Canada's Evasive Response on UNRWA

"We have instituted a pause pending the results of an investigation, and the pause was based on preventing any additional funding to UNRWA."

"The money for Gaza has been dispersed to UNRWA, and they've used it to deliver much-needed humanitarian aid, education and other duties that UNRWA has on the ground."

"They've done good work over the years."

Canada's International Development Minister Ahmed Hussen

International Development Minister Ahmed Hussen, pictured speaking with reporters in a file photo, said Tuesday that short-term funding for Gaza will not be impacted by funding pause announced on Friday. Photo by Sean Kilpatrick /The Canadian Press

 

"What funding does it impact on and when? It is clear to the rest of the funding nations that all is not well at UNRWA and they want answers, so do Canadian taxpayers."

"The Government of Canada is playing a little too fast and loose with this very serious matter."

Toronto Member of Parliament Kevin Vuong

"It's a big mess."

"We're going to press the government for some really granular responses in terms of the management of the funds, the scope of the funds, the targets of the funds, and the purposes."

"Canada should be providing humanitarian support. Palestinians are suffering; we may differ about what the source of that suffering is, but for somebody who needs medicine and is not getting it ... it doesn't mater to them who's responsible, they're still not getting it."

Shimon Koffler Fogel, president/CEO, Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs

Canada's widely publicized 'pause' in the government's funding of the contentious United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees has had some questions being asked as to when the pause took effect; before or following a promised payment to UNRWA...the answer to which is being clearly evaded. Evidently the federal government had made the first of four promised $25 million payments to UNRWA, irrespective of the announcement that funding would be paused.

Evidence presented that agency employees had taken part in the October 7 terror attacks in Israel -- raping, marauding, slaughtering, taking Israeli hostages back to Gaza, had shocked Western nations known for financial support for the UN agency. The response was swift; one by one, fifteen of those nations suspended their funding to UNRWA. It had been widely known for years that UNRWA had full knowledge of Hamas using their school as weapons storage and even assault sites, along with hospitals. And that UNRWA school curricula was rife with antisemitism and anti-Israel propaganda.

 

Canada and the U.S. are among the countries that have paused funding to the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) after Israeli authorities claimed several of the agency's staff members were involved in the Oct. 7 Hamas-led attacks on Israel. UN officials now have work to do to restore the faith of donors, says Michael Bociurkiw, a Canadian global affairs analyst and former UNICEF spokesperson for the West Bank and Gaza. Still from video

 

Along with the announcement of Canada's decision to pause funding for UNRWA, its Department of Foreign Affairs announced an additional $40 million in Gaza funding -- the bulk of it to go to the UN's World Food Program, while UNICEF, the United Nations Population Fund, the World Health Organization and the International Red Cross would all be beneficiaries, along with the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs -- to benefit Gaza.

Hamas, ruling Gaza as a despotic, militant Islamist group, has long been known to advantage themselves by taking possession of this international generosity supporting Gaza, seeing very little of it trickle down in actual support of Palestinians or in the construction of civil infrastructure, or manufacturing of anything but rockets and other weaponry alongside the building of a vast network of tunnels used for smuggling, weapons storage, and terrorist activities in general.

Minister Hussen steadfastly refused to respond to questions whether the $40 million earmarked for UNRWA had been sent prior to the pause. Asked when the first payment for the promised $100 million was due, he simply walked away. Fully 17 nations have now declared their intention to pause the funding of the UN agency once the United States led the way following Israel's evidence released showing that a number of agency employees had directly taken part in the October 7 bloodbath in Israel.

It has long been observed that UNRWA has been accused of ties with Palestinian terror groups. Alongside claims that money and resources donated to UNRWA routinely is intercepted by Hamas. Reports published in the Wall Street Journal suggest that ten percent of the 12,000 Gaza employees of UNRWA have ties to terrorist groups. 

Multiple countries, including the U.S. and Canada, have indefinitely paused their aid funding to UNRWA amid evidence from Israel that 12 of the relief agency's staff were involved in the Oct. 7 Hamas-led attack in Israel. CBC News

UNRWA Finally Recognized for the Failure It Is

"We're concerned about the fungibility of support directed by Canada to the agency, and ultimately where money goes and what it supports."

"There's been a very long track record of not just of internal corruption within UNRWA, but there were a number of UN investigations of the agency and impropriety on the part of their staff -- not just its local-hired staff, but the international UN staff that manages the organization."

"I think it would be great if Canada were to step up and seize opportunities to play a meaningful role [in the future of Israel]. But you can't do that independently -- it requires Canada to be more fully in sync with the approaches, the thinking and the considerations of our like-minded allies, and that's been where we haven't been as intentional as we could be, and perhaps as we should be."

Shimon Koffler Fogel, President/CEO, Centre for Israeli and Jewish Affairs 

"We've seen instances in which the United States and Republican administrations have frozen [funding and also under Stephen Harper [as Prime Minister of Canada prior to the current administration]."

"But the fact now that you have a Democratic administration in Washington, Biden, that froze [funding], and now all the other countries have followed, particularly Canada."

"The evidence has been very clear -- it's something countries have ignored for many years, but now because of the direct connection with the brutality of October 7, there's a recognition that UNRWA cannot continue to function the way it has been up until now."

Gerald Steinberg, president, NGO Monitor, Jerusalem

"What we are doing are taking these allegations very seriously."

"These are disturbing allegations, we have very serious concerns about those allegations, and I expressed Canada's concern over the allegations to the head of UNRWA."

