The growing pro-Arab and pro-PLO sympathy which is now discernible in Canada is being manifested in diverse ways. A recent article in the Toronto Star suggests that the PLO in particular “has built pipelines into Parliament, universities, the labor movement and churches.”
Robert Fife, a Canadian press correspondent who wrote the article, indicates that the success of the PLO advocacy has begun to cause disquiet among leading Jewish figures. However, Conservative Senator Na-than Nurgitz is quoted as saying that there is no concern about “the vastly increased effectiveness of their lobby in Ottawa.”
Evidence of the increasingly pro-Arab and PLO pro-file in Canada can be seen in the letters-to-the-editor section of the large metropolitan newspapers. Whereas communications from Arab supporters were rare two decades ago, today the situation has changed. The Toronto Star itself frequently publishes letters from the head of the Canadian Arab Federation and other partisan Arab correspondents.
Radio talk shows also provide corroborating evidence of the quantum jump in Arab input into the political discourse. Canada has a unique national radio talk program called “Cross Country Check-Up” in which listeners from Halifax to Vancouver may call toll free to express their views on controversial subjects.
Whenever a Middle East topic is discussed on the talk show, the program is inundated with phone calls from strategic points all across Canada ventilating pro-Arab and anti-Israel views.
CONSTITUENCIES SUPPORTING THE PLO
The growth in support for the PLO comes from two different constituencies; Canadians who for various reasons endorse the Arab rather than the Israeli position, and newly-arrived Arab immigrants to this country who quickly learn to translate their advocacy into vigorous media participation.
The University of Alberta Press recently published a volume which underscores this interpretation. Called “Canada and the Arab World,” and edited by Tareq Ismael, the volume contains eight essays and one report bearing on Canada’s relationship to the Middle East.
The general tone of the papers presented in the volume may be seen from Dr. Peyton Lyon’s essay which begins; “Canadians are becoming more aware of their nation’s stake in the Middle East, and less oblivious to the rights and aspirations of the Palestinian Arabs. At the same time, however, Canada’s diplomatic role in the area has become less imaginative and constructive, and it remains flawed by its bias in favor of Israel.”
Lyon, of Carleton University in Ottawa, a frequent letter-writer to the Globe and Mail of Toronto (inevitably criticizing Israel in those letters), is only one of the contributors who deplore what they perceive as Canada’s tilt towards Israel and the inordinate influence played by the Canada-Israel Committee (CIC), a Canadian Jewish organization which operates in Ottawa on behalf of the Jewish community. Paul Noble, a McGill University specialist, argues in his essay that Canada has been guilty, among other things, of adopting a static position vis-a-vis United Nations Security Council Resolution 242, there by ignoring the people-centered aspect of the Palestinian issue.
PLO’S SPARKPLUG IN CANADA
In his article circulated by the Canadian Press, Fife Says that much of the credit for the new sympathy being expressed for the Arab cause must go to Abdul Abdullah, a 44-year-old Palestinian from Jerusalem, who is the PLO representative based in Ottawa. His mandate on arriving in Canada in 1972 was to work with countries that did not officially recognize the PLO.
Canada was chosen for the PLO lobbying because it is seen as one of the nations responsible for the plight of the Palestinians. Canada is also a respected member of the UN. The PLO wants to enlist Canada’s support in any future deliberation.
Abdullah, Fife reports, works out of the Arab Information League in Ottawa and distributes pro-PLO materials to members of Parliament, government offices, schools, the media and the public.
SOME 60 MPS INVOLVED IN PRO-ARAB ACTIVITIES
Fife indicates that more than 60 Canadian MPs are part of the Canadian-Arab World Parliamentary Association– an organization formed only since 1982. The group has been active in promoting trips to the Middle East, for which the Arab Information League picks up the tab.
A number of the MPs, such as Marcel Prud’ homme, want Canada to recognize the PLO as the main voice of the Palestinians. Official Canadian government policy, however, denies this possibility until Yasir Arafat renounces terrorism and recognizes Israel’s right to exist.
“But Bob Corbett, a New Brunswick Tory MP and chairman of the pro-Arab Parliamentary Association, subscribes to the notion that one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter, He sees little difference between PLO terrorists blowing up a school bus and Israeli planes bombing a Palestinian refugee camp, “write Fife.
The Canadian Press correspondent also identifies two Canadian academics, Lyon and Joseph Graff of the University of Toronto, as “respected academics (who) have been active in the past few years on behalf of the Palestinians.
INROADS INTO THE LABOR MOVEMENT
The author suggests that the PLO has also made important inroads in Quebec and the West Coast labor movements, and among certain pro-Third World and Church groups. But it has been “frozen out” of the major labor organization, the two million-member Canadian Labor Congress, largely because of CLC president Dennis McDermott’s “distaste for terrorism.” Not long ago the CLC rejected what many thought was a pro-PLO resolution that came from its affiliate, the Ontario Federation of Labor. Although the Arab lobby does not have the same clout as the pro-Israel lobby, it is laying a foundation of support, according to the Canadian Press report, that was virtually non-existent 10 years ago.
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