On international day to eliminate racism Canadian politicians’ PR performances demonstrate their hypocrisy

Commemorating the International Day for the Elimination of Racism is political theatre for Canadian politicians. It costs nothing, changes nothing, and allows politicians to virtue-signal.
 

By Fareed Khan 

A version of this can be found on Substack.

Every year on March 21, Canadian governments at all levels solemnly mark the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination. Flags fly, statements are issued, and anti-racism programs are highlighted as evidence of governments’ actions to fight racism. Yet this annual ritual rings hollow when right-wing politicians and media outlets actively enable hate by refusing to condemn white supremacists or platform them for political gain.

As Islamophobia explodes according to Statistics Canada data, as academic research documents a surging white supremacist movement, and as Donald Trump normalizes bigotry from the White House, the gap between rhetoric and reality exposes a profound hypocrisy. Despite public commitments and taxpayer dollars poured into anti-racism efforts, Ottawa and the provinces have failed to adequately confront the hate poisoning Canadian society. Their deafening silence on the Gaza genocide—now formally acknowledged by Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, B’Tselem, the International Association of Genocide Scholars, and leading Holocaust scholars including Raz Segal, Omer Bartov, and Amos Goldberg—has only fuelled anti-Palestinian racism at home.

A report from the National Council of Canadian Muslims reports a shocking 1,300% spike in hate crimes targeting Muslims since October 7, 2023, with independent monitors documenting surges as high as 1,800% in some regions. These are not abstract statistics, they reflect real terror—vandalism of mosques, death threats, workplace discrimination, and violent assaults. Academic studies from institutions tracking far-right networks reveal a parallel surge in white supremacist organizing. Groups like the Active Clubs and networks tied to figures such as Jeremy MacKenzie have shifted from online echo chambers to street rallies, propaganda campaigns, and recruitment drives across Alberta, Ontario, and Nova Scotia. Their messaging—explicitly supremacist, xenophobic, and often intertwined with anti-Muslim and anti-Arab tropes—has moved from fringe forums into mainstream conservative discourse. Right-wing media outlets amplify this poison daily, framing immigrants, Muslims, and racialized communities as existential threats while platforming politicians who wink at the rhetoric.

Trump’s return to power has supercharged the trend. His casual bigotry—racist rants against migrants, praise for white nationalist ideas, and relentless dehumanization of Palestinians, and racist social media rants—provides a global template. Canadian right-wing politicians and commentators echo the same language, importing MAGA-style division into our politics. The result is a toxic feedback loop—hate crimes rise, white supremacist groups grow bolder, and governments respond with performative gestures rather than decisive action.

The federal government and provinces trumpet their anti-racism funding—grants for community programs, task forces, and funding for security around mosques and synagogues. Yet these efforts remain superficial. They fund workshops and awareness days while ignoring root causes. Police-reported hate crimes continue to climb because enforcement is lax and data collection severely under counts the crisis. In the most recent federal election which returned the Liberals to government the issue of fighting racism wasn’t even discussed.

Online hate proliferates unchecked on platforms that profit from division and fuels violence. Most alarmingly, successive governments have refused to address how their own foreign policy stokes domestic racism. The Gaza genocide—documented in exhaustive reports by international human rights organizations and noted genocide scholars has been met with equivocation at best, complicity at worst.

Additionally, Canada’s leaders have offered tepid calls for Israeli “restraint” while maintaining arms exports, diplomatic cover, and economic ties, unlike Ireland, Norway, Spain and other nations, which have taken much stronger and principled stands against the Gaza genocide. This failure to unequivocally condemn the systematic destruction and horror in Gaza—potentially more than 680,000 dead, entire family lines erased, infrastructure reduced to rubble, conditions deliberately calculated to make life unlivable—has direct domestic consequences, and legitimizes anti-Palestinian racism. When Palestinian voices are silenced on campuses, in workplaces, and in public debate, when pro-Palestine protesters face disproportionate policing while hate marches receive kid-gloves treatment, the message is clear--some lives matter less. Anti-Palestinian bigotry, often disguised as “criticism of Hamas,” has surged alongside Islamophobia. Jewish Canadians who oppose the genocide are smeared as self-hating, Arab and Muslim Canadians are collectively demonized, and the Charter rights of Palestinian Canadians are systematically violated. The government’s inaction turns what should be a human rights consensus into a wedge issue that divides communities and emboldens racists and bigots.

The hypocrisy deepens when we examine specific leaders. Mark Carney, Doug Ford, François Legault, and their counterparts continue to deny Palestinians the full protection of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. They refuse to recognize the inherent racism embedded in Zionist ideology—an ethno-supremacist framework that privileges one group’s national rights over another's in the same land, justifying dispossession, settler-colonialism, occupation, and now genocide.

These politicians speak of “shared values” and “two-state solutions” in platitudes, yet they block calls for accountability, label Palestinian solidarity as extremism, and equate anti-Zionism and criticism of Israel with antisemitism, a claim vehemently rejected by progressive Jewish organizations in Canada and the US. They meet with the leaders of legacy Jewish community organizations to condemn antisemitism while ignoring or marginalizing Palestinian, Arab, and Muslim voices pleading for consistency. They fund anti-racism programs with one hand and undermine them with the other by refusing to apply Charter principles universally.