Canadian International Development Minister Ahmed Hussein

Israel's Iron Dome air defence system fires to intercept rockets fired from the Gaza Strip, in southern Israel on Jan. 21. Hamas claimed responsibility for rocket attacks that reached Tel Aviv on Monday. (Leo Correa/The Associated Press)

 

The New York Times on Sunday published an outline of Israel's indictment of UNRWA. It included the information that agency employees were directly involved in the atrocities that took place on October 7; mass murder, rape, torture, mutilation, and the abduction of 240 innocent civilians comprised of children, the elderly, women and men as well as non-Jews and foreign farm workers. 

A day later the Wall Street Journal published an article that led to the declaration that as many as ten percent of the 12,000 Gaza employees of UNRWA have ties to terrorist groups. According to the Israeli dossier, ten of the dozen UNRWA employees identified with links to terror, were revealed to have been implicated directly by participation in the Hamas/Palestinian Islamic Jihad storming of the Israeli border to commit countless acts of sadistic savagery on Israeli civilians.

Of that number of UNRWA employees directly involved, ten were full members of Hamas, while another was affiliated with the Islamic Jihad terror group. Of the employees implicated, seven were employed as teachers at UNRWA schools; facilities that have long been known to incorporate antisemitic and anti-Israel messaging in their school curricula. Two worked for schools in non-teaching positions and the remaining three were a social worker, a clerk and a storeroom manager, according to the New York Times. Stockpiles of weapons were kept in UNRWA schools as they were in hospitals.

The Times also pointed out that one of the implicated employees was a school councillor in Gaza. This man, assisted by his son, abducted an Israeli woman to take her as a hostage back into Gaza. She was wounded, and was kept prisoner in a room of the councillor's home. As well as participating in the taking of hostages, the UNRWA councillor was delegated the responsibility of co-ordinating vehicles and ammunition on October 7. When the Israeli woman was released in a prisoner exchange in November she related her experience as a captive.

 

An Israeli soldier guards the broken fence that Hamas militants crashed through to enter the Kfar Aza kibbutz days earlier, near the border with Gaza, Oct. 15, 2023 in Kfar Aza, Israel. Alexi Rosenfeld/Getty

By Monday of this week fully fifteen nations had announced they had cut their financial support for UNRWA following the American announcement of their decision to do so, late last week. It is worth noting that the Republican administration under Donald Trump had cut its donations to UNRWA in recognition of its links to Hamas terrorism, and in Canada under the Conservative government of Stephen Harper, funding by Canada was also discontinued.

In both countries succeeding administrations resumed UNRWA funding. Despite that it was well known how compromised UNRWA was, an utterly failed institution that knowingly allowed its schools to have textbooks glorifying violence against Jews and Israel, portraying the Jewish state as the 'enemy' of Palestinians. In Canada, funding will continue for Palestinian aid funnelling it through other UN agencies; the World Health Organization and the World Food Program.

The problem there is that aid tends to end up in the possession of Hamas, which uses the medicines, food, water, fuel for its own purposes, stockpiling it for their own use. Any that does reach ordinary Palestinians is often 'sold' to them at outrageous cost, further propping up Hamas rule. In other words the West continues through its humane generosity to the suffering Palestinian population, to support and sustain the Palestinians' terrorism oppressor.

Several countries, including Canada, have cut funding to the United Nations relief program for Palestinians after accusations that some workers had links to the Oct. 7 attacks on Israel. The reduced funding is expected to make aid in Gaza more precarious. CBCNews

"We had so many warning signs about UNRWA. There were studies done by NGO Monitor and others that were rejected by Canadian diplomats, but the evidence is staring them in the face."

"Now, the evidence was so stark that there was clearly documentation that shows members of UNRWA were actually moonlighting as terrorists. It got to the point where they just ignored the evidence, but it's not as if the evidence wasn't there, they didn't want to see it."

"The evidence was hiding in plain sight."

Aurel Braun, professor of international relations, University of Toronto

Living In An Orwellian World

"[The fact that the court was willing to discuss the genocide charges was a] mark of shame that will not be erased for generations."

"We will continue to do what is necessary to defend our country and defend our people."

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu

Judges of the International Court of Justice are seen while ruling on a request by South Africa on behalf of Gaza on Friday. (Remko de Waal/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock)

The Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide established in 1948 represented a determination to ensure that the crimes of the Holocaust would never be repeated. The crime of genocide requires proof of intentional destruction "in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group". When the Third Reich destroyed the lives of six million Jews in a deliberate, state-planned eradication of Europe's Jews, it was the very quintessence of genocide. The intent was there, the outcome spoke for itself. 

Israel saw its founding that same year of 1948. It exists today as a bulwark against another Holocaust. Finally, Jews had a reborn national territory of their own established on a small portion of their original ancestral land. And that nation developed a military for the obvious purpose of defending itself and Jews from another attempt at genocide. The International Court of Justice delivered its provisional response to South Africa's claim of genocide perpetrated by Israel on Gaza, on the very memorial date of the Holocaust.

Could anything be more spectacularly grim and ironic? Israel, by the metric of the court consenting to hear the case and adjudicate it well into years ahead before reaching a final decision even while failing to order Israel to retreat from Gaza, has been held in suspicion of genocide, marking it as the fifth country to face the charge of genocide in the ICJ. As in the United Nations itself, it is always the human-rights-abusing nations that hold Israel to account for violations of human rights. 

 

Israel's violation can be seen in the fact of its existence, in the indisputable fact that it exists only because it defends itself.

Sudan committed an intended genocide in Darfur. And when its president and the head of the Sudanese military were condemned by the ICC as war criminals the Organization of Islamic Cooperation and the Arab League paid no mind. Syria's Bashir al-Assad has been accused by the United Nations itself of having killed 300,000 of its own citizens. Today he is in good standing in the Arab League. Iran threatens genocide against Israel, has done so openly, former President Ahmadinejad openly declared at the UN General Assembly Iran's intention to destroy Israel.

