Assessing Canada’s foreign policy approach to the Palestinians and Israeli-Palestinian peacebuilding, 1979–2019

Abstract

ABSTRACT Since 1979, Canada has had two distinct foreign policy approaches toward the Palestinians and Israeli-Palestinian Peacebuilding. This article labels those “Pearsonian” and “Harperian”. To understand both approaches, it starts with the Jerusalem Embassy crisis in 1979 and moves on through the Middle East Peace Process, assessing Canada’s policy up to 2019. In response to international fallout from the 1979 Clark Progressive Conservative government pledge to relocate Canada’s embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, a 1980 Stanfield Report helped orient Canadian regional Middle East policy toward a more Pearsonian approach committed to multilateralism and sensitivity for Arab viewpoints. Successive Canadian governments heeded its advice in an attempt to build peace and regional relationships, while remaining Israel’s close friend. By contrast, starting with the Harper Conservative government in 2006, Canada adopted an approach that clearly favours Israel over and at the expense of the Palestinians. It is a foreign policy approach centred on bilateral relationships with what Canadian political leaders consider countries that are like-minded democracies with shared values. This approach mostly describes Canada’s regional approach from the mid-2000s to 2019.