When sincere anti-hate advocates—civil society groups, scholars, and affected communities—offer concrete recommendations (stronger hate speech enforcement, independent oversight of policing, ending arms sales linked to genocide, public recognition of anti-Palestinian racism as a distinct category, and genuine consultation with impacted groups), the response is lip service. Photo-ops and press releases substitute for structural change. Leaders nod solemnly on March 21, then return to policies that protect the status quo.

Commemorating the International Day for the Elimination of Racism under these conditions is political theatre. It costs nothing and changes nothing. It allows governments to virtue-signal while right-wing enablers stoke division, white supremacy groups organize openly, Islamophobia explodes, and the Gaza genocide’s spillover hatred festers unchecked. True commitment demands more--unequivocal condemnation of all racism, including the ethno-supremacist ideology driving the Gaza genocide—full Charter protections for all, accountability for foreign policy failures, and implementation of community recommendations rather than performative gestures.

Canadians deserve better than annual hypocrisy. Until governments match their anti-racism rhetoric with courage—confronting right-wing hate, addressing surging white supremacy and Islamophobia, and ending complicity in genocide abroad—the International Day will remain an empty ritual. Hate will not be eliminated by press releases and political platitudes. It requires moral consistency, political will, and the recognition that Palestinian rights are human rights. Anything less is mere theatre, not justice.

© 2024 The View From Here. © 2024 Fareed Khan. All Rights Reserved.

It’s time for regime change in the United States and Israel to restore international law

A global regime-change campaign against lesser violators rings hollow without confronting the architects of global impunity—the United States and Israel.

By Fareed Khan 

A version of this can be found on Substack.

In the pantheon of post-World War Two violators of international norms, no two states rival the United States and Israel in the scale, frequency, or the sheer impunity of their actions. As Noam Chomsky has powerfully documented in works such as Hegemony or Survival and his essay The Dangerous Rogue States Operating in the Mideast, these nations function as twin rogue powers, freely resorting to aggression, terror, and systematic violations of the UN Charter, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the Genocide Convention.

While other states, like Russia and China, have undoubtedly committed grave offenc

es, some on multiple occasions, none approach the breadth of America's and Israel's combined record—illegal wars, prolonged occupations, orchestrated coups, false-flag operations, and destabilizing interventions spanning continents. If a genuine global campaign is ever needed to enforce accountability through regime change, it must begin with Washington and Tel Aviv.

This is not hyperbole but the logical extension of analyses by Chomsky, William Blum in Killing Hope: US Military and CIA Interventions Since World War Two, Ilan Pappé in The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine, and Norman Finkelstein in Gaza: An Inquest into Its Martyrdom. Their scholarship lays bare a pattern that demands action to address the problem at the source.

Since 1948, when it was created on stolen Palestinian land, Israel’s violations form a continuous arc of territorial conquest and collective punishment. It has occupied and bombed every nation on its borders—Egypt in 1956 and 1967, Jordan in 1967, Syria repeatedly (seizing the Golan Heights in 1967 and annexing it illegally in 1981, in defiance of UN Security Council Resolution 497), and Lebanon in 1978, 1982, 2006, and beyond. Palestinian lands have remained under constant and brutal occupation for almost six decades, violating the Fourth Geneva Convention’s prohibitions on settlement and collective punishment, as well as UN resolutions 242 and 338 demanding withdrawal. Pappé meticulously chronicles this as incremental ethnic cleansing, while Finkelstein demonstrates how Gaza’s siege and repeated assaults meet the Genocide Convention’s criteria of intent to destroy a group in whole or in part.

The International Court of Justice’s ongoing proceedings and UN experts’ findings underscore these breaches. Israel’s actions have displaced millions, killed more than 680,000 in Gaza alone according to one study, and flouted the Universal Declaration’s guarantees of self-determination and freedom from arbitrary deprivation of life. No other state since 1945 has maintained such prolonged, illegal occupations while rejecting UN authority with US protection and complicity.

The US ledger is even longer and more global. Blum’s Killing Hope catalogues over fifty CIA-orchestrated coups, invasions, and destabilizations—the 1953 overthrow of Iran’s democratically elected government (Operation Ajax); installing the Shah as his replacement and sowing seeds for decades of resentment; the 1954 coup in Guatemala that unleashed genocidal civil war; the 1973 coup against Chile’s Salvador Allende, ushering in the dictatorship of Augusto Pinochet; interventions in Africa in Congo, Ghana, Angola and Mozambique; Asia (Vietnam, Cambodia, Indonesia); and Latin America (Nicaragua’s Contras, Grenada in 1983, and Panama in 1989). These are just a few of the operations that routinely violated Article 2(4) of the UN Charter banning threats or use of force against territorial integrity or political independence.