Open displays of of rampant antisemitism and the celebration of the Hamas terrorist bloody rampage through southern Israel on October 7 have taken place in huge rallies throughout the Western world. A world that stands by and merely observes 'pro-Palestinian' calls in gatherings on city streets calling for another intifada, calling for a Palestine 'from the river to the sea', calling for 'gas the Jews'. These are akin to the rallies and the vicious propaganda that presaged the Holocaust.

How can any rational mind support a charge of genocide against Palestinians by Israel, when the populations of both Gaza and the West Bank have risen steadily at a rate not seen elsewhere in the world? Of a people considered by the United Nations to be refugees. Whose leaders gather huge sums of funding from the international community free to plunder and amass personal wealth. And for Hamas to build a network of offensive tunnels while amassing a huge cache of weaponry. 

 

The target is Israel. The intent is there, the attacks are deadly. 

In Israel, 20% of the population is comprised of Palestinians. They have citizenship, a quality of life denied Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza, while their leaders accumulate personal riches and deny proper administration of the territories that would allow the Palestinian people to prosper, have proper employment and live satisfying lives instead of being fed non-stop malicious lies about a neighbour hoping at some time to be able to relax its military vigilance.

Pro-Palestinian demonstrators gather outside the International Court of Justice in the Hague, the Netherlands, on January 26, 2024.

Nikos Oikonomou/Anadolu via Getty Images

Failing to Validate South Africa

"In my respectful dissenting opinion the dispute between the State of Israel and the people of Palestine is essentially and historically a political one, calling for a diplomatic or negotiated settlement."

"It is not a legal dispute susceptible of judicial settlement by the Court."

"This case is complicated by the fact that in the context of an ongoing war with Hamas, which is not a party to these proceedings, it would be unrealistic to put limitations upon one of the belligerent parties but not the other."

Judge Julia Sebutinde, Ugandan ICJ court member

Judge Julia Sebutinde

"[Israel must also take] immediate and effective measures to enable the provision of urgently needed basic services and humanitarian assistance to address the adverse conditions of life faced by Palestinians in the Gaza Strip."

"The Court is acutely aware of the extent of the human tragedy that is unfolding in the region and is deeply concerned about the continuing loss of life and human suffering."

International Court of Justice

After due consideration and hearing of legal arguments from all perspectives the ICJ did not call for a ceasefire in Gaza and for the IDF to withdraw. The Ugandan judge sitting on the International Court of Justice, along with 16 others, was the only judge to have voted negatively on all of the six provisional measures set out by the IJC. Even the Israeli justice on the court voted positively for several of the rulings. Justice Sebutinde felt none of the rulings represented total fairness and voted accordingly. 

 

She has become a heroine to Israelis, an outcast to the government of Uganda and a much detested personage to Hamas and its South African supporters.

 

Uganda is a country that produced two quite notable individuals, whose ethics, morals and perspectives couldn't be more distant from each other; while both distinguished themselves as Ugandans, one, Idi Amin its former President, did so by disrepute, not only hosting Palestinian plane hijackers at Entebbe airport in a collusion against Israel where a daring raid rescued the Jewish passengers and led to the death of the raid leader, Benjamin Netanyahu's brother, but he also expelled Asian/Indian minorities of long-standing residence in the country.

 

A country that was also capable of producing a keen and highly respected legal mind who gained a different kind of notoriety when she defied her own country on a previous occasion. Her actions at the IJC had a response from Uganda’s ambassador and permanent representative to the United Nations, Adonia Ayebare, who issued a statement to the effect that:

"Justice Sebutinde’s ruling at the International Court of Justice does not represent the Government of Uganda’s position on the situation in Palestine."

"She has previously voted against Uganda’s case on DRC [Democratic Republic of the Congo]. " "Uganda’s support for the plight of the Palestinian people has been expressed through Uganda‘s voting pattern at the United Nations." 

While Israel's actions in Gaza in response to Hamas's savage assaults against southern Israel where over a thousand people were murdered, hundreds taken hostage, an untold number of women raped, mutilated and murdered, children killed along with the elderly and entire families scorched to death when their homes were torched, over ten percent of the 3000 young Israeli music lovers at the Nova Music Festival were killed by fanatical psychopaths, the actions of the Hamas terrorists were never taken into account by the Court. 

South Africa's charge to the Court of Israeli genocide deliberately side-stepped the genocidal intent of the rulers of Gaza. To ascribe intent of genocide to Israel, on the very eve of Holocaust Remembrance represents the apex of moral failure. October 7, its outcome and its aftermath represented a repeat of a loathing for a people so reprehensible that it led to genocide; to ascribe that intent to the inheritors of the Holocaust must be accounted a crime unto itself.

The single issue that gave credit to the Court was its statement that it was "gravely concerned about the fate of the hostages" abducted by Hamas, calling for "their immediate and unconditional release". Creditable, but barely; treated as an aside to the main issue of holding Israel suspect of genocide.
Any focus on a two-state solution where there is but one side of the issue prepared for dialogue and to reach a useful solution acceptable to two parties in the absence of the second, is a fallacy.

Getty Images

"It was brought to the attention of the Court that South Africa, and in particular certain organs of government, have enjoyed and continue to enjoy a cordial relationship with the leadership of Hamas. If that is the case, then one would encourage South Africa as a party to these proceedings and to the Genocide Convention, to use whatever influence they might wield, to try and persuade Hamas to immediately and unconditionally release the remaining hostages, as a goodwill gesture."

"I have no doubt that such a gesture of goodwill would go a very long way in defusing the current conflict in Gaza."

