We’ve been feeling under the weather for a few days, but we can’t let this week end without writing about how “the issue of Palestine” affected the Canadian Federal election.
For those who are not aware, the Liberal party of Canada emerged from the election with 168 seats, four short of a majority. The Conservative Party of Canada, which was favoured to win by a landslide at the beginning of the year, placed second, with 144 seats. This was an increase of 25 from the last Parliament, but not enough to win. Other parties did poorly. The left leaning New Democratic Party (NDP) which propped up the previous Liberal minority for over three years, was reduced from 24 to 7 seats, their worst showing since the party was founded in 1960. The Separatist Bloc Quebecois also lost ground, losing 11 seats.
Image: Standings in the Canadian Federal election ——Source(BBC)
Those who have read our past articles will recall that an NDP resolution was introduced in the Canadian House of Commons in April of 2024. This resolution called for the recognition of the “State of Palestine” as well as other measures against Israel, including an arms embargo. After a day long debate, the governing Liberals amended the resolution to remove recognition of Palestine, but allowed the other measures to remain. They then voted for the resolution as amended, including the embargo on selling arms to Israel. Only the Conservatives voted against. The Liberal government has maintained the arms embargo since then.
The Palestine Platform
In the runup to this week’s election, a well organized campaign called on voters to “Vote Palestine”. The votePalestine.ca web site listed hundreds of candidates running in the Federal election who had endorsed the Palestine Platform. The platform can be seen in the screen shot just below. Readers will note the link to the extremist anti-Israel group, Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East (CJPME).
Image: Palestine Platform Source: Screen capture from votePalestine.ca
The program includes the recognition of the aspirational state of Palestine, raising again the question that was deleted from the resolution passed in the House of Commons in April of 2024. As we’ve discussed before, Palestine has no recognized boundaries. Recognizing Palestine is, in effect, a call on Israel to surrender territory unilaterally to create such a state, regardless of Israel’s security concerns, or Israel’s own claims to the territory. It undermines Israel’s right to defend itself, and preempts any negotiated settlement that would take Israel’s legitimate interests into account.
The platform also calls for extending the arms embargo to ban purchases of arms from Israel. At a time when Canada needs to rapidly build up its military capabilities, and diversify its sources of arms supply, this would prevent Canada from buying from one of the most advanced arms producers in the world.
It calls for an official Canadian boycott of “settlements”. Since the so-called settlements are integrated into the Israeli economy, any settlement boycott would be difficult to disentangle from a boycott of everything Israeli. In particular Jews living in East Jerusalem are considered a “settlers”. A complete boycott of Israel as called for in the BDS program is the real goal of this plank of the platform.
The call for “combatting anti-Palestinian racism” is code for criminalizing any support for Zionism. As we wrote in one of our earlier articles on the Arab Canadian Lawyers Association (ACLA) document defining anti-Palestinian racism, anyone standing up for Israel is liable to be swept up in such a campaign. One of the examples cited in the ACLA document was the case of Toronto District School Board trustee Alexandra Lulka, who got into trouble for complaining about the promotion of Palestinian terrorism in material distributed to TDSB teachers by an employee of the board, an employee whose responsibilities were to promote women’s rights.
Finally, the platform calls for the maintenance of funding for UNRWA, which has been implicated in the October 7, 2023 atrocities. UNRWA facilities, including schools, were repeatedly found during the war to be used by Hamas for military purposes. UNRWA’s entanglement with Hamas has led Israel to ban the organization from operating in areas under its jurisdiction. In spite of this, the platform calls on Canada to continue funding UNRWA, and thus supporting terrorism against Israelis as well as the continued oppression of Palestinians.
Was the Vote Palestine Campaign Successful?
I was interested to see that many people in the pro-Israel camp considered the Vote Palestine campaign to have been a failure. One friend posted on Facebook that the campaign had not gone well. On Wednesday, Honest Reporting, an organization I support and generally agree with, sent out an eMail with subject line “Canadians Overwhelmingly Defeat ‘Vote Palestine’ Candidates At The Ballot Box”. Here’s what they wrote:
Despite widespread media attention, the Vote Palestine campaign, which made multiple anti-Israel demands of candidates for Parliament, failed to resonate with voters in Canada’s 2025 federal election.
Of the 362 candidates who signed onto the platform—backed by extremist-aligned groups—only 25 were elected, representing a 93 percent failure rate. The results make clear: Canadians overwhelmingly rejected this fringe initiative and its radical demands.
