Mazal tov to the BCTF

Editorial

It has been some time since supporters of Israel have had reason to be cheered when Canadian trade unions have become involved in the Middle East conflict. Over the past five years, unions and other left-wing groups have been the genesis of some of the most virulent and unbalanced criticism of Israel.

At the representative assembly of the B.C. Teacher's Federation, that phenomenon may have turned a corner. Two resolutions were up for discussion at the conference – which is the decision-making body of the teachers' group between full conventions – over the weekend. One resolution urged the BCTF to seek out and offer solidarity to Israeli and Palestinian organizations whose objectives include peaceful resolution of Mideast disputes. Considered the least offensive of the two motions, amendments were made to ensure that only groups with no links to violence would be considered potential partners for co-operation. After the amendments, the resolution passed.

The other resolution, considered the more inflammatory, was defeated by a count of about 52 to 48 per cent. That resolution urged the BCTF to press the teachers' national body, the Canadian Federation of Teachers, to urge Canada's federal government to oppose the separation barrier Israel is constructing. Using the opinion of the International Court of Justice in The Hague as its principle, the resolution demanded that the wall be dismantled.

Kit Krieger, a former head of the BCTF and a strong activist against the resolutions, said he was delighted with the outcome. But he acknowledged there remains some mystery as to the motivation of the delegates. The contentious resolution was the last issue dealt with before the conference ended Saturday afternoon. Once the vote was taken, delegates scattered to catch their planes or return to what was left of their weekend, Krieger said. He didn't get much chance to debrief.

Though the votes do not indicate that a major Canadian union has sided with the Zionist cause, it does suggest that there may finally be a recognition that this conflict has enough blame to go around. The popular depiction of a downtrodden Palestinian population oppressed for the fun of it by an Israeli "apartheid state" may be a distortion that some trade unionists are at last beginning to recognize as an insupportable over-simplification.

Krieger and other teachers who worked tirelessly to urge a more nuanced understanding of the complexities of the Israeli-Arab conflict deserve to be recognized by the Jewish community for the victory they have achieved and the teachers deserve credit for rejecting a degree of simplicity that was unbecoming their role as educators.

That Israel's behavior remains a key issue to social justice groups like the BCTF is hard to understand for many Jewish and other Canadians, who see in the world a panoply of atrocities that make Israel's worst behavior pale by comparison. With dire developments, natural and human-created, on every continent and in almost every country of the world, the emphasis on Israel's actions by a large proportion of global activists continues to reflect a massively distorted worldview. This distortion is indisputable. To compare the attention Israel's "atrocities" have received with the attention given to issues like the Sudanese crisis, the Asian tsunami, AIDS, leprosy, child slave-soldiers in central Africa and the depressingly long list of disasters in every part of the world, is to realize the rank unfairness of the world in dealing with Israel.

That Canadian trade unionists – educators especially – devoted their limited time and resources to critiquing Israel itself raises questions about the priorities of the members who brought the resolutions forward. The obsession with Israel's behavior belies claims to justice. There can be no logical qualitative or quantitative reason why the Israeli-Palestinian conflict usurps so much of the attention of alleged justice-seeking peoples. This unjust state of affairs must be due to some extenuating circumstances and may be the result of entrenched suspicions of, choose one, liberal democracy, individual freedom, America and its allies, modernity, a Jewish state, Jews ... one can only speculate – and most likely a variety of these prejudices are at play.

In the milieu of this massively distorted state of global opinion, the BCTF has made a small but significant move toward balance. They have rejected, by a narrow margin, the knee-jerk depiction of Israel as the sole perpetrator of atrocities in the current conflict. And that, in the context of contemporary discourse, is a glorious revolution.

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