"Unfortunately, the failure, reluctance or inability of states to resolve political controversies such as this one through effective diplomacy or negotiations may sometimes lead them to resort to a pretextual invocation of treaties like the Genocide Convention, in a desperate bid to force a case into the context of such a treaty, in order to foster its judicial settlement."

"It is clear that a permanent solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict can only result from good-faith negotiations between Israeli and Palestinian representatives working toward the achievement of a just and sustainable two-state solution. A solution cannot be imposed from outside, much less through judicial settlement."

Judge Julia Sebutinde

Canadians of Academic Distinction

"[The internal investigation ended with the employee being allowed to return to work with] the expectation they would comply with the college's policies and initiatives which support a safe, respectful, and inclusive learning and working environment."

"Further, they were expected to take care to ensure any future remarks could not reasonably be interpreted as celebrating violence against civilians."

"The employee proceeded to engage in activities contrary to the expectations laid out by the college and as a result this employee is no longer an employee of Langara College."

"We are focused on supporting those in our community who are living with immense pain over the continuing violence and tragic loss of life in the Middle East."

Langara College statement 

"She demonstrably failed in her obligation as an instructor to create a safe environment for all students."

"By dismissing Knight, Langara College has acted to ensure the safety of its Jewish and Israeli community and taken a stand against antisemitism and the glorification of terrorism."

Nico Slobinsky, spokesman, Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs

Natalie Knight, pictured centre holding microphone, faced criticism and calls to be fired from her academic job after a speech she gave at a pro-Palestinian rally in late October. Knight defended her comments as legitimate speech in the face of Israeli actions against Palestinians. (United in Struggle)

Claiming to have been reinstated to her position at a Vancouver college with no disciplinary consequences, openly pro-terror academic Natalie Knight announced to her followers and friends that Langara College in Vancouver placed her back on staff. "It means we won. It means I did nothing wrong. It means none of you are doing anything wrong", she said delightedly during a small rally. 

 

She had been suspended in November from her position as an English instructor and Indigenous curriculum consultant at Langara College. A video had circulated of her praising the Hamas massacre of over 1,200 Israeli civilians on October 7. She had appeared as a speaker in front of the Vancouver Art Gallery at an October 28 rally. There, she characterized the October 7 atrocities in southern Israel that took 1,200 lives and saw over 200 children, women and elderly abducted, as an "amazing, brilliant offensive".

By that time, details of the heinous crimes committed against innocent people living in towns and kibbutzim close to the Gaza border, and the horrendous events at the Nova Music Festival where over 300 young people had been raped, mutilated and slaughtered, had become public knowledge. She knew, as did her co-celebrants, the details of the savagery meted out on that day, and still found it in their moral code to celebrate the sadism perpetrated that day.

The event she spoke at was an All Out for Palestine rally sponsored by the Palestinian Youth Movement and Samidoun, representing two organizations known to openly celebrate the massacres, endorsing Hamas terrorism. Video and photographic evidence had emerged illustrating the inhumanity of the attacks including many images that the terrorists themselves had videoed in celebration of their unbelievable depravity.

Langara, two days later, placed Knight on leave, with the statement that the matter was "under investigation" and her views "do not represent those of the College". When she was temporarily reinstated the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, arguing for her initial suspension stated: "The college ha a choice to make here; to decide whether or not it is a safe school for Jews or not", CIJA spokesman Nico Slobinsky related to the news media.

At an earlier date, two days after the Hamas invasion of Israel, a former director of the B.C. Civil Liberties Association herself stated "how beautiful is the spirit to get free that Palestinians literally learned how to fly on hang gliders", in reference to the tactic of some of the terrorists using paragliders to ambush the  Nova music festival. Harsha Walia was relieved of her position with the B.C. Civil Liberties, but went on an acclaimed speaking tour.

Both events reflect Canada's academia with its many apologists for the October 7 terrorism where students, faculty unions and tenured professors haven't  hesitated to justify the atrocities as an act of "resistance" -- "decolonization". Uahikea Maile, a professor of Indigenous politics at the University of Toronto wrote a social media post on October 7 that the ongoing attacks constituted "anticolonial resistance", suggesting similar violence should be visited on the rest of the settled world. He remains on staff as director of Ziibling Lab, the offiical Indigenous Politics Collaboratory at University of Toronto.

A 'law of war' researcher at York University's Osgoode Hall Law School, Heidi Matthews wrote a social media post decrying the "obfuscation going on about what the right of resistance looks like in brutally asymmetrical contexts". That was her comment on October 7. Osgoode Hall later touted her as an expert on the Israel-Hamas conflict. She wrote an op-ed entitled "Canada is hypocritical by not supporting South Africa's genocide case against Israel."

 

Natalie Knight is no longer an employee of Langara College, said the post-secondary institution in a letter to its students, staff, and faculty on Friday. Photo by NICK PROCAYLO /PNG

 

 

The Russian Piece of Work That is Vladimir Putin

"[Ukraine would push for an international investigation of what happened]."

"It is necessary to establish all the facts, as much as possible, considering that the plane crash occurred on Russian territory — beyond our control."

"It's obvious Russians are playing with lives of Ukrainian POWs, with feelings of their relatives and emotions of our society." 

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy

Russia escalating attacks on Ukraine  Still from video

Vladimir Putin seems to enjoy his little jokes, turning the screw, twisting the blade and watching the results. This is the man who decided to launch a full-scale war on a neighbour, preferring to call it a "special military operation", and enacting a new law that would make it a criminal offence to name it a war. This is the man who bare-facedly expressed emotional anguish over the humanitarian crisis that Palestinians are facing in Gaza, sternly admonishing Israel to a ceasefire to spare Palestinians from more deaths and injuries.