The 2003 Iraq War stands as a textbook case of an illegal and unjust war. Launched on fabricated claims about weapons of mass destruction—blatant lies exposed by the Downing Street Memo—without Security Council authorization, it resulted in more than a million Iraqis killed, destabilized the region, and birthing extremist groups like ISIS. Chomsky labels this the hallmark of a “failed state” that exempts itself from the rules it imposes on others.

Both nations have weaponized false flags and covert coups to rationalize their criminal actions. The Gulf of Tonkin incident, later admitted as fabricated, propelled US escalation in the Vietnam War, costing millions of innocent lives. Proposed but unexecuted schemes like Operation Northwoods (1962) relating to Cuba, reveal a pattern of manufacturing pretexts to achieve geopolitical objectives. Israel’s history includes alleged provocations in border conflicts, while joint US-Israeli intelligence has fuelled coups from Tehran to Santiago.

These tactics erode sovereignty, as Blum details—sovereign governments toppled not for security or in response to aggression but for resource control and ideological conformity. The destabilizing fallout has been catastrophic, resulting in civil wars, refugee crises impacting millions, and economic collapse. The war in Iraq fragmented the Middle East, Latin American coups entrenched inequality, African interventions prolonged proxy conflicts. Such chaos, orchestrated by these two rogue nations, repeatedly violated the UN Charter’s core purpose—maintaining international peace and security.

Today, this pattern continues in the unprovoked US-Israeli assault on Iran, launched February 28, 2026. What began as airstrikes under “Operation Epic Fury” and “Roaring Lion” has resulted in the assassination of Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei, targeted nuclear research and missile sites, civilian infrastructure, all in pursuit of regime change. Experts at the UN have condemned it as “flagrant violation of international law” and an “act of aggression,” executed while the US was in diplomatic negotiations with Iran, where progress was being made. Legal scholars and analysts describe their actions as illegal under the UN Charter, lacking Security Council approval or a credible self-defence claim. Iranian retaliation followed, yet the initiators’ stated goal—overthrowing a sovereign government—mirrors the very interventions Blum and Chomsky have chronicled for decades.

This war, with civilian deaths mounting, including strikes on schools and hospitals, exemplifies the hypocrisy often displayed by both the US and Israel—powers that lecture on nuclear non-proliferation while violating it themselves through nuclear ambiguity (Israel) and pre-emptive force (both).

Critics rightly note that other states also have blood on their hands, but none approach the quantitative and qualitative dominance and aggression of the US-Israeli axis.  The US maintains over 800 overseas bases in 70 countries, projects power globally, and has vetoed UN resolutions dozens of times to shield Israel from being held accountable for its criminal actions.

Israel, as Chomsky observes, acts with impunity and with US support, rejecting International Atomic Energy Association inspections while demanding them of Iran. Their combined interventions have reshaped the destiny of nations around the globe, through coups (Iran, Guatemala, Chile), illegal wars (Iraq, Vietnam), and occupations (Golan, West Bank, Gaza blockade). The Genocide Convention, invoked against others, applies here also. Finkelstein’s inquest into Gaza and Pappé’s settler-colonial framework reveal systematic intent. The Universal Declaration’s rights to life, self-determination, freedom from torture are trampled daily at the hands of the leaders of these two nations. No rival tally is comparable.  China’s or Russia’s actions, while serious and at times egregious (Russia's war with Georgia and China's crackdown on democracy protests over the decades), lack this post-1945 breadth of extraterritorial subversion.

A global regime-change campaign against lesser violators rings hollow without confronting the two top architects of global impunity. Chomsky urges recognizing US exceptionalism as the obstacle to peace, while Blum demands dismantling the intervention machine. Pappé and Finkelstein join them with calls to end Israeli apartheid and occupation, with external force if needed. Extending their logic, the world must mobilize and apply universal sanctions, arms embargoes, ICC prosecutions for American and Israeli leaders, support domestic movements to rebuild democratic institutions, and amplify BDS-style isolation for the two nations. Regime change here will mean empowering peoples to reclaim sovereignty—through non-violent pressure where possible, and other means where necessary. Only then can the UN Charter regain meaning, the Genocide Convention deter future atrocities, and human rights become universal rather than selective. The alternative is a world trapped in perpetual hypocrisy—one where the most powerful nations proclaim universal rules while brazenly violating them, sowing the seeds of endless conflict and instability.  

 

Through decades of meticulous scholarship and irrefutable evidence, thinkers such as Chomsky, Blum, Pappé, and Finkelstein have demonstrated beyond doubt that no other states since 1945 have matched the United States and Israel in the sheer scale, duration, and audacity of their violations of international law, human rights, and the foundations of global order, all but making the case for regime change in these two nations.

 

True justice demands that we finally turn the lens inward. Rather than selectively punishing lesser violators while shielding the architects of impunity The international community must summon the resolve to launch a sustained, principled global campaign aimed at regime change in Washington and Tel Aviv, the very epicentre of systemic global lawlessness. Nothing less will restore credibility to the United Nations Charter, halt the cycle of aggression, and secure the survival of a rules-based international order worthy of the name.

© 2024 The View From Here. © 2024 Fareed Khan. All Rights Reserved.

