The Arab-Muslim/Canadian Divide

"[With respect to] the increasing push for Liberal staff members to phone bank and door knock, while many of us started our political careers in elections as volunteers, we can no longer in good conscience campaign for a party that excludes us and our values."

"[They will not participate in activities as party members until the government changes its diplomatic posture to] join our allies in explicitly condemning Israel for its numerous war crimes and for the genocidal rhetoric from members of the Israeli Cabinet."

"[Canada must] join our allies, including Norway, Spain, and Ireland in recognizing the state of Palestine [and] acknowledge anti-Palestinian racism as a unique form of hate and work to address it in Canada."

"[As well as an end to] all research collaboration on military and dual-use technologies between Canadian and Israeli researchers." 

"Over the past months we have expressed our growing concerns in relation to the human rights violations experienced by Palestinians and advocated for a change in policy towards a posture that is aligned with our values,"

"We have often felt unheard by the leadership of our party."

Arab and Muslim Liberal ministerial staffers

"They're far more brave than we are. We held back our money, sure.... They're putting their own livelihood at risk."

"I'm hoping that the party recognizes that this is not some people who may or may not be donating. Maybe they think they can find other donors, but you can't just find 50 staff overnight."

"What [the staff] are really trying to do is help the Liberal Party wake up, and they're taking this extreme step to do so."

Hussein Hamdani, founding member, Network 100-GTA

Dozens of Arab and Muslim staffers with the federal Liberals have threatened to sit out of the upcoming Montreal byelection over the government’s stance on the war in Gaza and its policies on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. CBCNews

Perhaps it was inevitable under the Liberal, 'progressive', 'post-national' agenda of Prime Minister Justin Trudeau that a large contingent of ministerial staff numbering 52, who happen to be Arab or Muslim have issued an ultimatum to the Liberal Party that they are no longer prepared to act as objective, non-partial staffers in Parliament to ministerial offices until such time as the government actively pursues the staffers' personalized agenda of condemning Israel for responding to the October 7, 2023 mass atrocity visited upon the Jewish state's southern border region of farming communities, devastated by mass slaughter at the hands of Hamas terrorists.

 

What Israelis recognize as an existential threat to their survival within a Jewish state, and Palestinians interpret as a threat to their ambition of using the ancestral Judaic geography to be dedicated to a state for Palestinians is the issue at the heart of these 52 dissenters' demands of the Canadian government. That no country on the globe would ever hesitate to protect itself and its people from criminal violence, much less a mass atrocity on the scale of what Israelis were subjected to on October 7 is no impediment to the demands of these Liberal staffers who would surely feel more at home in Gaza than Canada.

 

Under international law any country that is attacked in less extreme a manner than what Israel was forced to experience, is entitled, and expected to take any and all steps required to ensure the safety and security of its population. It is the primary obligation of any state. Palestinian terrorists have proven themselves over the decades to be resolutely committed to the destruction of Israel. Violent, deadly attacks have been non-stop. They are countered by Israel's military and its intelligence branches' efforts to apprehend any attacks in their planning stages, preemption that occasionally fails.

The scope and barbaric severity of the last terrorist attack on southern Israel, makes it impossible for matters to proceed as they have for 70 years; Israel can no longer handle each crisis as it arises; the time has come for the complete and total eradication of Palestinian terrorism, its structures, infrastructure, operatives, stores of weaponry, all to be demolished. As would any other nation commit to under similar unending violent attacks requiring the nation-target to be ever on alert, ever prepared to meet new lethal challenges. The time has come, simply put.

Arab and Muslim demographics in Canada choosing to support terrorism against a Western democratic country have no place in this country, much less feel entitled by sheer force of numbers, to declare themselves at war with a foreign country, and to aspire to force the government of a country that has given them the opportunity to live peacefully in a framework of peaceful co-existence of all ethnic/religious groups that have made Canada their home through a century of immigration.

Threatening to quit their jobs? Why wait? Their challenge could be swiftly accommodated by relieving them of their employment. The Arab/Muslim Liberal ministers in the Cabinet and caucus can continue to do their jobs as best they can without such staff, as a lesson learned in how critical it is to hire staffers capable of doing the work assigned to them, rather than deploy themselves as arbiters of how government must react to international situations, to suit their personal standards of justice and accountability. 

 

The sooner, the better.

 

Salma Zahid, Liberal MP for Scarborough Centre, speaks during a discussion titled “Voices for Peace” organized by the Ahmadiyya Muslim Youth Association in the Parliamentary Precinct of Ottawa. Canada shifted its stance to join international calls for an immediate ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Spencer Colby

"We fully stand behind the comprehensive ceasefire deal, outlined by President Biden and endorsed by the UN Security Council. We call on parties to the conflict to agree to the deal. Any delay will only see more lives lost."

"[Hamas must lay down its arms and release all hostages, civilians must be protected and a sustained increase in the flow of humanitarian assistance throughout Gaza]."

"The Liberal Party of Canada firmly believes that everyone should feel safe, welcome, and included in our movement — and we'll continue working very hard to engage volunteers and supporters on their priorities to keep moving forward."

Liberal Party statement