 

It might not have occurred to him to admonish Hamas for perpetrating a mass atrocity in Israel on October 7, nor to recommend that the terrorist group surrender the hostages taken from Israel into Gaza, much less they stop bombarding Israel with rockets at the expense of Palestinians in Gaza whom Hamas leaders proudly claim are willingly offering themselves as martyrs to enable Hamas to achieve its goal of destroying Israel and slaughtering Jews. It strikes, after all, a little too close to home.

This is the man who shells Ukrainian towns and villages, hospitals and schools under the pretext of bombing military sites which don't exist there. The man responsible for levelling towns and cities to rubble, shooting drones and rockets at apartment blocks and killing residents who evidently don't deserve the empathy and concern that Palestinians do in the Russian Czar's estimation. And just as Hamas revels in the growing body count of Palestinians during the Israel Defense Forces offensive against Hamas to work in their public relations favour, Putin too likes to twist reality to his advantage.

On Wednesday a Russian military transport plane was shot out of the sky and crashed in a border region close to Ukraine. Moscow took the occasion to accuse Kyiv of having shot it down, and thus was responsible for the death of all 74 people aboard the I1-75 transport plane. A video of the crash from the Belgorod border region of Russia showed a plane falling out of the sky onto a snowy, rural landscape followed by a massive ball of fire as it hit the ground.

Aboard were 65 Ukrainian prisoners of war meant to be traded back to Ukraine in exchange for Russian prisoners held by Ukraine, according to Russian media. The Russian Defense Ministry stated that the plane had been carrying 65 prisoners of war, a crew of six and three Russian servicemen. According to the ministry, Russian radar registered the launch of two missiles from the Kharkiv region of Ukraine, bordering Belgorod.

Following the event the General Staff of the Armed Forces of Ukraine made no acknowledgement of the crash, but stated that Ukraine targets Russian military transport planes meant to deliver missiles, particularly adjacent the border between the two countries. In May of 2023 Russia lost two warplanes and two helicopters in its own airspace in a single day. Initially, as is their habit, Kyiv officials denied involvement, later stating Patriot missiles were used to hit the aircraft.

Exchanges between Ukraine and Russia including airstrikes with missiles and drones have been a focus of the fighting around the Kharkiv and Belgorod regions. Russian state news agency Tass reported that first responders rushed to the crash site in the Korochansky district of Belgorod. According to the Moscow Defense Ministry, a military commission was dispatched to the scene of the crash.

The Ukrainian prisoners were being flown to the region for a prisoner exchange, stated the Russian military, when the plane was shot down at 11:15 a.m. Designed to carry up to 225 troops, cargo, military equipment and weapons the Il-76 was charged on this occasion with delivering the prisoners of war. Ukraine bitterly charged Russia with failing to advise them beforehand of the purpose of the flight and while the Ukrainian military intelligence confirmed a prisoner exchange was due to take place, no information had been conveyed on who was on the crashed Russian plane.

Somewhat like Hamas informing Israel that the  hostages they had taken out of Israel were dying as a result of Israel bombing Gaza's infamous tunnel system, caught in the collapse and the destruction of the tunnels or adjacent buildings with tunnel entrances from which Hamas exits to launch missiles in the midst of crowded  urban centres, accustomed to using the civilian population as collateral damage shields and their deaths as public relations coups.

A video, which Reuters obtained and matched to satellite imagery of the area, shows a Russian transport plane crashing by the Ukrainian border. The Russian state news agency said the plane was carrying 65 Ukrainian prisoners of war, a claim Ukraine hasn't confirmed.

Commitment to Ukraine by Europe

"No one  talks about stopping after this [massive bombing attack on residential neighbourhoods] happens."

"The sanctions aren't working. The West must stop procrastinating with ammunition, air defence and financial support, or what we are getting here will come to their countries."

"Do you want Russia on your borders? Do you think they will stop?"

"The war is not over and Putin's getting stronger and won't stop. Why would he stop? He must be defeated."

Ukrainian political leader Kira Rudik

"I therefore call on our allies in the European Union to also step up their efforts in support of Ukraine."

"The arms deliveries for Ukraine planned so far by the majority of EU member states are by all means too small."

"We need higher contributions."

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz

"My personal priority is to have an agreement by 27 [countries]."

"And if this is not possible, we are prepared for an agreement by 26 [minus holdout Hungary]."

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen

 

Russia has renewed its attacks against Ukraine, likely emboldened by the stale-mate in Washington which has placed further support for the Ukrainian counteroffensive against the Kremlin on ice for the time being at a time when ongoing military assistance is critical. In Europe, leaders are attuned to the nature of Vladimir Putin's bellicosity and hunger for expansion. They fully understand that nothing will stop Putin, and they are just as likely to be next on his 'special military operation' agenda as any.

This uppermost in mind, European leaders are looking to increase their support. Data, in fact, from the German-based Kiel Institute indicates that aid to Ukraine from European nations represents a doubling of the aid being provided to the embattled country as compared to what the United States has committed to. 

 

Britain and France jointly reaffirmed a pledge to defeat the Russian war machine. "What we have to do is make that economic strength [the combined economies of the West 25 times larger than Russia's], and that commitment pay", asserted British Foreign Secretary David Cameron. "I have no doubt that we can make sure that Putin loses and it's essential that he does lose."

When British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak earlier in January visited Kyiv, he announced a $4.3 billion support package.  In the same token, French President Emmanuel Macron made an announcement of his country planning to deliver additional military aid to Ukraine that would include 40 long-range cruise missiles and hundreds of bombs.

