Trudeau speaks to Netanyahu cabinet minister after his comments trigger Israeli backlash

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau spoke to Benny Gantz — Israel’s former defence minister who now serves in the wartime cabinet — hours after his critical comments about the war effort ignited an Israeli backlash.

In a readout sent to reporters Thursday, the Prime Minister’s Office said that in his conversation with Gantz on Wednesday, Trudeau reaffirmed Canada’s “longstanding support for Israel and its right to defend itself in accordance with international law” and condemned Hamas’s “terrorist attacks” and its use of Palestinian civilians as human shields.

Trudeau also stressed that Israel needs to take “all possible measures to protect civilians and minimize casualties,” the PMO said.

Trudeau, who made the call on the sidelines of the APEC summit in San Francisco, cited the recent spike in antisemitic incidents in Canada and the two leaders “agreed on the need to address it head-on,” the PMO said.

In a statement on social media, Gantz said Trudeau voiced his support for Israel and its “right to self defence.”

“We discussed the war’s development in Gaza, the atrocious Hamas terror attack and the efforts to release the hostages held in Gaza immediately,” Gantz said.

Gantz served in senior roles in the last Israeli government before Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu took the reins of power following the December 2022 parliamentary election.

He then agreed to join Netanyahu’s cabinet as a minister without portfolio after Hamas’s brutal Oct. 7 attack.

The inclusion of Gantz, who is not a member of Netanyahu’s right-wing Likud party, was a show of national solidarity in the face of Hamas, which has vowed to destroy Israel.

Gantz is the leader of National Unity, a centrist party.

Trudeau has taken heat from Israelis and Jewish Canadians for comments he made Tuesday that were perceived as overly critical of Israel.

Trudeau said “the world is watching” as women, children and babies are killed in Gaza.

He said “even wars have rules” — a comment seen as a suggestion that Israel, Canada’s friend and ally, was not following international law in its war with Hamas.

While not explicitly calling for a ceasefire, Trudeau said “the violence needs to stop urgently” and he urged Israeli’s leaders to “exercise maximum restraint” in the conflict.

Trudeau’s comments came on a day when Gaza’s Al-Shifa hospital was grappling with an increasingly dire situation. A lack of water, power and internet service is threatening Al-Shifa’s patients, including babies in incubators.

Worsening conditions in the hospital have made it a focus of international alarm. Thousands of patients, medical staff and displaced people have been trapped in the hospital by an Israeli assault on Gaza over the past five weeks.

The Israeli military took control of the hospital on Wednesday.

Israel has claimed Hamas used the site as a secret base. Relatively little evidence has been presented publicly to support that assertion.

Israeli forces are still searching the property for evidence.

Ashraf Al-Qidra, a spokesperson for the Hamas-run health ministry, told Al Jazeera Arabic that, in addition to people who have been sheltering at the complex, about 650 patients are still there.

In a social media post that tagged Trudeau, Netanyahu said Israel isn’t the one “deliberately targeting civilians, but Hamas that beheaded, burned and massacred civilians in the worst horrors perpetrated on Jews since the Holocaust.”

Netanyahu said Israel has been providing Palestinian civilians in the embattled territory with humanitarian corridors and safe zones. He alleged Hamas has stopped them from leaving at gunpoint.

“It is Hamas, not Israel, that should be held accountable for committing a double war crime — targeting civilians while hiding behind civilians. The forces of civilization must back Israel in defeating Hamas barbarism,” he said.

Michael Levitt, a former Liberal MP and the president and CEO of Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Centre, a Jewish rights group, said Trudeau’s claims about alleged Israeli wrongdoing could fan the flames of “Jew-hatred” in Canada.

“The prime minister’s remarks were delivered sharply and curtly. The accusation of Israel killing women and children, killing babies, it was something that did not properly contextualize how we got here,” Levitt told CBC News.

“Everything that’s happening now, the tragic loss of life that we’ve seen of both innocent Palestinian and Israeli civilians, is the result of the atrocities committed by the terror group Hamas.”

Michael Mostyn, president and CEO of B’nai Brith Canada, said the community is “extremely upset” with how Trudeau framed Israel’s activities in Gaza.

Like Levitt, Mostyn said Trudeau’s “tone” was particularly upsetting to some in the Jewish community.

“Rape, murder and brutality that shouldn’t even be discussed — there’s no democracy in the world that would stand by and allow that to happen,” Mostyn said in an interview.

“If Canada’s position is that Israel has the right to defend itself, then you have to allow Israel to defend itself. It’s every democracy’s job to stand by those that are following international laws.”

Diana Buttu, a Palestinian-Canadian lawyer and former spokesperson for the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), also criticized Trudeau’s statement — she said he didn’t go far enough in condemning Israel’s actions in Gaza.

“He’s taken the middle-line road, which for the Israelis means they can continue business as usual. And for Palestinians, this means the process of decimating Gaza is going to continue,” she said in an interview with CBC’s Power & Politics.

“It’s so crucial, so important for world leaders to stand up and say, ‘Enough, Gaza cannot sustain this.’ The whole point of the international system is to prevent this kind of decimation. It’s not to foster it.”

Buttu said Canada needs to differentiate itself from the U.S., which has presented itself as a steadfast ally of Israel in this conflict.

“They’re taking their cue from the U.S.,” Buttu said of the Liberal government. “I would hope that Canada would separate rather than join the chorus.”

That statement echoed comments from the National Council of Canadian Muslims.

The group’s CEO, Stephen Brown, said Wednesday Trudeau’s forceful condemnation of the deaths of women and children in Gaza is “an important and positive step.”

“But we need to see more. Canada needs to be a leading voice in the international community calling for a ceasefire and also working for a just and lasting peace for the Palestinians,” he said.