By David Matas and Sarah Teich, September 9, 2026
The Arab world and Iran have never acknowledged nor assumed responsibility for the ill treatment and displacement of their Jewish populations. They could and should acknowledge responsibility, which would cost nothing.
When the Government of Canada recognized the State of Palestine in September 2025, Prime Minister Mark Carney stated that “Canada supports the development of a credible peace plan” without indicating what would make a peace plan credible or not credible. Any credible plan will have to deal with refugees, a question that has defeated every previous attempt at a settlement. However, it’s crucial to remember that this conflict produced two refugee populations — and a credible peace plan would have to deal with both.
In November 2013, the House of Commons Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development recommended that the government officially recognize the experience of Jewish refugees displaced from states in the Middle East and North Africa after 1948, and that the Government of Canada encourage the direct negotiating parties to take into account all refugee populations as part of any just and comprehensive resolution. The Government of Canada acted on the first recommendation, and on March 26, 2014, Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird announced that the House had agreed and that the Canadian government officially recognized that experience. Canada agreed in principle that the experience of Jewish refugees should be taken into consideration as a part of any just and comprehensive peace deal. This agreement bears on what the Carney government now says about a peace plan.