The Baltic states and Norway together delivered the equivalent of over one percent of their economies in support of Ukraine, according to figures released by the Kiel Institute. Fighter jets have been pledged by European countries and last summer the Netherlands and Denmark pledged they would supply Ukraine with 61 F-16s in coming years. As new replacement models arrive, Belgium is prepared to deliver over 50 jets, and Norway is to donate  upwards of 10 F-16s.

A new trilateral initiative to improve maritime safety in the Black Sea and assist Ukraine in maintaining open shipping lanes by clearing Russian mines, was signed off by Romania, Bulgaria and Turkey. Members of the European Parliament in Brussels have taken to efforts to strip Budapest of its veto powers so that they can prevent Hungary from blocking aid to Ukraine.

 

The G7 is considering whether to confiscate $300 billion in frozen Russian assets to finance the war in the realization that they have no option but to assist Ukraine in defeating Russia or risk becoming the next countries to face an unexpected invasion with Russian bombs destroying their own homes and neighbourhoods.

"Europe has clearly overtaken the United States in promised aid to Ukraine, with total European commitments now being twice as large."

"A main reason is the EU’s new €50 billion “Ukraine Facility,” but also other European countries have upped their support with new multi-year packages."

"For the first time since the start of the war, the US is now clearly lagging behind. This is one of the results of the latest update of the Ukraine Support Tracker."

Kiel Institute for the World Economy

In The Fog of War

"[This has been] one of the hardest days [of the war, but the offensive will continue]."

"We are in the middle of a war that is more than justified."

"In this war, we are making big achievements, like the encircling of Khan Younis, and there are also very heavy losses."

"I mourn for our fallen heroic soldiers. I hug the families in their time of need and we all pray for the peace of our wounded."

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu

 

"[The war will determine Israel's future] for decades to come."

"The fall of the fighters is a requirement to achieve the goals of the war."

"Over the past day, [Israeli Defence Forces] troops carried out an extensive operation during which they encircled Khan Younis and deepened the operation in the area. The area is a significant stronghold of Hamas's Khan Younis Brigade."

"Ground troops engaged in close-quarters combat, directed [air force] strikes, and used intelligence to co-ordinate fire, resulting in the elimination of dozens of terrorists."

Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant 

Twenty-four Israeli soldiers were killed in the Gaza Strip, the military said on Tuesday, the biggest Israeli death toll in one day of the war against Hamas, with 21 killed in a single incident.

The Israel Defense Forces daily report war casualties, the dead and the injured.  Each day's solemn count lists one or  two -- at most four -- IDF soldiers, their names, their ranks, their place of origin, identifying yet another fallen sacrifice in the war against a ferociously deadly enemy whose mission is proudly proclaimed as the total destruction of the State of Israel, and death to all Jews. On Monday, the setback in the loss of Israeli troops had another dimension entirely in the deaths of 24 soldiers, reservists and commanders. 

On that occasion the single deadliest attack took place on Israeli forces with 21 soldiers in the interiors of buildings being set up for detonation. The Israeli soldiers died when a rocket-propelled grenade triggered explosives they were laying to blow up buildings. The Prime Minister, in expressing his sorrow over the loss, vowed to press on to achieve "absolute victory" in crushing Hamas, with the ultimate goal to free the over 100 Israeli hostages still held by the terrorists.

According to an unidentified senior Egyptian official, a proposal for a two-month ceasefire where the hostages would be freed in exchange for the release of Palestinians imprisoned by Israel and top Hamas leaders in Gaza permitted to relocate to other countries that was proposed by Israel, was rejected by Hamas which insisted that no further hostages would be released until such time that Israel put an end to its offensive and withdrew from Gaza.

On Monday, the Israeli reservists were preparing explosives to demolish two buildings located outside central Gaza's Maghazi refugee camp, close to the Israeli border. A Hamas operative fired a rocket-propelled grenade at a nearby tank. The explosives being laid in the buildings were triggered by the ensuing blast, leading to the collapse of both two-storey buildings, with the soldiers trapped inside. 

The troops had been tasked to work on an informal buffer zone about a kilometre wide along the border between Israel and Gaza for the prevention of attacks by terrorists against Israeli communities close to the Gaza border. A promised repeat by Hamas of the terrorist breach of the border through the separation wall when thousands of terrorists streamed into border communities and kibbutzim

ravaging the towns, raping and mutilating girls and women, slaughtering families in their homes, abducting children, women and the elderly on October 7.

Israeli troops carry the coffin of fellow soldier Ilay Levy during his funeral at the military cemetery in Tel Aviv on Tuesday. Levy was among three IDF soldiers killed in southern Gaza the previous day. (Oren Ziv/AFP/Getty Images)

According to military spokesman Daniel Hagari, the mission was meant to clear buildings to "create the conditions" that would permit Israeli residents of southern Israel to return to their homes. "It’s a very complicated area – very crowded, with a lot of people living there."

 

 Israeli troops have made use of controlled detonations throughout the conflict in Gaza to destroy structures that Hamas operatives hide in, as well as tunnels that have been used by the terrorists as firing positions. Efforts at removing those threats have led to the massive destruction resulting from the ground offensive.

In a separate event on Monday, three other IDF military died, bringing the total since the October ground offensive began, to the loss of 217 Israeli soldiers. "The IDF has opened an investigation into the disaster. We must draw the necessary lessons and do everything to preserve the lives of our soldiers", added Prime Minister Netanyahu. "While we bow our heads in memory of our fallen, we are not relenting, even for a moment, in striving for the goal that has no alternative—achieving total victory."

