A legal challenge filed in April against the Canadian government’s decision to resume financial support for the United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) will need to cross a key hurdle this week or face dismissal.
The Center for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA)—the advocacy arm of Jewish Federations of Canada-UIA—announced a hearing taking place on Wednesday and Thursday in Ottawa to make the case that a lawsuit filed by family members of those murdered by Hamas terrorists in southern Israel on Oct. 7 can continue.
The hearing will determine if the plaintiffs have filed their suit in the correct jurisdiction, which the Canadian government’s lawyers deny. If the judge agrees, then the suit would be dismissed.
“CIJA brought together the Canadian families who lost loved ones in Hamas’s barbaric terrorist attacks to take the federal government to court because the government and its actors must be held accountable and abide by the law,” said Richard Marceau, CIJA’s vice president of external affairs and general counsel, in a statement.
Marceau pointed to UNRWA’s ties to the terrorist organization and “its employees’ history of moonlighting as Hamas operatives” as reasons to oppose the decision to restore government support for the group.
“Not only was the decision to restore UNRWA funding morally unconscionable, but it was also unreasonable—both in fact and in law,” Marceau said. “We are deeply concerned that Canadian government funding may be ending up in the hands of Hamas or other listed terrorist organizations. The minister’s decision must face judicial review, and UNRWA must be disqualified from funding.”
