Canada in fire and ice

Editorial

"Some say the world will end in fire, / Some say in ice," wrote the poet Robert Frost. "From what I've tasted of desire / I hold with those who favor fire." For some people in the Kelowna area, the end seemed to be creeping over the hillcrest this week. Thankfully, no one was killed, though some 240 homes burned to the ground in what is a tremendous loss for those families and communities.
"But if it had to perish twice, / I think I know enough of hate / To say that for destruction, ice / Is also great / And would suffice," Frost concluded.

Across the world, last week, the tentative and fragile peace that had been nurtured by Israel and Palestinian moderates turned to ice as a bus bombing reignited the retributive actions of the Israeli army and froze out, once again, the warming trend that had been carefully constructed over a few weeks of peace.

The two worlds – the blazing fires of the Okanagan and the icy, murderous zeal of the Middle East – may seem a world apart, but the connection is not just poetic. There is apparently a very tangible correlation between our country and the violence in Israel and the larger Middle East. U.S. intelligence reports suggest an organization operating in Canada – the International Islamic Relief Organization – is tied to Bosnian, Palestinian, Philippine and other terror groups, including Hamas and al-Qaeda. The group apparently also operates under the name Muslim World League, which is a Canadian registered charity.

This is not the first time Canada has been cited as a hotbed of terrorism. Most famously, the United States liked to blame Canada after the Sept. 11 attacks, alleging that some of the terrorists had entered from Canada, an allegation that proved a bit inflated, rather like the assertion that this month's East Coast blackout was all our fault.

Canada should hardly base our foreign and internal policies on U.S. intelligence reports. But neither should we ignore them. Those reports, seen as part of the larger American foreign policy imperatives of the Bush administration, have to be taken in the spirit in which they are released: paranoid hysteria.

Of course, as the saying goes, just because you're paranoid doesn't mean people aren't out to get you. Canada should not ignore the potential that sleeper cells or murderous extremist groups are operating out of this country. What would make us feel a lot better would be a Canadian intelligence service addressing these issues forthrightly, from a Canadian perspective that is not sullied by the needs of a U.S. president desperately trying to justify, post facto, a "sexed-up" foreign policy gamble.

In the meantime, the situation remains fouled up in Gaza, as Palestinian Authority military types destroyed tunnels that have been used over the years to transport bombs and weapons from Egypt, under the border and into the Gaza Strip. See what a little digging will do? Imagine their surprise when they found tunnels!

In a sense, these tunnels lead all over the world, as military support, terrorist weapons and the money to finance them funnel from places like Canada through literal or figurative tunnels to the terrorists. While we Canadians like to think of ourselves as above such terrible international crises as the murderers who kill Israeli bus-riders, reality may not be so benign.

Though Canadians like to maintain a lily-white image, there is another reason why we might hesitate to get all worked up over the potential link to Palestinian terror: There are a significant number of Canadians who view the Palestinian terrorists as "freedom fighters." One hears the subtle justification in the newspapers and in the heated conversations we have with the occasional Palestinian sympathizer who views violence as a necessary prerequisite to Palestinian self-determination.

There was a time when our icy but warm-hearted country exported peacekeepers. Not just Lester Pearson, but the blue berets. Our cool heads reduced flaming tensions worldwide.

What is Canada exporting now? Do we know?

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