The Iran war is negatively impacting national economies, and will have severe impacts on real estate

Beyond higher interest rates and inflation, wars cause jobs to dry up, slow construction, and increase unemployment. 

By Fareed Khan 

A version of this can be found on Substack.

Regional wars that break out far from Canada can still send strong ripples through the economy and impact every sector in the economy, particularly real estate and housing. The current war on Iran instigated by the United States and Israel, which started on February 28, shows exactly how this happens. Rising oil prices, higher everyday living costs and the Bank of Canada keeping interest rates elevated all make it tougher for average families to buy homes, slow down sales and push house prices lower. The longer these conflicts last, the more damage they do.

Canada’s real estate sector stands out as one of the largest parts of the national economy, accounting for roughly 13.2% of GDP – the biggest single slice of the national economic pie. This covers the value of people living in their own homes, rental properties, commercial leasing and the work of real estate agents and brokers. It also accounts for jobs in construction, banking and related services, which fuels much of the consumer spending that keeps the economy moving. When this sector takes a hit, the pain spreads quickly, touching everything from the more than one million mortgage renewals due in 2026, to plans for the construction of new homes and condos across the country.

The way these economic shocks reach Canada's shores is straightforward—and it plays out the same way with every major global conflict. Wars in the Middle East hit particularly hard because the region produces a substantial share of the world's oil supply; under normal conditions, countries there (including key Gulf producers) account for roughly 30 per cent of global output, and critical routes like the Strait of Hormuz carry about one-fifth of seaborne crude trade.

When fighting disrupts production, threatens tankers or blocks key shipping lanes—as has happened dramatically since the current conflict escalated—oil prices surge quickly. That higher cost flows straight into everyday expenses—gasoline at the pump gets pricier, home heating bills climb, and even the price of fruits and vegetables rises because so much modern farming relies on oil-based fertilizers and fuel for transport. Even though Canada is a net exporter of oil and produces more than it consumes domestically, the country isn't shielded from these international swings. When global oil prices jump, the cost of living rises for everyone, no matter where they live, pushing up inflation and pressuring central banks to respond.

To stop prices from spiralling out of control, the Bank of Canada holds off on cutting interest rates or raises them if needed, thus making mortgages more expensive, especially the variable-rate ones many households carry. According to the International Monetary Fund Canadians already carry some of the heaviest household debt in the world relative to their income, consistently ranking at or near the top among developed nations. As of the fourth quarter of 2025, Canadians held approximately $1.77 in credit market debt for every dollar of disposable income, according to Statistics Canada data released in March 2026.

In the current market, with housing affordability already a major problem, and households struggling under these heavy debt burdens, even modest rate increases make buying a home feel out of reach for many. In such a scenario, many owners would likely decide to stay put rather than sell and take on a costlier new mortgage, while first-time buyers find entering the market even more difficult. 

This pressure has been building for years.  Since 2021, consumer insolvencies—including bankruptcies—have risen annually, with 2025 recording the second-highest annual volume on record since tracking began in 1987, a 16-year high. Consumer bankruptcies specifically increased by 4.3% compared to 2024, driven largely by persistent inflation, higher debt servicing costs from elevated interest rates, and growing debt loads, particularly on credit cards.

These trends leave families more vulnerable when external shocks like rising energy prices from a distant war push borrowing costs higher, turning what might be a temporary squeeze into longer-term financial strain that further cools the real estate market.

Building new homes becomes noticeably more expensive too, because oil plays a central role in producing many construction materials—asphalt for roads and roofing, plastics for pipes and wiring, paints, and insulation—while also raising the price of trucking those supplies across vast distances to building sites. At the same time, when wars disrupt global supply chains and sows widespread uncertainty about the economy, people considering entering the housing market or moving to a bigger home, along with investors eyeing properties, often choose to pause and wait for a more stable situation. That collective hesitation quickly becomes visible in the market as fewer homes sell, activity slows sharply, and house prices flatten or begin to trend downward. 

If a conflict ends quickly, things can usually return to normal fairly soon once oil supplies stabilize and interest rates come down. But when the fighting drags on—as appears increasingly likely in the current US-Israel operations against Iran, now in its third week with no immediate end in sight—the elevated costs take root as the new everyday reality.  Borrowing remains expensive for an extended period, and the harm to home values grows deeper and more persistent, affecting markets nationwide from high-rise condos in Vancouver and Toronto to single-family houses in Halifax and communities in between.

During the six long years of the Second World War, Canadian factories turned almost entirely to producing weapons, vehicles, and other military supplies, left civilian construction—including new homes—severely limited. With building materials rationed and labour redirected to the war effort, the number of homes added to the market was far below what was needed. As the conflict dragged on, cities swelled with workers drawn to wartime jobs and, later, with returning soldiers eager to start new lives. The result was a sharp housing shortage that left families crammed into overcrowded apartments, shared homes, or whatever shelter they could find.

Because the disruption lasted so many years, the housing market could not begin to recover until well after the fighting ended in 1945. Only then, with the help of government programs such as those run by the newly created Central Mortgage and Housing Corporation, did large-scale home building finally take off and ease the pressure. Even though Canada was never bombed or occupied, the long diversion of resources and attention to the war effort still created a deep and lasting housing crunch for ordinary families across the country.

