The Canadian settler colonial state is deeply connected to its settler-colonial partner Israel and deeply implicated in the Israeli state’s occupation and genocide in Gaza — from shipments of military equipment to financial support and beyond.
One aspect of this complicity that has received too little attention is the recruitment of Canadians to fight in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), and the Canadian state’s refusal to hold those who serve in, or recruit to, the IDF accountable. Incredibly, neither Global Affairs Canada, the Department of National Defence, nor Public Safety Canada keep track of Canadians serving in the IDF.
Toronto police raided the homes of activists, and made 10 arrests on November 22, in relation to a Palestine solidarity action held at an Indigo Books store. Indigo has long been the target of boycotts because of the actions of its CEO Heather Reisman and her husband Gerry Schwartz. Reisman and Schwartz — who control 68% of the company’s assets — established the HESEG Foundation, which provides academic scholarships and stipends to foreigners, known as “Lone Soldiers”, who serve with the IDF.
According to Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East (CJPME): “Each year, the HESEG foundation rewards hundreds of ‘Lone Soldiers’ with more than CA$3 million worth of scholarships for further academic studies in Israel.”
Writer Naomi Klein has reported that the foundation provides “all kinds of perks as a reward for military service” with the IDF. She also notes that HESEG “is listed as the first source of scholarships on the ‘Draft IDF’ website”.
Critics argue that these actions put HESEG in violation of Canada’s Foreign Enlistment Act — which prohibits recruitment into the armed forces of a foreign state. Instead of holding HESEG accountable, the Canadian government has granted them tax-deductible status.
The bookshop action should have brought scrutiny to groups recruiting for the IDF. Instead, it sparked a hate-motivated mischief investigation into the protesters.
Yet, the recruitment of Canadians to the IDF goes well beyond the case of HESEG. Canadians are currently serving with the IDF as it undertakes its genocidal war in Gaza. Several groups based in Canada as well as the Israeli consulate in Toronto are implicated. It should be a national scandal — and could be, if it were receiving proper coverage in the mainstream media.
Canadian fighters in the IDF
It has been estimated that as of 2017, there were around 230 Canadians serving in the IDF. It is not known publicly how many of these were recruited through means that violate the Foreign Enlistment Act.
Ironically, the Act was passed in 1937 to prohibit the recruiting of Canadian volunteers to fight fascism in the Spanish Civil War.
It is estimated that Israel recruits about 7000 foreign youth annually to serve in the IDF as lone soldiers. In 2020, about 75 of them were Canadian. Canada has allowed IDF recruitment for decades, despite the Act being on the books for almost 90 years. Critics say the state even encourages it.
If there was any doubt about the role of these soldiers in the Zionist occupation project, Israel’s President Reuven Rivlin refers to them as “true Zionists”. Jewish Agency Chairman Isaac Herzog describes them as “a true example of what Zionism is all about”.
Rather than hold them accountable, however, Canadian officials have celebrated Canadian lone soldiers. The Canadian embassy in Tel Aviv even hosted a party for them in January 2020. The event was organised by Ambassador Deborah Lyons, who told The Jerusalem Post she “wanted to show the appreciation and care felt by the embassy for the 'lone soldiers' who left their homes to serve in the Israeli army".
“Canadian lone soldiers are a particularly special group. I know some of the parents of these kids and I wanted to reach out and let them know that their Canadian family of the embassy is here if they want to talk hockey and a home cooked meal.”
Media complicit
Since Israel’s latest genocidal assault on Gaza began in October, Canadian media have run puff pieces profiling Canadians serving with the IDF. CBC broadcast a January 2020 feature on Noy Leyb, a 30-year-old Israeli-Canadian reservist — who was born in Calgary but was living in New York when he signed up.
Leyb left Canada at 18 to join the Israeli army in 2009. He told CBC that since finishing active service, he has continued to return to Israel once or twice a year to train as a reservist. Leyb trained as a machine gun operator and described his training as “serious, but it's also fun”.
Global News did a piece on Temima Silver, a 21-year-old born and raised in Ottawa, who moved to Israel in 2020 to join the IDF as a lone soldier. She was released from service last year, but in October responded to a call for members of her former platoon to voluntarily return to duty.
CP24 featured Michael Zenou, a 32-year-old Toronto-born Israeli reservist. Zenou was already on the frontlines in Gaza’s north when interviewed and admitted he had been “in a gunfight” that week “between a unit of eight Hamas terrorists who were all killed”.
The Canadian Jewish News featured families of Canadians serving in the current assault on Gaza. They spotlighted 27-year-old Eden Philip, who left for Israel immediately the assault began. He also got his start as a lone soldier. His younger brother, Benjamin who was born in Montreal, left for Israel on December 18.
Palestine solidarity activists are asking if these fighters will face any legal consequences for their participation in genocide and potentially war crimes. IDF veteran Oren Medicks estimates that about 95% of those who served in the occupied Palestinian territories “were involved, directly or indirectly, in the commission of war crimes”.
Recruitment
As reported by the Canadian Jewish News, despite allegations by social justice groups in 2020 that IDF online recruitment ads posted by the Israeli consulate in Toronto were unlawful, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) refused to investigate, instead launching a “review” into the matter. In June last year, it announced that the “file” was concluded and no one would be charged. The ads invited young people to meet with an IDF representative at the Consulate if they wished to join up. This invitation extended beyond Israelis doing compulsory military service.
Critics are skeptical of any RCMP investigation into the activities of Israeli forces in Canada given its connections to the IDF, including sending officers to the occupied West Bank to serve alongside Israeli troops.
In another case, a criminal charge against Toronto-based organisation Sar-El Canada, which recruits “non-combat” volunteers with the IDF, was withdrawn in December 2022. Three months earlier, an order had been issued against the group, compelling it to attend court to respond to allegations that it had violated section 11 of the Foreign Enlistment Act.
The case alleged “that Sar-El Canada acted as an intermediary to recruit or induce individuals to volunteer in a non-combatant role with the Israeli military. It is further alleged that once in Israel volunteers would reside on military bases, wear military uniforms, and complete tasks that would otherwise be assigned to soldiers. These tasks allegedly included (but were not limited to) packing food rations or medical kits, cleaning tanks, painting helmets, radio repairs, and gas mask refurbishment.”
Sar-El Canada makes public appeals for “wartime volunteers” via their website and their volunteers have been featured in the mainstream media as far back as 2015.
Accountability
CJPME started a campaign In January to make Canadians who serve with the IDF accountable. They wrote to Justice Minister Arif Virani on January 18 calling on the government “to investigate Canadian nationals who are serving or volunteering with the Israeli military in its war on Gaza”.
In addition to pushing the Canadian government to “discourage Canadian involvement in the Israeli military”, CJPME made several recommendations, including that the government warn Canadians “that serving or volunteering with the Israeli military may make them criminally liable under the Crimes Against Humanity and War Crimes Act”, and ensure that Canadians “returning from foreign military service” are interviewed in detail by border agents.
It called on the government to “[p]ublicly investigate the HESEG Foundation for Lone Soldiers for breaching section 11(1) of Canada’s Foreign Enlistment Act” and called for an investigation “under [the governmnet’s] War Crimes Program” into the participation of Canadians in Israel’s war.
It also recommended that any investigative findings are shared with the International Criminal Court.
It is highly unlikely the government — even in this period of open genocide — will act on these recommendations. Hopefully, however, this campaign will raise awareness of the Canadian contributions to genocide and war crimes.