The federal election is underway, and we need your help to force Gaza back into the political conversation and beat the media blackout. Despite Israel renewing its genocidal campaign, the leaders of all Canada’s political parties have been nearly silent.

The Leaders’ Debates will be held on April 16 and 17 in Montreal. We need to ensure that the federal leaders are directly asked about Canada’s complicity in Israel’s ongoing crimes.

It’s time to ask about genocide!

Send an email to the Leaders’ Debates Commission and debate moderators, and insist that they ask the party leaders whether they believe Israel committed genocide and if they will continue to allow Canadian companies to sell weapons to Israel.

The Leaders’ Debates Commission is a public agency created to manage leaders’ debates during federal general elections. It will be hosting two debates in Montreal: one in French on April 16 at 8PM ET, and another in English on April 17, at 7PM ET. Steve Paikin will be moderating the English debate, while Patrice Roy is moderating the French debate.

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It has been well established that Israel’s actions in Gaza amount to genocide:

• UN experts initially warned of the risk of genocide in Gaza as early as 2023;
• UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese recently confirmed that genocide is underway and that it even risks expanding to the occupied West Bank;
• In January 2024, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruled that Palestinians have a right to be protected from genocide and imposed provisional measures upon Israel to prevent and punish genocidal acts – with which Israel has failed to comply;
• In issuing its arrest warrants against Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu and former Defense Minister Gallant, the International Criminal Court (ICC) echoed the language of the crime of genocide in finding reasonable grounds to believe that they knowingly and deliberately “created conditions of life calculated to bring about the destruction of part of the civilian population in Gaza”;
• Amnesty International issued a landmark report in December 2024 that found that Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. Amnesty arrived at the grave conclusion that Israel has committed multiple acts of genocide with the specific intent of destroying the Palestinian people in Gaza;
• Human Rights Watch also released their own damning report of Israel’s operations in Gaza. They also concluded that, “Israeli authorities have intentionally deprived Palestinian civilians in Gaza of adequate access to water since October 2023, most likely resulting in thousands of deaths and thus committing the crime against humanity of extermination and acts of genocide”;
• Doctors Without Borders warns that “what our medical teams have witnessed on the ground throughout this conflict is consistent with the descriptions provided by an increasing number of legal experts and organisations concluding that genocide is taking place in Gaza”;
• Within Canadian civil society, Justice for All Canada has released multiple reports analyzing the case to recognize Israel’s campaign in Gaza as a genocide. Their analysis has included critical proposals for how Canada can respond to the ICJ provisional measures.

Despite this well-documented crime, the party leaders have largely ignored the question of genocide. Only two have spoken out in the past, with the NDP’s Jagmeet Singh calling out the “ongoing genocide by Netanyahu’s extremist government” in November, and the Green Party of Canada recently condemning Israel’s airstrikes as “part of the ongoing genocide against Palestinian people.” We need to push all of the leaders to publicly call out Israel’s genocide, and to commit to a full two-way arms embargo.

Thank you for supporting this campaign. Every additional voice makes a difference!

For Justice and Peace,

The CJPME Team (CJPME Email)