Israeli soldiers hold an Israeli flag on a tank that is moving along the border with the Gaza Strip on Jan. 21, 2024.  Amir Levy—Getty Images

Hamas Psychopathy on Ego-Steroids

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a meeting with relatives of hostages held in Gaza, at the Prime Minister’s Office in Jerusalem on January 22, 2024. (Prime Minister’s Office)

"Contrary to what is [being] said, there is no genuine proposal by Hamas."

"On the other hand, there is our initiative, which I will not detail."

"If we agree to this [the Hamas demand that the Israel Defense Forces withdraw from Gaza and end its war with Hamas] we will not be able to guarantee the security of our citizens."

"We will not be able to return the evacuees safely to their homes, and the next October 7 will only be a matter of time."

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu

Demonstrators hold up portraits of hostages held by the Hamas terror group during a rally to demand their release, near the Prime Minister’s Residence in Jerusalem on January 22, 2024. (Ahmad Gharabli/AFP)

Israel has been attempting to negotiate through third parties with Hamas for the release of the remaining 136 Israeli hostages being held by the terrorists in Gaza. Public pressure and the desperate pleas of the hostages' families, along with the state's own fervent intention to have all Israelis rescued from the plight of further traumatic treatment at the hands of Hamas and other terrorist groups in Gaza have exerted pressure on the government which cannot function solely on its pledge to destroy any future capability of Hamas and Islamic Jihad to mount further attacks on Israel and its citizens. 

The Israeli Prime Minister speaking to representatives of the hostage families in a meeting, apprised them of that simple fact; no offers that could be seriously contemplated have been received from Hamas whose suggestions for the release of the remaining hostages come from a source that believes it has the upper hand in the certainty of how dearly Israelis take the well-being of their citizens to enable it to put forward the kind of offers that no sane government could ever contemplate; certainly not one tasked with the security of its nation.

Benjamin Netanyahu did on the other hand, confirm that during negotiations Hamas demanded the retreat from Gaza of the Israel Defense Forces, and that Israel commit to ending its war with the terrorist group -- a unilateral demand in that whatever Israel might commit to in withdrawing its troops and its commitment to destroy the terrorist group, Hamas would have no intention of stopping its intermittent violent attacks against Israel. Hamas's arrogance demands "the release of all the Nukhba (terrorist commando) murderers and rapists, and leaving Hamas intact."

Troops operating in the Gaza Strip in an undated photo released on January 23, 2024 (Israel Defense Forces)

 

A committee session at the Israeli parliament in Jerusalem (Knesset) saw several dozen relatives of Israelis held hostage disrupt the event with demands that the lawmakers make a greater effort to free their family members. Many of the protesters carried photographs of their family members taken to Gaza. 

 

"Is it reasonable that 260 trucks of flour are entering Gaza now while my brother is eating nothing", Adi Angrest shouted. His brother Sgt. Matan Angrest remains a  hostage in Gaza. "It doesn't make any sense that my brother isn't eating anything when they bring them [Palestinians] 260 trucks of flour!"

 

French Defence Minister Sebastien Lecornu was in Israel to meet with Prime Minister Netanyahu in Jerusalem. Issues being discussed included the Paris-brokered agreement where medicines were to be delivered to Israeli hostages suffering from chronic illnesses that were destined to be provided to them entered the Gaza Strip last week and which the International Committee of the Red Cross stated they had no intention of delivering to the hostages. Instead, they said, the deliveries would be entrusted to Hamas. 

Mr. Lecornu was informed by Netanyahu that he is awaiting evidence that any of the medicines had actually reached the Israeli hostages, emphasizing that the implementation of the agreement must be monitored. Official Israeli figures state that 136 hostages remain in Gaza out of the total of 240 taken there on October 7. An unknown number are believed to have been killed there. 100 of the hostages had been released in November through a deal brokered by Egypt and Qatar.

Israeli authorities have no reason to believe that the hostages received any of the life-saving medications prescribed for their medical conditions. Instead, there is a common belief that just as Hamas operatives had commandeered much of the fuel, food, water and medicines sent by the international community into Gaza through border crossings to alleviate Palestinian shortages, so too did the Hamas terrorists advantage themselves with the delivery into their hands of medications meant for ailing Israeli hostages.

Friends and family members mourn during the funeral of IDF soldier Hadar Kapeluk in the Mount Herzl cemetery in Jerusalem on January 23, 2024, a day after he was killed in combat in the Gaza Strip (Photo by Menahem KAHANA / AFP)

Nothing Is As It Seems

"Gender binary is a colonial and white supremacist structure rather than a natural and indisputable truth."

"Because of colonialism, gender in Ontario and Canada, and specifically in the education system, still tends to be understood in binary terms or as being on either end of this 'spectrum' or somewhere in between it."

"European settlers forced their rigid views on gender upon the civilizations they invaded, reforming Indigenous gender roles through colonial restrictions as a tool to align patriarchal family and kinship structures that mirrored the privileged European family systems during the time of the invasion."

"Cisgenderism, cissexism and cisnormativity are the root of the violence perpetrated against trans and gender diverse people."

Trans-Affirming Toolkit for teachers, federal gov't funded

The Progress Pride Flag flies at Syncrude's Wood Bison Viewpoint. Photo by Vincent McDermott/Fort McMurray Today/Postmedia Network

As difficult as it is to credit, the Liberal government of prime minister Justin Trudeau has financed a 'Trans-Affirming Tookit' for the use of teachers with a stated purpose to educate teachers on transgender-identifying students. This is a 100-page instructional to be used in Canadian schools, addressing social justice theory, leftist identity politics, and assertions relating to biology, history and sex.

Teachers are informed via this teaching tool that biological sex has seven elements to determine gender; no single element, it insists, can determine sex; certainly not DNA. No, the elements related to external genitalia, internal sex organs, gonads, secondary sex characteristics, hormone production, hormone response and chromosomes all come into play, and teachers had better familiarize themselves with all of them for they will be held accountable  for the manner in which they disport themselves in the classroom as advocates of promoting the well-being of .09 percent of the population.

