In early August, the Green Party of Canada voted at its national convention to endorse boycott-divestment-sanctions (BDS) measures against segments of Israel\u2019s economy and society. BDS advocates were quick to claim victory, citing that the Greens are now the first Canadian political party of any significance to support BDS.<\/p>\n
But not so fast.<\/p>\n
In the wake of the vote, party leader Elizabeth May immediately declared she was \u201cdevastated\u201d by the decision and \u201cdisappointed that the membership has adopted a policy in favor of a movement that I believe to be polarizing, ineffective and unhelpful in the quest for peace and security for the peoples of the Middle East.\u201d May added that, \u201cas is the right of any member, I will continue to express personal opposition to BDS\u201d \u2013 a breath-taking statement to hear from a party leader, particularly when the leader is the party\u2019s sole voice in Parliament.<\/p>\n
In the weeks that followed, May openly mused to the media about how this entire episode was causing her to rethink her future in the Green party. In an interview with CBC Radio, May talked about the possibility of walking away from the party: \u201cI would say as of this minute I think I\u2019d have real difficulties going not just to an election but through the next month. There are a lot of issues I want to be talking about with Canadians, and this isn\u2019t one of them.\u201d<\/p>\n
And May wasn\u2019t alone. The leader of the Green Party of British Columbia, Andrew Weaver, issued a scathing statement disavowing the federal party\u2019s decision. \u201cThis is not a policy that I nor the B.C. Green party support,\u201d said Weaver. \u201cI think the Green Party of Canada needs to take a careful look at their policy process and ask themselves how a policy that goes against Green party values could have been allowed on the floor of a convention.\u201d<\/p>\n
Various Green candidates likewise condemned the decision. One from Ottawa said, \u201cI\u2019m in a state of disbelief.\u2026 I don\u2019t agree with it, I don\u2019t like having that over me going into [the next] election.\u201d Another, from Halifax, said the policy is \u201cdestructive for the party.\u2026 Every country has its issues. When we specifically single out Israelis, I worry about the buzzwords and subtext and code language, which is antisemitic.\u201d<\/p>\n
A party torn apart. A leader willing to quit. Controversial headlines eclipsing anything else the party intended to highlight coming out of convention. Is this what a BDS victory looks like?<\/p>\n
The fight against BDS revolves around psychology much more than economics. Israel\u2019s economy is strong, with trade and ties growing despite calls for BDS. But, on the psychological level, BDS activities have the potential to poison attitudes toward Israel among civil society organizations and demoralize the Jewish community. On both levels, BDS proponents failed when it comes to the Green party.<\/p>\n
While May has since declared she will stay on as leader, every Green voter should be outraged that BDS activists \u2013 in using the party to promote their own marginal agenda \u2013 nearly pushed the Greens\u2019 only voice in Parliament out of the party. If anything, this initiative has exposed the toxic nature of BDS to those it intended to seduce. As CIJA Chair David Cape recently wrote: \u201cOnce again, BDS has proven bitterly and publicly divisive for political parties that contemplate endorsing it. In this case, BDS has sown resentment among Greens and come at a great cost for anti-Israel activists.\u201d<\/p>\n
And when it comes to the morale of the Jewish community, this issue has mobilized thousands of Jewish Canadians across the political spectrum (including former Green party members) to speak out and condemn the party\u2019s hostility toward Israel. In a matter of weeks, CIJA galvanized some 7,500 Canadians to email the Green party\u2019s leadership to express their opposition to this initiative. Without question, our united efforts had an impact, with May openly admitting BDS is \u201cvery clearly a polarizing\u00a0movement that leaves most of the Jewish community in Canada feeling that it is antisemitic.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hopefully, this will spur May and other Greens to take the steps needed to annul the BDS policy and regain control of the party\u2019s direction from those behind this hateful agenda.<\/p>\n
Steve McDonald<\/strong> is deputy director, communications and public affairs, at the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" In early August, the Green Party of Canada voted at its national convention to endorse boycott-divestment-sanctions (BDS) measures against segments of Israel\u2019s economy and society. BDS advocates were quick to claim victory, citing that the Greens are now the first Canadian political party of any significance to support BDS. But not so fast. In the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[6236,3555,3976,458,4612,4613,4330,3597],"class_list":["post-20446","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-op-ed","tag-andrew-weaver","tag-bds","tag-boycott","tag-cija","tag-elizabeth-may","tag-green-party","tag-israel","tag-politics"],"blocksy_meta":{"styles_descriptor":{"styles":{"desktop":"","tablet":"","mobile":""},"google_fonts":[],"version":8}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20446","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20446"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20446\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20446"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20446"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20446"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}