Shimon Peres is more dove-like than hawkish. But when he spoke in Toronto, in early May to a sold-out crowd, we were in the presence of greatness. There was no question he would not answer. Little wonder why, he's one of the few to have seen it all in the Middle East.
Today I declare to the Twitterati and the literati -- and everyone else -- that everyone should be a Zionist. But that's not all. Everyone should also be a Palestinian nationalist.
