Canada says its position on Gaza has not changed, backs two-state solution
World
President Trump proposed that the US take over Gaza and create a "Riviera of the Middle East"
OTTAWA (Reuters) – Canada's longstanding position on Gaza has not changed and it is committed to achieving a two-state solution, Foreign Minister Melanie Joly said in a post on X.
President Donald Trump on Tuesday proposed that the US take over Gaza and create a "Riviera of the Middle East" after relocating Palestinians elsewhere.
According to Canadian media, politicians are pushing back on the idea of clearing Palestinians out of the Gaza Strip as an Israeli minister suggests some of them could be sent to Canada.
Israeli Defence Minister Israel Katz wrote Thursday on X that he’d instructed Israeli’s military to draft a plan to evacuate “any resident of Gaza who wishes to leave” to be resettled to willing countries abroad.
“Countries like Canada, which has a structured immigration program, have previously expressed willingness to take in residents from Gaza,” he wrote.
Ottawa’s only resettlement programme for Gazans is limited to people with relatives in Canada, and only a small portion of the applications — currently capped at 5,000 — have resulted in Palestinians actually making it to Canada.
Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada did not immediately respond when asked for the latest figures on Palestinian resettlement. In its last public disclosure release, issued in late May 2024, it said just 41 people had arrived as of May 20. CBC News reported last month that just 616 people had arrived under the temporary programme.
Before Katz made his comments, Joly said Canada is still calling for a two-state solution — the creation of a Palestinian state that would exist in peace alongside Israel.
International Development Minister Ahmed Hussen, Justice Minister Arif Virani and NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh were among a dozen MPs who also pushed back on Trump’s idea.
Hussen, Virani and seven other Liberal MPs released a statement calling Trump’s idea “preposterous and a complete violation of international law” and saying that “it amounts to ethnic cleansing.”
Singh said that Trump’s comments “destabilize” the Middle East and threaten the ceasefire between Israel and Hamas. “Trump’s threats are utter madness. They violate every international law,” he wrote in a post on X.
The Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs deferred comment to the Israeli embassy in Ottawa, which did not provide an immediate response.
The Gaza Strip was established as a Palestinian territory after Palestinians were displaced across the region during the creation of the State of Israel.
Jordan, Lebanon and Egypt already host millions of Palestinian refugees and say it would be inappropriate to remove more Palestinians from their homeland.
Israel rejects the United Nations' designation of Palestinians as refugees, saying this creates an illegitimate idea of them returning to land that is now Israel. Israeli officials also have argued that the Jewish people have ancestral ties to the land.
Mona Abuamara, the Palestinian ambassador in Ottawa, said that Israeli “terrorist settlers” in occupied Palestinian territories are the ones who should be moved to other countries. She said another alternative is to have Palestinians take back land that is now Israel.
“If you don’t want to move forward, we can happily go back,” she wrote on X.
