Ironically, genuine internationalism must be nationalistic

Deflection is the answer when they have run out of ways to defend immoral and illegal behaviour by their favourite apartheid state. But Canadian critics of Israel will not let them change the channel because we have a duty to protest what our country is doing to support the ongoing genocide in Palestine.

Recently, the former head of B’nai Brith, Marvin Rotrand, posted “Why is the world ignoring genocide by Islamist militias against Black Africans? Not a word on college campuses: Sudanese paramilitary forces have carried out ethnic cleansing in Darfur, rights group says.”

Another less sophisticated poster responded to my criticism of the Israel lobby by posting, “Where are your tweets about the genocide in Sudan? Somehow you don’t seem to mind that mass destruction, starvation, mass movement of refugees, killing of babies and women. We expect you to protest the arms sales to and investments in Sudan by — oh dangerous Muslim countries.”

This is a common Zionist tactic. They regularly seek to undercut opposition to Israeli crimes by deflecting discussion towards another conflict. The ideal alternative conflict is one that can be blamed on “Islamists” or Arabs and which strengthens the US empire’s geopolitical aims.

Part of the answer to this deflection tactic is — counterintuitively for internationalists — to question what it has to do with my country. How many weapons has Canada provided to this “Islamist militia”? Is Ottawa backing the killing diplomatically? How many Canadians are fighting for the militia? Do state-subsidized Canadian charities raise money for it? How many Canadian schools regularly sing its anthem? Did a number of Canadian cities just raise the militia’s flag?

While apartheid apologists complain incessantly about Israel being unfairly “singled out,” that country is, in fact, singled out for special treatment by our country. No other wealthy faraway country receives a remotely comparable amount of registered charity funds. No other faraway state has received a constant flow of Canadians joining its military. No other state has a publicly financed special envoy to deflect criticism of its apartheid or gets Ottawa to send letters threatening the International Criminal Court on its behalf. Nor is there another country in which the government sues to block proper labels on its wines, or the foreign minister says Canada would act as an “asset” for it on the UN Security Council.

When it comes to Israel, forcing Ottawa to simply uphold existing Canadian laws on registered charities, assisting foreign militaries and arms sales would be a significant step towards justice. That should be part of the response to Rotrand’s deflection. But another part of answering Rotrand is the deflection itself.

Few say ‘you criticized the Rapid Support Force for killing Sudanese why haven’t you criticized Israel’. Or you ‘criticized Rwandan violence in eastern Congo why not Israel’s slaughter in Gaza’. On the other hand, there’s a powerful political movement denying Israel’s crimes. As such, Rotrand’s tweet offers the answer to why the student encampments are necessary. Canadian of conscience must do all we can to resist our government’s support for Israel precisely because of the existence of groups like B’nai Brith, the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs and others who seek to shape our foreign policy. Canada’s support for Israel is a “domestic” issue. It concerns what our government does in our name.

That’s not to say Palestine solidarity focused activists shouldn’t broaden their outlook and engage in broader critiques of Canadian foreign policy. But it should be rooted in the basic moral principle that we focus on the crimes of our government.

Paradoxically, genuine internationalism must be nationalistic. Or at least so long as we inhabit a nation state structure, particularly when living in a country towards the apex of global imperialism. To formulate it in a more controversial way: it’s immoral to focus on international crimes equally.

Instead, our focus should be on how our government/society contributed to a particular international wrongdoing and what’s our leverage to make change.

That’s the best response to deflection by supporters of Israel.

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In mid-June Yves will be touring from Vancouver Island to Winnipeg with his new co-authored book Canada’s Long Fight Against Democracy. For more info.