While this is true, I think that it conceals some troubling results. The vote Palestine candidates included the 35 running for the Marxist Leninist Party of Canada, and the 24 running for the Communist Party of Canada. The 24 candidates of the Centrist Party of Canada also supported the Palestine Platform, as did the 17 candidates of the Revolution party of Canada. None of these parties has ever elected a member, but it’s not because of their position on the Palestine platform.
It is true that several sitting Green and New Democratic party candidates who endorsed the Palestine platform were defeated. Incumbent New Democrats who signed up and lost their seats include,
Blake Desjarlais in Edmonton Griesbach,
Laurel Collins in Victoria.
Peter Julian in Westminster Burnaby,
Bonita Zarillo in Port Moody Coquitlam,
Niki Ashton in Churchill Keewatanuk,
Leila Dance in Elmwood Transcona,
Matthew Green in Hamilton Centre,
Brian Massé in Windsor West
Lindsay Mathyson in London Fanshawe
Jagmeet Singh in Burnaby Central
Incumbent Green Mike Morrice lost his seat in Kitchener Centre.
In addition to these sitting members, the defeated candidates include many other New Democrats and Greens who signed on to the Palestine platform. Many of them had no chance of winning, but they are included in the total of 362 candidates cited by Honest Reporting.
Winning Candidates who Endorsed the Palestine Platform
While we were glad to see the defeat of sitting New Democrats and Greens who signed up for the Vote Palestine campaign, we should be aware of the people who did so and won their seats.
Among New Democrats, the following winners signed up:
Heather McPherson held Edmonton Strathcona (some readers may remember the picture of Heather in the house of Commons during the debate on the Palestine resolution in 2024)
Don Davies seems to have squeaked back in in Vancouver Kingsway
Gord Johns held Courtenay Alberni
Leah Gazan held Winnipeg Centre
Image: NDP member Heather McPherson speaks in the House of Commons
Green leader Elizabeth May, who was the only Green to survive on Monday, is also a signatory of the Palestine platform.
While this small remnant may not seem to be much of a threat, it is the Liberals who signed the Palestine platform and won that we must be aware of.
Patrick Weiler won West Van-Sunshine Coast-Sea to Sky Country
Sima Acan won Oakville West
Shafqat Ali won in Brampton Chingacousey
Fares Al Soud won in Mississauga Centre
Chris Bittle held his seat in St. Catherines
Shaun Chen held his seat in Scarborough North
Nate Erskine Smith held his seat in Beaches East York
Iqra Khalid was re-elected in Mississauga Erin Mills
Tim Louis held in Kitchener Canestoga
Aslam Rama won in Hamilton Centre
Jenna Sudds was re-elected in Kanata
Adam van Koeverden was re-elected in Milton West (he talked about genocide in Gaza during the campaign)
Salma Zahid held her seat in Scarborough Centre Don Valley East
Sean Casey was re-elected in Charlottetown
Alexandra Mendes was re-elected in Brossard
Sameer Zuberi was re-elected in Pierrefonds Dollard
This means that at least 16 of the 168 Liberals elected on Monday have signed up to support all of the problematic planks of the Palestine platform. Moreover they did this with the tacit approval of the new Liberal leader and Prime Minister, Mark Carney.
Knowing that he had this element in the mix of his candidates may account for Carney’s lamentable comments, and ambiguous retraction during the course of the campaign. It may also account for the efforts of the (now former) NDP leader Jagmeet Singh, to try to pin Carney down during the debates on the question of genocide in Gaza.
While the number of MPs who have signed the Palestine platform represent a small minority in the new Parliament, we can be sure that the pressure will be on, for them to advocate for the positions they endorsed during the election. The Palestine Youth Movement (PYM), organized the campaign and PYM is closely aligned with Samidoun, now officially proscribed as a supporter of terrorism. These people are not going away, and neither are the MPs who endorsed their anti-Israel campaign. Unfortunately, the “question of Palestine” (with all the troubling implications discussed above) is now firmly on the Canadian agenda.
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Good posting. I also thought Honest Reporting's take on this was way too sunny.
I think there are some take-aways:
Most likely, no one either won or lost their seat because of their support for the Palestine Platform, and the NDP's effort to brand themselves as the most anti-Israel party didn't slow their slide toward oblivion.
The one riding where anyone's stance on Israel made the difference is my own: York Centre, the only riding in Toronto to turn Conservative, largely because it's 20% Jewish, and our former MP Ya'ara Saks failed to stand up for Israel and failed to prompt any action from the Liberals to do anything about antisemitisism.
Totally, totally, agree with this post. I was flabbergasted that Honest Reporting could see the results as positive. As I see it there are more “Pro-Palestine” Liberal MP’s now than there were before the election. How is that successful?