Dispatch from the Front Line: The government is bad at governmenting
Dispatch from the Front Line: The government is bad at governmenting
But at least we can help each other. Right?
A nice, long meaty dispatch awaits you all, beloved readers. Find it below.
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Like much of the world, your Line editors have been watching the slow release of hostages from Hamas custody this week — and the disturbing online commentary that has accompanied this otherwise welcome turn of events.
Particularly on Twitter/X, it's been impossible to ignore segments of the pro-Palestinian left going to considerably deranged lengths to read emotions and insights into the photographs and videos of released hostages. They're seeing something that we at The Line do not: emotions like gratitude, friendship, and even affection for their captors. Some of this psychological projection even seems to have crept into bizarre translation errors at the BBC.
This is 10/10 insane.
Regardless of how you feel at this juncture about the Israel-Hamas conflict, these people were taken from their homes at gunpoint. Their family members have been killed, and they've been held captive for weeks. Some of these hostages have likely been killed and raped. Some still have family in captivity. Some are traumatized; others are offering lectures on the Holocaust to fellow survivors. One claims to have been held by a UNWRA teacher, and another by a Gazan doctor. We would also note that the humanitarian pause between the two actors fell apart because Hamas refused to release female hostages that the West believes are still alive. (We have a few guesses as to why this may be the case. Needless to say, we suspect these women will not be coming home with stories of adventures had and friends made along the way — if they come home at all.)
Some hostages, we suspect, actually did form human relationships with their captors; perhaps waving upon release was spontaneous and a reflection of humane treatment by individual members of Hamas. Maybe the hostages had guns to their heads just out of the frame of the camera and these hostages waved because they were told to do so.
Regardless, none of this — literally none of it — speaks to the morality of Hamas, nor of taking hostages. It just doesn't. You can't post-hoc justify or glorify this violence based on a facial expression in a video clip or a photograph. And we note attempts to do so are entirely in line with a growing tendency among the pro-Palestinian left to adopt conspiracies and denial to whitewash Hamas and its actions. Rape denial has perhaps been the most odious example — the use of sexual assault as a tactic of war by Hamas finally officially acknowledged only this week by UN Women, a mere seven weeks after the attack, after the details, evidence and survivor testimony documenting Hamas' use of rape against Israeli women became too obvious to underplay.
We are not saying Israel never lies, nor that Team Israel doesn't suffer from its own evil impulses and blindspots — it certainly does. But Team Palestinian is concocting an elaborate and deluded fantasy to bridge the cognitive dissonance created by the desire to support the liberation of ordinary Palestinians, and the reality of the genocidal militia they have chosen to cheer on in pursuit of that end.
These people are not thinking clearly. And their laudable empathy for the oppressed is leading them to some very dark places, both intellectually and morally.
Which brings us back to Canada. And why this war seems to have devoured our political discourse for weeks.
Canada is among the most privileged countries on Earth: safe, prosperous, surrounded by ocean, and chock-full of valuable resources and talent. But we've spent the last two generations indulging in a God-given complacency. We're a free rider in the Western alliance. Our military and aid contributions are unimpressive relative to our size and certainly to our sense of self importance, and our choices are reflected in our degraded geopolitical role in the world.
These choices have consequences. Among them is this: nothing Canada does or says is going to make much difference to the conflict in Israel. We're not going to make an impact in Yemen or Sudan either. It’s theoretically possible we could be asked to take part in some humanitarian mission or peacekeeping force, but our resources are so strained that any Canadian contribution would be token, at best. Our allies know this. Which is why we doubt they’d ask for much.
We've tried to help Ukraine with a few billion in aid — largely because helping Ukraine benefits the West broadly, and Canada specifically — but even what we contribute to that war is comparatively paltry. We are a parochial and smug little nation, and as such, we lack both the hard and soft power to dictate — or even significantly affect — outcomes in most countries. We must pick our spots, and we're barely useful even when we do.
It didn’t have to be this way — indeed, given our wealth, alliances and history, we should probably be more useful and influential by default, all things being equal. That we are not reflects the choices we made for ourselves.
Canadians who have spent the last two months raging hard on Twitter on Israel and Palestine don't like to hear this. They see this observation as a strategy (as they see all things). Unfortunately, it happens to be the truth. Justin Trudeau's latest tailored tone shift on Israel will not influence Bibi Netanyahu's actions in Gaza. Mélanie Joly's delusions of pragmatic diplomacy will not convince Hamas to respect an enduring ceasefire. What motions we could pass about recognizing Palestine as a state, or Hamas as a terrorist organization, would be, at best, symbolic. They will also never be enough to appease anyone.
Some people in this country believe that Israel has a right to defend itself, and that civilian casualties in Gaza, even in their current great multitude, are tragic but necessary consequences of the pursuit of the vital goal of destroying Hamas; others reject this position, seeing Israel as a “genocidal” power, and even recognize Hamas as a militia of an oppressed people in the pursuit of a legitimate military goal. These two positions are irreconcilable.
But in a country like Canada, the debate is also not that important. If we were living in Sderot or Khan Yunis, we would not have that luxury; disagreement would not be academic.
But we do not live in such places.
We live in Canada, where we can (or should be able to) thrive next to people who have radically different views on such subjects and feel little fear. Muslim, Jew, Atheist, Christian, or Other, we are all, first and foremost, Canadians. The conflict in Israel/Palestine is not an existential threat to any one of us. We can still help each other shovel the sidewalks, and call CAA if we see each other in a ditch, honour each others’ religious services and festivals, and love our neighbour as we love ourselves. Which is why debates about Israel and Palestine here will soon drift back into the old rhetorical stalemate, the ancient steady state of an ancient war.
Engaging in violent, antisemitic behaviour here, like firebombing synagogues, protesting Jewish daycares, or storming a school board meeting in Peel Region is not only unhinged in its own right; it also serves no useful end — beyond fuelling a mass hysteria, stoking fear of our neighbours, and chipping away at the social trust and cohesion that we all need to build a peaceful and functional society together in the face of irreconcilable differences.
Stop it. Be decent to each other.