The 1973 Yom Kippur War and the oil embargo that followed also brought years of rising prices and economic pain to Canada. Fuel costs quadrupled, pushing up the price of almost everything. To fight the surge in living costs, the Bank of Canada pushed rates higher, eventually topping 20% by the early 1980s. Mortgage payments became crushing for many families, sales slowed dramatically and home prices stagnated or fell when measured against inflation. The effects lasted well into the 1980s because the oil shock did not fade quickly, showing how a distant conflict can keep housing under pressure for years even when Canada was not directly involved.

The 1990-1991 Gulf War lasted only months but still helped trigger a recession that weighed on Canadian real estate+ for several years afterward. Oil prices spiked at first, inflation rose and consumer confidence cratered. The Bank of Canada eventually cut rates, but the damage had already been done as sales weakened, new building slowed and average house prices dropped noticeably in many parts of the country. The short duration of the war allowed an eventual rebound, yet it proved that even brief regional wars can create extended drags on the market through higher costs and lost confidence.

The Russia-Ukraine war, now entering its fourth year, offers a recent warning of how drawn-out fighting keeps hurting economies far away. Energy and food prices jumped as a direct result of the Russian incursion into Ukraine, forcing the Bank of Canada to raise interest rates within a week after the invasion began, driven by fears of runaway inflation and soaring commodity prices. Housing sales volumes cooled, affordability worsened and price growth slowed across the country even in strong markets like Toronto and Vancouver. The conflict’s length has prevented a full recovery, leaving higher borrowing costs and uncertainty in place far longer than a quick resolution would have allowed.

The current situation with Iran is already showing early signs of the same pressures. Since the strikes began in late February, oil prices have climbed to more than US$100 per barrel, with gas prices topping $2.00 per litre in British Columbia, approaching $1.70 per litre in Ontario and Quebec, and reaching $1.80 per litre in Atlantic Canada. Bond yields have moved higher because investors worry about lasting inflation, making mortgage rates firmer just as hundreds of thousands of Canadian families face renewals. Economists note that if the conflict stretches on, the Bank of Canada may have to increase rates and keep them elevated longer, delaying the relief many home buyers were counting on for the spring market.

Wars create extra layers of harm beyond higher interest rates. Construction jobs dry up when building slows because of costly materials and hesitant buyers, leaving tradespeople out of work, and more families are forced to sell homes quickly—sometimes at a loss—to cover bills. This extra supply on the market pushes prices down even further in already soft conditions.

Overseas investors who once saw Canadian real estate as a safe place to park money are also likely reassess their investing and with many of them looking at investment opportunities in other countries. With uncertainty rising, capital will flow elsewhere, cutting demand sharply in cities where foreign buyers play a large role in the market—cities like Toronto and Vancouver—and will cause noticeable price drops in certain neighbourhoods. The simple fear of what might happen next will freeze the market in place, as families put off buying their first home or moving up, while sellers who can afford to wait hold off until the market improves. Fewer deals mean that prices will drift lower as the lack of activity itself signals trouble to everyone watching.

Looking back at past conflicts makes the pattern clear. During the early 1990s slowdown linked to the Gulf War, Canadian real estate took a particularly heavy hit, with property values declining sharply in many rmarkets once lending tightened and confidence vanished. The 1973 oil crisis produced similar years of flat or falling prices once inflation was taken into account. These repeated drops show how deeply wars can wound the housing market even in a peaceful country like Canada.

Notable is that the economic damage does not stop when the shooting ends. It often takes years for confidence to return fully, for rates to settle and for large numbers of buyers to feel secure enough to jump back in. During that slow recovery period, many families watch their biggest asset—their home—lose ground or fail to grow, eating into retirement equity and overall wealth that most Canadians count on. This long-lasting drag is why experts stress that extended wars are especially dangerous for the housing sector.

Real estate’s large role in the Canadian economy makes these blows land harder. It not only drives a big share of GDP but also supports hundreds of thousands of jobs, and lets families tap into home equity for everything from children's education to daily spending. When wars disrupt that foundation through higher interest rates, increased costs, fewer sales and lower values, the effects reach far beyond individual homeowners to slow growth across the national economy.

Taken together, history and the present situation prove the point clearly. Regional wars send shocks through energy prices and interest rates that reach Canada regardless of any direct involvement. Short conflicts may cause only brief dips, but longer ones—like the multi-year oil crises of the 1970s, the lingering effects of the Gulf War recession or Ukraine’s ongoing drag—embed higher costs, greater uncertainty, and sustained pressure on real estate prices.

The new Iran conflict, with its potential to push oil prices to new record highs, and keep inflation elevated, risks repeating the worst of those patterns if it continues. Mortgage payments could stay at painful levels, new construction could remain stalled, and buyer confidence could remain shaky, leading to clear declines in real estate values nationwide. The longer such wars go on, the more severely Canadian real estate and housing values suffer—a reminder of how connected even a peaceful country’s biggest asset class is to distant conflicts.

