Rights group slams Canada’s decision to aid Israel

A Montreal-based rights group has denounced a decision by the Canadian government to give financial support to Israel, Press TV reports.

The Palestinian and Jewish Unity, known as PAJU, has said the government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper should boycott Israel, which has violated over 400 UN resolutions since it started seizing Palestinian lands in 1948.

Asked why he criticizes the government for its financial support to Tel Aviv through the Canada-Israel Free Trade Agreement, the group’s co-president Bruce Katz told Press TV from Montreal, “Well, for the very same reason that years back, governments and financial institutions were criticized for financially supporting the South African apartheid regime.”

“You know, Canadian foreign policy states… that it views the settlements as illegal under international law. Yet, successive Canadian governments disregard their own policy and this particular government, the Harper government, has been the worst of all. Not only has it disregarded its own foreign policy, but it actively supports Israel’s apartheid policies in the occupied territories,” Katz said.

Harper “went to Ramallah… [but] did not visit one refugee camp and the worst still… paid lip service to the idea that any criticism of Israel is a manifestation of a new form of anti-Semitism,” he noted.

“We feel that the Harper government has gone way too far in its support for the [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu regime, but in our minds what that shows is the extent to which Canada has become isolated politically… so is Israel under Netanyahu. In a way, these two individuals really are cut from the same cloth,” Katz said.

On Tuesday, Harper and Netanyahu announced the new agreement that will boost economic, cultural and social ties between Canada and the Israeli regime, and will expand the free trade pact between the two sides.