Above all, teachers must flush out of their minds the wildly inaccurate assumption that people are either male or female, for this is clearly racist. Anyone with an ounce of intelligence and common sense, it points out, must acknowledge that gender norms are of European derivation, and since Europeans were colonial settlers that oppressed indigenous populations everywhere, so-called gender norms are inherently oppressive.

The instructional encourages teachers to 'audit' their personal views on gender and take the time to introspectively deconstruct them -- in the classroom. According to Statistics Canada, 99.7 percent of the population identify as female and male. The vast majority of any population are not trans-represented despite the toolkit insisting such assumptions to be cruel and unjust social constructs. Teachers would do well, the teaching tool emphasizes, to review their 'cis-privilege', and reflect on unfortunate instances when they made 'cisnormative assumptions'. 

Progress Pride flags should be on display in every classroom and gender ideology embedded in the curriculum. Teachers have an obligation to speak about trans people throughout lessons, and students should be taught about dogmatic privilege hierarchies that are the driving mechanism behind social justice. Teachers must consider reading books about transgender children to their classes. Students should be charged with completing gender-introspective worksheets.

In the toolkit, Critical race theory has its place, encouraging teachers to apply 'intersectionality' theory to identify layers of oppression. This new initiative can partner with the federally funded "Anti-Hate Toolkit" for teachers that speaks of the Red Ensign as a symbol of white supremacy. Wayne Martino, professor of 'equity and social justice education' at Western University had a hand in producing the Trans-Affirming Toolkit. Teacher trade unions are circulating the treatise to their member-teachers.

University of Western Ontario

"Every single student needs to learn about gender diversity in all areas of the curriculum, inclusive of science and mathematics, and not just in language arts and history."

"Knowledge about gender diversity in the study of biology is important, for example. Learning about trans and gender diverse communities for their brilliance beyond gender-based activism, survival in the face of violence and transition stories that center linear representations of transition is vital."

"Students must be affirmed in their identities, and so no assumptions should be made about them [for example, educators should not assume that all students are cisgender as the default]."

"Dedicated separate spaces must also be provided for students who are Othered so that they might find support if and when they experience harm."

Trans-Affirming Toolkit

Looking for Peace, Opportunity, Future

"[We're waiting for] border patrol to come pick us up and give us protection."

"It doesn't matter if it's cold. There is peace here."

Sudanese migrant, Izzeddin, 32, migrant encampment, Sasabe, Arizona

"In terms of migrants per day, December 2023 has been larger than any average we have ever seen."

"Every official who is commenting on it, on all levels, says they're near or past the breaking point."

"If you move to a place that's super remote, there won't be a lot of agents on staff, and that increases your chances of being released into the U.S."

"There is nowhere to put people They can't hold you."

Adam Isacson, migration expert, Washington Office on Latin America

Women wait in a hallway Friday, Dec. 15, 2023, at a Border Patrol station in Ajo, Ariz. (AP Photo/Gregory Bull)

In a remote, cold and lonely place while awaiting the arrival of border guards, dozens of migrants huddle close to a hole in the border wall. They have been given coffee by aid group No More Deaths. Given blankets, food and emergency telephone calls should there be any there who sustained life-threatening injuries on their journey. Those hailing from Sudan have escaped another Darfur-like conflict, patiently waiting for their search for haven to end far from their homeland.

Among them are others, not only themselves fleeing war in Sudan, but those escaping from Central American violent gangs and Mexican cartels. All have crossed illegally into the United States, trekked over rugged terrain for tiring hours, to arrive near Sasabe, Arizona exhausted, hungry and cold. They wait to turn themselves over to authorities to be given the opportunity to ask for asylum; stranded in the Arizona desert, but hopeful.

Just as night time temperatures begin dropping, a convoy of American Border Patrol agents roll in. The men are loaded into a van where they're briefly processed. The van continues driving in its search for more people needing rescue. "We are not equipped to deal with this. It's a humanitarian disaster", comments Scott Carmon, a Border Patrol watch commander, of the crisis unfolding at the southern U.S. border.

 

A migrant walking along a road shadowed by the steel columns of the separation border between Mexico and Arizona. AP

 

Once again, migrant encounters reach toward record levels, testing the capacity of American law enforcement. Thousands of migrants arrive daily, on their way from Africa, Asia, the Middle East or South America. Relentless violence, desperation, fear and poverty drive them from their places of birth where they can no longer find a future.

There was a broad sigh of relief in the spring when crossings into the U.S. declined after the lifting of pandemic border restrictions. The anticipation was that the floodgates would burst, but they held. More lately, numbers have spiked. The number of apprehensions in a recent week soared to over 10,000 a day -- the Border Patrol found itself stretched beyond capacity. 

 

Small towns on both sides of the border were overwhelmed with people funneled through new routes by human smugglers, to evade capture.

American officials monitored a caravan moving north through Mexico comprised of over 2,000 migrants, heading toward the United States; unlikely to complete their journey according to experts, but drawing significant media notice to the migrant tide crossing the border. What has caused the recent swell is as yet unknown.

Theories include larger numbers of Mexicans fleeing from cartel turf battles; rumours of a key legal pathway ending; smugglers who push desperate people of all nationalities to attempt entry at increasingly remote parts of the vast border. Border officials in Arizona closed a key port of entry to legal crossings early in December to enable them to focus on the unlawful entries.

Migrants huddle around fires for warmth along the U.S.-Mexico border near Lukeville, Arizona. Camilo Montoya-Galvez/CBS News