© 2024 The View From Here.  © 2024 Fareed Khan.  All Rights Reserved.

OP-ED -- Refusal to condemn US-Israeli illegal war on Iran shows the hypocrisy of Canada’s ‘rules-based’ PM

Mark Carney’s powerful words at Davos now ring hollow as he fails to stand up to the US and Israel after their illegal attack on Iran.

 

By Fareed Khan 

This has previously been published on Rabble.ca.
A version of this can be found on Substack.

In the final judgment of the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg in 1946, the Allied powers delivered a verdict that still echoes as the bedrock of modern international law: “To initiate a war of aggression … is not only an international crime; it is the supreme international crime differing only from other war crimes in that it contains within itself the accumulated evil of the whole.”

 

That supreme international crime is being committed right now, in real time, by the United States and Israel. On February 28, these two rogue powers launched an unprovoked, unjustified assault on the sovereign territory of Iran. As missiles and bombs rained down one of the targets hit on the first day was a girls’ primary school in Minab, slaughtering at least 165 innocent schoolgirls. Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei was also assassinated along with a number of senior leadership figures. Civilian infrastructure, including oil depots, have been pulverized, more than 1,300 have been killed so far and more than 17,000 have been injured. This was not an act of self-defence, but rather naked aggression—the exact crime the Nuremberg Tribunal branded as a supreme evil. 

 

The history of the current Iranian regime is not a pretty one. Yes, it has been brutal, it crushes protesters, oppresses women, jails and tortures dissidents. That deserves unequivocal condemnation. But Iran’s brutality at home does not grant a license to other nations to bomb a sovereign state into submission. The rule of law is not a buffet. You don’t get to pick and choose when it applies based on whose regime you dislike. 

 

Yet that is precisely what Mark Carney is doing. Canada’s prime minister has refused—point-blank—to call this aggression by its proper name. He has issued tepid calls for “restraint” while conspicuously refusing to condemn the two nations that started this inferno. He even expressed support for the strikes, framing them as necessary to stop Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. The reality, confirmed by anonymous US intelligence sources, the International Atomic Energy Association, and independent experts, is that Iran was nowhere near a functional nuclear weapon. No imminent threat existed. Diplomacy was progressing. Talks were constructive. Then came the missiles.  

 

Only weeks before the attack, Carney stood at the World Economic Forum in Davos and delivered a lofty speech about the need for “smaller nations” to band together to uphold international law, sovereignty, and the rules-based order. He spoke passionately about middle powers defending territorial integrity and rejecting the law of the jungle. So what was the point of that speech if he now endorses the very thing he criticized? Was it empty rhetoric designed to impress Davos elites while he quietly supported the very violations he claimed to oppose in January?  

 

If Canada truly believes in international law, why the cowardly silence when the world’s most powerful actors torch it? The question demands an answer. Is Carney only interested in upholding international law when it serves Canada and its allies? Or is he committed to the territorial sovereignty of all nations—ally and adversary alike?

 

Carney’s initial response to this new war screams selective enforcement. Canada was among the loudest voices condemning Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as a flagrant violation of the UN Charter. Sanctions were imposed amid speeches filled with outrage. “Rules-based order” became a mantra. Yet when the United States and Israel launch an illegal war of aggression against Iran—bombing civilian sites, assassinating leaders, and igniting a regional conflagration—Canada offers support “with regret” at best, and deflection at worst. No demands for accountability, just platitudes about diplomacy while the innocent die. 

 

International experts are calling out this grotesque double standard. UN Special Rapporteur Ben Saul has stated bluntly that the US-Israeli strikes “appear to breach the UN Charter’s prohibition on aggression” and lack any valid legal justification.  

 

Yusra Suedi, assistant professor of international law at the University of Manchester, warns that the attacks amount to a crime of aggression and expose the “unravelling fragility” of international law—precisely the same fragility the West highlighted when Russia invaded Ukraine but now conveniently overlooks for its own allies.  

 

Rebecca Ingber, a professor at Cardozo School of Law at Yeshiva University said, “The use of wanton military force has contributed to a sense of impunity for powerful states and has degraded the international law system.”   

 

The Global Centre for the Responsibility to Protect has documented the pattern—a swift, unified condemnation of Russia’s actions in Ukraine contrasted with excuses, silence, or outright support for US-Israeli aggression against Iran, Gaza, Lebanon, and beyond.  

 

The greatest beneficiaries of Washington’s contempt for the UN Charter are the very actors the West claims to oppose—Russia, now emboldened in Ukraine, and China, watching for its moment in Taiwan. The message to the world is clear—international law is a weapon to be wielded against adversaries, never against ourselves. 

 

Instead of demonstrating principled leadership Carney has shown rank hypocrisy that shames Canada’s international reputation. Not surprising given his government’s refusal to recognize Israel’s actions in Gaza as genocide, despite the overwhelming evidence and the explicit findings of Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, B’Tselem, Médecins Sans Frontières the International Association of Genocide Scholars, the UN and numerous other respected international organizations. 

