Pro-Palestine activists rally at the Manitoba Legislative Building nearly one year after the attacks of October 7, 2023 attacks. Photo courtesy CTV News.

Prime Minister Mark Carney’s oft-repeated claim that Israel has the right to defend itself—even as it attacks other nations—has become something of a pathetic joke.

Over the past two years, Israel has launched strikes against Lebanon, Yemen, Syria, and Iran, yet it has not faced condemnation from Canada, neither under Justin Trudeau nor, since the general election in April of this year, under Mark Carney. In the final days of his leadership, under the looming shadow of Israeli genocide, Prime Minister Trudeau proudly declared, “I am a Zionist.”

Carney’s electoral success was largely built on his defiant stance against US threats to Canadian sovereignty, but his rejection of American expansionism has not extended to Israel’s own territorial ambitions in the Middle East. Belligerent Israel continues its attacks on neighbouring nations, its illegal settlements in the West Bank, and its genocidal campaign in Gaza, with both material and rhetorical support from its ally, Canada. Carney’s recent strings-attached promise to recognize a Palestinian state will do little to help starving Gazans in the critical, immediate future.

Manitobans hoping that a progressive NDP provincial government would show greater sympathy for Palestinians than the federal Liberals should prepare to be disappointed. Supporters of Palestinian human rights often quote Nelson Mandela: “Our........

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