Story summary
In late 2023, the Hamas massacre killed more than 1,200 people, mostly Israeli civilians, leading to massive Israeli retaliation which reportedly caused up to 73,000 deaths among Palestinian civilians and combatants. Amid this conflict, attention shifted away from West Bank Palestinians. While there was significant global outcry over the situation in Gaza, where Israel had withdrawn all Jewish settlements nearly a quarter-century ago, fewer voices protested against abuses in the occupied West Bank.
Recently, Canada joined countries like the United Kingdom and France by declaring that commercial ties with illegal Israeli settlements must be curtailed. These European nations plan to ban such ties, reflecting international laws that view these settlements as obstacles to peace. This move underscores a renewed focus on ensuring compliance with legal standards regarding occupied territories.
Written for “Canada West Bank Decision” on 2026-10-04,
grounded in this article and the 0 other(s) covering the same event.
After the Hamas massacre in late 2023 (which slaughtered more than 1,200 people, mostly Israeli civilians), and amid the massive Israeli retaliation (which rained death on as many as 73,000 Palestinian civilians and Hamas combatants), the world took its eye off the fate of West Bank Palestinians.
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world → slaughter → Palestinians
While people protested vociferously about the killing in Gaza — a territory from which Israel withdrew all Jewish settlements nearly a quarter-century ago — few raised their voices about the abuses in the territory that Israel still occupies illegally across the West Bank.
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Israel → protest → Bank
It barely registered on the world’s map.
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It → register → map
This month, Canada joined the United Kingdom and France in declaring that it cannot be business as usual for Jewish settlements that were created — and keep expanding — in violation of international law.
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that → join → law
Specifically, Canada is joining other European nations in planning to ban commercial ties to these settlements.
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Canada → join → settlements
The logic, in law and in policy, is that these settlements have long been deemed to be an obstacle to peace.
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settlements → deem → peace
“For more than 70 years, successive Canadian governments have held the position that a two-state solution is the way forward,” argued Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand.
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Anand → hold → position
Bands of armed Jewish settlers have been provoking, attacking, ransacking Palestinian land with rising impunity in recent months, attracting the ire of even the loudest apologists within the current Israeli and American governments.
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Bands → provoke → governments
When I was based in the Middle East as a foreign correspondent in the late 1990s, I covered endless confrontations between Jewish settlers in outlying areas of the West Bank imposing themselves in indefensible (and undefendable) outposts.
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I → base → outposts
Back then, Israeli governing and security authorities did not turn a blind eye with as much abandon as they do now.
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they → govern → abandon
In those days, when the Oslo peace process was still alive, it was widely understood that these outlying settlements would one day be demolished (while the bedroom blocs outside Jerusalem and Tel Aviv would be bartered for other concessions).
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blocs → understand → concessions
Jewish settlements were removed from Gaza in 2005, and from the Israeli-occupied Egyptian Sinai in the 1980s.
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settlements → remove → 1980s
But the long-term goal of a two-state solution is not dead, if for no other reason that there is no better, workable alternative — certainly not the “one-state solution” that many of Israel’s opponents call for.
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many → be → opponents
The idea that the Jewish state should sign its own death warrant by merging into a Greater Palestine, soon to be outvoted by a Palestinian majority including Gaza and the West Bank, ignores the lessons of history.
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state → sign → history
There’s a reason that the UN chose partition, which gave rise to Israeli independence in 1948; the breakup of Yugoslavia is another illustration that you can’t force people who hate each other to live under the same roof, deprived of self-determination.
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who → ’ → determination
Canada and other friends of Israel cannot be complicit in watching the current government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu sabotage the possibility of that two-state solution.
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government → watch → solution
That is precisely why the time is right, at this very moment, to send a signal of Canada’s position.
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time → send → position
This is not piling on, it is making a point.
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it → pile → point
Decades ago, I wrote about the incongruity of Revenue Canada (now the CRA) granting charitable deductions to registered charities that sent funds to the West Bank.
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that → write → Bank
I took some heat for those stories at the time, but I believed that the contradiction had to be exposed, and that we needed the kind of governmental clarity we are seeing today.
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we → take → clarity
BDS is an amorphous agglomeration of activists, some of whom well understand the distinction between Israel proper and the occupied West Bank; others deliberately blur the lines by treating all of Israel as an “apartheid state” that must be boycotted and decertified.
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that → understand → state
A transparent, properly administered governmental rubric — restricting commerce with illegal settlements, not isolating the rest of Israel — is far preferable and fully justifiable.
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rubric → administer → Israel
The timing of British Prime Minister Andy Burnham in leading the charge is surely suspect, given his desire to appease impatient Labour MPs who supported his recent bid for the party leadership.
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who → lead → leadership
The Middle East’s most enduring — if embattled — democracy is going to the polls on Oct. 27.
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democracy → go → Oct.
Canada and Europe are clearly signalling to Israelis that the more they expand Jewish settlements on occupied territory, the more they are diminishing their ties with friendly countries.
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they → signal → countries
By delivering that message now, Canada is telling Israeli voters what they need to hear as they decide on their country’s future.
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they → deliver → future
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