Canadian Foreign Policy in the Middle East

About a week ago I was at the opening session of the 14th Jerusalem Conference in Canadian Studies. One of the keynote speakers was Irwin Cotler (Liberal MP, Mount Royal) -- he was AG under Paul Martin from 2003-2006. He is an expert on human rights and international law having spent the bulk of his career at McGill; he was first elected to Parliament in 1999. Cotler was speaking on Canadian Foreign Policy in the Middle East, a potentially slightly tricky task if you are generally in favour of Canada's position and a member of the opposition (little "o" since the Libs are not Her Majesty's official opp) and you are a Jew in a Jewish crowd.

 He opened by querying why there is a perception in Canada and Israel that the Harper Government is the best friend Israel has ever had. He asked why this is the case when successive Canadian governments have maintained the same principles -- why  is Harper Israel's best friend? Like any good lawyer in a tricky spot, Cotler focused on the fine distinctions between the traditional Canadian position (obviously espoused by the Liberals!) and Steven Harper's position. First, he suggested there are 10 key principles to Canadian foreign policy in the Middle East. Perhaps curiously, he peppered his discussion of the principles with quotes from Dion and Martin, nothing from Trudeau the elder or the younger. According to Cotler, these are the principles in a nutshell, should you be keen:

1. A cornerstone of the policy is support for Israel and its legitimacy
2. Palestinians are people with a right to a state - support of the 2 state solution
3. support of UNSC Res 242 & 338, which set out the basic framework for conflict resolution
4. Terrorism is unacceptable
5. Genocide is unacceptable
6. support of democracy for good governance
7. demands integrity of international institutions
8. Iran may pose a threat to regional stability
9. support for bilateralism
10. support for UNSC 242 -- there are Jewish and Arab refugees

Then Cotler made 6 distinctions between previous Canadian government policy and Harper policy.

1. Harper has made support for Israel = Canadian foreign policy in the Middle East
2. Conservatives have been especially demonstrative of their support in international forums e.g. Baird's speech at the UN in Nov 2012 to oppose the granting of Palestinian observer state status.
3. Conservatives have been especially demonstrative of their support on the ground, e.g. it was front page news that Baird visited Tzipi Livni at the Justice Ministry in East Jerusalem.  Cotler said he did this too as a representative of the Canadian government. (Small aside -- many governments don't do this as it imparts legitimacy to Israel's annexation of the East.)
4. Canada's closing of its embassy in Iran and the Iranian embassy in Canada was framed as support for Israel
5. Harper suggests that Canada didn't get a seat at the UNSC because of its Middle East policy (support for Israel). Cotler (and others) suggest the problem is Canadian foreign policy in Africa
6. At least eight ministers of Harper's government have visited Israel in the last few years.

Upshot: It's all Israel, all the time from the Harper Conservatives. 


Before the keynote speeches I had an interesting conversation with a Canadian-Israeli lawyer who studied at UBC in the late 60s. He's retired now, but told me he's spent nearly the last 40 years in Israel doing law reform that has used Canadian legislation as a model. One example he gave was the PPSA -- the personal property security act! This is the provincial law that you use to register a security interest against property that isn't real property. Like, when the bank gives you a loan to buy a car and they take a security interest in the car so that if you don't pay your loan, they get the car and can recover. (When I was at law school the PPSA's creation was attributed to Prof Cumming at UofS, although I see that Wikipedia says it was first implemented in Ontario. I think Wikipedia is wrong in this case, Cumming was legendary, but I'm not inclined to do further research on this point!) For my fellow lawyerly types -- this brought up fond memories of reviewing PPSA searches after dinner in my office in Calgary for aircraft financing deals. Shudder! Surely there is a more automated system these days?