 

Instead, Canada continues to ally itself with and politically shield nations committing the gravest of international crimes while Iran burns and its people suffer.By backing—or at minimum refusing to condemn—this war of aggression, Carney has aligned Canada with the very forces that he criticized in Davos, ones that ignore the rule of law, inflict chaos and suffering, while their victims are left to bury the corpses. We were supposed to have left that era behind after 1945. Yet here we are returning to the law of the jungle. 

 

The strikes were launched while negotiations over Iran’s nuclear program were reportedly advancing. The 2015 nuclear deal with Iran—negotiated under Barack Obama—was working until Trump tore it up at Netanyahu’s behest. Carney knows this, yet he calls for “restraint” now that the genie is out of the bottle. He condemns Iran’s retaliation but refuses to name the original aggressors. Why? 

 

Because consistency would require Canada to stand on principle against powerful allies. Because admitting the attack on Iran violates the UN Charter would expose the hypocrisy. Because Carney’s vaunted Davos vision is performative theatre not meant to apply to the crimes of allies. 

 

Canada cannot claim moral authority when our prime minister shrinks from stating the obvious—the US-Israeli assault on Iran is illegal, dangerous, and a direct breach of the UN Charter and the territorial sovereignty of a member state. Carney’s refusal to condemn it reveals exactly where his true commitments lie—to power and alliance above principle. 

 

The world is watching. Smaller nations—the very ones Carney claimed to champion in Davos—are taking notes. If Canada will not defend the rules when it matters most, against the most powerful violators, then Carney’s words were worthless. International law either applies to everyone or it applies to no one. The shame belongs to him—and to every Canadian who still believes their government stands for something more than selective hypocrisy. 

 

The path forward is anarchy unless leaders like Carney find the courage to speak truth to power—starting with naming the supreme crime for what it is. Until then, his Davos speech will stand as a monument to empty rhetoric and moral bankruptcy. 

© 2024 The View From Here.  © 2024 Fareed Khan.  All Rights Reserved.

Global nuclear non-proliferation dealt a fatal blow with US-Israeli attack on Iran

The US-Israel military campaign against Iran is not just another regional war. It is a profound setback to the slow, fragile progress toward a world with fewer nuclear weapons.

 

By Fareed Khan 
A version of this can be found on Substack.

 

On February 28th the United States and Israel launched a coordinated and unprovoked military assault on Iran. This unprecedented aggression targeted Iran's nuclear facilities, ballistic missile sites, military command structures, as well as targets in Iran's major urban centres.  The strikes were intended to destroy what remained of Tehran's nuclear program after a previous round of strikes in June 2025, which US President Donald Trump claimed at the time "completely and totally obliterated" Iran's key nuclear enrichment facilities.

He framed the operation this week as necessary to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, but provided no proof that Iran was anywhere near completing a nuclear warhead.  However, the repercussions of the attack are far more damaging. By attacking a non-nuclear state amid ongoing diplomatic talks, the US and Israel have not only done serious damage to the Iranian regime but also dealt a severe blow to global nuclear non-proliferation efforts. This act of aggression sends a chilling message to smaller nations that the only reliable deterrence against powerful bullies like the US and Israel is to acquire nuclear weapons of your own.

The assault on Iran underscores a harsh truth about international power dynamics. For decades, the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) has been the main tool used by the international community to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons, with nuclear-armed states like the US promising security in exchange for others' restraint. But the attack on Iran flips this logic on its head. Iran, a signatory to the NPT, had been negotiating limits on its nuclear activities when the bombs fell.  Diplomacy was abandoned in favor of force, proving that even compliance offers no protection from pre-emptive strikes. As experts have noted, this incentivizes proliferation, with other nations with the capability now looking to develop nuclear programs as a deterrent before they themselves are attacked and their governments overthrown. Smaller nations, witnessing Iran's fate, will conclude that nuclear weapons are essential for survival against hegemonic powers like the US, China and Russia.

Consider Ukraine, a stark example of the perils of denuclearization. In 1994, Ukraine inherited the world's third-largest nuclear arsenal from the Soviet Union but relinquished it under the Budapest Memorandum, receiving security assurances from Russia, the US, and the UK. Russia violated those assurances in 2014 by annexing Crimea and again in 2022 with a full-scale invasion. Ukrainian officials have lamented the decision to denuclearize, with one MP stating, "We gave up nuclear weapons because of this agreement. Now, there's a strong sentiment in Ukraine that we made a big mistake." Had Ukraine retained its arsenal, Russia might never have considered invasion, deterred by the threat of nuclear escalation. Instead, denuclearization left Ukraine vulnerable, reinforcing the lesson that lack of a nuclear deterrent invites aggression.

Libya's experience echoes this tragedy. In 2003, Muammar Gaddafi abandoned his weapons of mass destruction (WMD) program, including nascent nuclear efforts, in exchange for normalized relations with the West and a security guarantee. Eight years later, in 2011, NATO intervened in Libya's civil war under a UN mandate to protect civilians, but the operation expanded into regime change, leading to Gaddafi's overthrow and death. The intervention, led by the US, UK, and France, demonstrated that giving up WMDs offers no lasting security. As one analysis put it, this set a precedent for authoritarian regimes--nuclear weapons deter foreign intervention. North Korea's Kim Jong-un has cited Libya as a reason for his nation developing its nuclear arsenal, viewing it as protection against a possible attack by the US.

