This position paper discusses how the Canadian government should handle Trump's decisions regarding Jerusalem and Palestinian refugees. 

Montreal, October 1^st, 2018 — Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East (CJPME) calls on the Canadian government to take concrete action to renew its commitment to the UN aid agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA). Late last week, the Vice-President of the European Union and several Foreign Ministers hosted a meeting in New York in response to the Trump administration’s cancellation of key funds to UNRWA. Thirty-four UN member-states and organizations were in attendance, raising $122 million in funds for the organization. Canada was notably absent from this meeting.

Montreal, August 25, 2017  — Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East (CJPME) applauds the Canadian government’s decision this week to renew funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) – the UN aid agency for Palestinian refugees.  Thursday, Canada’s Minister of International Development, Marie-Claude Bibeau announced that Canada would contribute $25 million total to support the organization’s work.  “CJPME and other human rights organizations would prefer that Canada and the international community find a permanent solution for the five million registered Palestinian refugees.  In the meantime, however, this funding is much needed by this vulnerable refugee population," declared Thomas Woodley, president of CJPME.  

Montreal, April 13, 2015  — Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East (CJPME) calls on the Canadian government to make an emergency intervention to help the Palestinian refugees caught between warring factions at the Yarmouk camp.  UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon condemned the situation in Syria’s Yarmouk refugee camp this week, calling it Syria’s “deepest circle of hell.” Yarmouk Camp, located just seven kilometers from central Damascus, is currently home to approximately 18,000 Palestinian refugees and has been threatened by Assad government forces, Syrian rebel groups and, most recently, Islamic State (ISIS) fighters. The situation in Yarmouk has deteriorated in past weeks with aid agencies unable to reach people in need and ISIS militants engaging in violent acts against civilians. Secretary Ban Ki-Moon further described Yarmouk by saying, “a refugee camp is beginning to resemble a death camp.”

CJPME Factsheet 125, published June, 2011: This factsheet looks at Canada’s continued defunding of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinians in the Near East (UNRWA), which provides assistance, protection and advocacy to approximately 4.8 million Palestinian refugees in the Middle East. Until 2009, Canada had been one of the top 20 contributors to UNRWA’s core programs. While UNRWA’s funding grew consistently between 2000 and 2008, Canada was the only donor country to defund UNRWA’s core programs during this period.

This position paper discusses several points regarding how the Canadian government should handle the Palestinian refugees.

CJPME Factsheet 73, published January, 2010: This factsheet addresses a number of destructive myths relating to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinians in the Near East (UNRWA). This UN Agency, tasked with alleviating the humanitarian needs of Palestinian refugees and their unique political situation, has been the target of attacks and malicious allegations in recent years.

CJPME Factsheet 72, published January, 2010: This factsheet provides a historical and contextual overview of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestinians in the Near East (UNRWA), created to provide humanitarian assistance to the 850,000 Palestinian refugees displaced by war or forcibly expelled from their homes between 1947 and 1949. Today, Palestinian refugees now constitute the world’s largest and most enduring refugee population.

CJPME Factsheet 25, published May, 2007: Following comments made at the Camp David II Summit in July, 2000, there has been a resurgence of interest and publicity concerning the rights and redress due Jewish emigrants and refugees who fled Arab countries in the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s.  (See CJPME’s factsheet “The Emergence of the Jewish Refugee Question” April, 2007)  While both Palestinian and Jewish refugees are protected under international law, it is important to understand fundamental differences in the narratives of each people.