One thing we admire about Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s Mideast policy is that he has chosen sides. He has spoken plainly. He has provided “clarity.”
Harper’s position is that Canada is Israel’s friend. Not it’s friendonly when it is expedient to be one. But rather, a true friend.
As Harper put it in a speech to the Canadian Council for Israel this week, “a battle between a democratic state and the terrorist groups who seek to destroy both it and its people is not a matter of shades of grey. It is a matter of right and wrong. . . . When faced with such threats, Israel will always have a steadfast friend” in Canada.
Bravo. We have urged Canadian governments to take this position for years. Because it is the right position.
Harper has not changed his view despite constant whining from the opposition parties and many in the media that his position lacks “nuance” and betrays Canada’s traditional role as an “honest
broker” in the Mideast.
Actually, that was the Liberals’ position when they were in government and there was nothing “honest” about it. It was a position of unceasing moral equivalency, in which Israel was deemed a “friend” only when it was easy to be one. Harper has been a friend of Israel even when it was not easy.
To be sure, Harper went too far last summer when he accused the Liberals of being anti-Israel during its war with Hezbollah.
In fact, Liberal policy toward Israel — as indicated by Liberal Leader Stephane Dion, who spoke to the same group on the same night as Harper — is not actively “against” Israel. The problem is it is
not actively for it, either.
Dion said Canada supports Israel’s right to exist in a secure and peaceful Mideast.
Two points. The Mideast is not peaceful. Nor has Israel’s place in it ever been secure.
To say one recognizes Israel’s right to exist is really to say one recognizes the facts on the ground. Yes, Israel exists. The question is: do you support its right to defend itself? Dion is the latest Liberal leader to fudge the answer.
http://lfpress. ca/newsstand/ Opinion/Editoria ls/2007/02/ 08/pf-3558396.html
Canada; “a true friend”
Absolutely true! Despite well-publicised jihadi infiltration in it’s institutions, Canada towers over other countries in it’s refusal to stab the Jewish State/People, in the back!
The fellows in the silly “Toques” have a clarity of vision cultural pride that has long been bred out of their southern neighbours. No American president will ever speak out for Israel the way Harper has.