North Korea stands as the counterexample, proving the deterrent value of nuclear weapons. Facing US threats of regime change since the Korean War, Pyongyang pursued nukes relentlessly, conducting its first test in 2006. Today, with an estimated 50 warheads and advanced missiles, North Korea has effectively shielded itself from invasion. Analysts argue that its arsenal deters US aggression, allowing provocations like missile tests without fear of full-scale war. The US-Israel attack on Iran only bolsters the view that non-nuclear states are prey, while those with nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them are predators.

Israel's role in this hypocrisy cannot be ignored. It possesses an undeclared nuclear arsenal of an estimated 90 to possibly more than 200 warheads, and refuses to sign the NPT or allow IAEA inspectors into its nuclear facilities. Its policy of "nuclear opacity" undermines global non-proliferation efforts, as it demanded that Iran disarm while maintaining its own nuclear monopoly in the Middle East. Since the 1980s, Israel has threatened Iran, viewing its support for Palestinian rights as a threat, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu repeatedly claiming that Iran was weeks away from a nuclear bomb—assertions dating back to the 1990s that have never materialized. He made similar false claims about Iraq's WMD in 2002 and Libya, both strong supporters of Palestinians. Israel's history of aggression—bombing or invading every neighbor since 1948, including recent strikes on Yemen, Qatar, and now Iran—fuels regional instability. This belligerence, backed by undeclared nukes, drives others to seek deterrence, thereby undermining non-proliferation efforts.

The fallout from the Iran attacks last summer is already evident. In September 2025, Saudi Arabia signed a mutual defense pact with Pakistan, placing the kingdom under Pakistan's nuclear umbrella. Officials hinted that "all military means," including nukes, are encompassed. This deal, a response to perceived threats from Israel after the June 2025 attacks on Iran, shows how attacks on non-nuclear states by those with nuclear arms accelerates proliferation. Saudi Arabia, fearing similar strikes, has secured nuclear protection without developing its own arsenal, bypassing the NPT. Now, given the most recent aggression by the US and Israel, more nations may follow, eroding the global regime.

Why does the West accept this double standard? Canada, for instance, opposes rogue nuclear states but overlooks Israel's illegal arsenal, and does little beyond PR statements and political platitudes in response to repeated military aggression by the Zionist state against neighbouring nations. The US, the only nation to use nuclear weapons in war, lectures others while enabling Israel's opacity.

Russia and China acquired nukes after World War 2 fearing US dominance. The UK and France followed suit due to Cold War threats from the Soviet Union. North Korea's program stems from fears of a US invasion. The only way to understand this mentality on a personal levels is to consider if a neighbor threatens you with guns and authorities fail to protect, then you would most likely arm yourself.  Under the seeming lawlessness that the world is witnessing with the attack on Iran it wouldn't be surprising if nations behaved similarly.

The attack on Iran will accelerate this cycle. Experts warn, it incentivizes proliferation and makes adversaries hesitant to participate in good faith diplomacy with the United States lest they experience the same fate as the Iranians. Iran, battered but surviving, may redouble secret efforts, and others, like Saudi Arabia, will seek alliances with nuclear states. Weaker nations with resources will prioritize nukes for self-defence, with Iran being a prime example of what could happen to a nation that does not bow to stronger military powers.

To salvage the global non-proliferation regime, we must confront its deepest underlying cause--the stark power imbalance between nuclear-armed states and those without them. A genuine commitment to nuclear disarmament requires universal action—dismantling all arsenals, including Israel's undeclared one—and bringing an end to hegemonic aggression that fuels insecurity worldwide.

The NPT rests on three inseparable pillars: non-proliferation, disarmament, and the peaceful use of nuclear energy. True adherence demands that nuclear-weapon states fulfill their Article VI obligations by leading through example, rather than perpetuating a system where they retain monopoly power while demanding restraint from others.  As long as the nuclear powers modernize and expand their arsenals instead of disarming, non-nuclear states will view nuclear weapons as the ultimate equalizer—the only credible guarantee of survival in a world where might dictates right.

The ongoing US-Israel military campaign against Iran is far more than another regional war. It is a profound setback to the slow, fragile progress toward a safer world—one with fewer nuclear weapons and stronger diplomatic norms. By choosing pre-emptive force over negotiation at a moment when talks had shown promise, this assault risks shattering the NPT's credibility entirely, accelerating proliferation pressures, and closing the door on the very diplomacy needed to prevent a cascade of new nuclear states.

The path forward is clear.  Nuclear powers must finally honor their disarmament commitments, or the treaty they claim to defend will collapse under the weight of their own hypocrisy. Only then can we hope to build genuine security—not through endless cycles of dominance and retaliation, but through shared vulnerability and mutual restraint. The alternative is a more dangerous world for everyone.

© 2024 The View From Here.  © 2024 Fareed Khan.  All Rights Reserved.