XPost: can.politics, ont.politics, bc.politics   
   From: ConsRCons@govt.cda   
      
   Our Prime Minister has a name like mud all around the globe.  They don't   
   thin much of him in the UN.  WE don't think much of him in Canada.   
   And now they're walking out on him on what he presumed would be 'safe turf'.   
      
   Aren't Canadians pleased to have elected such a man to head our country?   
      
   ___________________________________   
   CBC News Posted: Jan 20, 2014   
      
   Ahmad Tibi: Why I walked out on Stephen Harper's speech   
      
   Stephen Harper's speech, policy on Israel 'biased,' 'unilateral,'   
   Arab-Israeli legislator says   
      
      
   An Arab-Israeli legislator who stormed out during Prime Minister Stephen   
   Harper's speech to the Knesset on Monday says he did so as a form of   
   protest against Harper's bias.   
      
   Speaking to Evan Solomon, host of CBC News Network's Power & Politics,   
   Ahmad Tibi said Harper's speech was "biased" and that he described   
   Israel in "a very unbalanced way."   
      
     "We are 20 per cent of the population, we are suffering   
   discrimination," Tibi told Solomon.   
      
   "That democracy of Israel is a selective democracy, ethnic democracy.   
   Canada is a democracy and people are equal without relation to their   
   ethnic background. Here, there's a problem with that," he said.   
      
   Tibi is a deputy speaker of Knesset and leader of the Arab Movement for   
   Change, or Ta'al.   
      
   Canada's foreign policy toward Israel is "biased, non-balanced, and   
   that's why Canada has a very marginal role in the Middle East," Tibi said.   
      
   He and colleague Abu Arar walked out, Tibi said, "to say that we are   
   very much unsatisfied with the remarks and the policy of Prime Minister   
   Harper. It is very diplomatic. It's a protest which is legitimate in any   
   parliament."   
   'Confiscating, occupying lands'   
      
   Harper was speaking out against what he says is a more subtle form of   
   anti-Semitism than what the world saw ahead of the Holocaust.   
      
      
      
   Arab-Israeli legislator Ahmad Tibi stormed out during Prime Minister   
   Stephen Harper's speech to the Knesset on Monday. 'Why [is he] totally   
   neglecting the absence of freedom of the Palestinians under occupation?   
   It is a double-standard,' Tibi says. (Muhammad Hamed/Reuters)   
      
   "Some civil-society leaders today call for a boycott of Israel.… Most   
   disgracefully of all, some openly call Israel an apartheid state. Think   
   about that. Think about the twisted logic and outright malice behind   
   that," Harper said.   
      
   "A state, based on freedom, democracy and the rule of law, that was   
   founded so Jews can flourish as Jews, and seek shelter from the shadow   
   of the worst racist experiment in history," he said. "That is condemned,   
   and that condemnation is masked in the language of anti-racism. It is   
   nothing short of sickening."​   
      
   Tibi said Harper didn't mention the Israeli settlements in the West Bank   
   and East Jerusalem. Canada officially opposes Israeli control over   
   territories occupied in 1967, although Harper has refrained from   
   criticizing Israel for its policy.   
      
   "When you are controlling, discriminating, confiscating, occupying lands   
   from one side and putting them in the corner without any basic rights,   
   you are by this way ruling and committing apartheid in the occupied   
   Palestinian Territories," Tibi said.   
      
   "If he is talking about freedom, why [is he] totally neglecting the   
   absence of freedom of the Palestinians under occupation? It is a   
   double-standard. These words are moral double-standard from the prime   
   minister of Canada."   
      
   Reuven Rivlin, a member of the governing Likud Party and former Speaker   
   of the Knesset, said Tibi has the right to speak his mind because he   
   lives in a democracy in Israel.   
      
   "Sometimes it's annoying a lot of members of [the] Knesset," Rivlin said   
   in an interview with Solomon.   
      
   "I believe that he, Mr. Tibi, was elected to [the] Knesset as much as I   
   was elected to [the] Knesset. But he has to respect the rule of law and   
   to respect the rule of majority."   
      
      
   Support for Jewish state 'very, very important'   
      
   Rivlin said it's important to host the Canadian prime minister, whom he   
   referred to as one of Israel's friends. Rivlin said Canadian support for   
   a Jewish state is "very, very important for the Israeli people."   
      
   Tibi also took issue with the idea that debating boycotts of Israeli   
   products and using the term apartheid is anti-Semitic.   
      
   "Do you accept at any case to be under occupation and then somebody will   
   tell you that it is absolute democracy? It is not. We are living day by   
   day here. Palestinians under occupation are living day by day, and   
   saying that the occupied territory is apartheid has no relation at any   
   case with anti-Semitism," he said.   
      
   "What's the connection? If you are criticizing the policy of the state   
   of Israel, immediately you are categorized as anti-Semitic. This is a   
   twisted logic of Mr. Harper."   
      
   The Knesset has people from all sides and with all views, Rivlin said.   
      
   "In Israel, in spite of all differences of opinion and in spite of the   
   idea that we are sometimes thinking that Mr. Tibi can incite against the   
   state of Israel, he has the ability and he has the right to say his   
   words in the Israeli parliament without any fear.   
      
      
   Not just a Jewish state, Tibi says   
      
   Tibi argued that with one-fifth of Israel's population made up of   
   Arab-Israelis, Israel does not belong only to the Jewish population.   
      
   "We are citizens of this state. We are indigenous people," Tibi said.   
      
   "Israel should be defined as a state of its own nationalities. There are   
   two nationalities in Israel. One is [the] Jewish majority, one is [the]   
   Arab-Palestinian minority. We are not transparent. We are not nonsense,   
   nobody. We are community, we are minority and we are a national   
   minority. Saying that Israel is the Jewish state is neglecting our   
   existence, our very existence and our narrative, and I will not accept   
   that."   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)