John Ivison speaks with Rae about Canada's relationship with Israel and if there has been a fundamental shift in Canada’s position at the UN

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This week, John Ivison was joined by Bob Rae, Canada’s ambassador to the United Nations in New York.

Ivison noted that Canada has joined the U.S. and a host of other countries including Japan and Saudi Arabia in calling for a 21 day ceasefire following the death of Hezbollah leader, Nassan Nasrallah.

He asked if there was any room for diplomacy at the moment, especially given Iran’s missile attacks on Israel.

“I think the challenge is, to try to figure out how to reduce the prospect of a deeper, wider war. And I think the reason for the 21-day ceasefire is in order to get all of the challenges on the table very clearly and see what further progress we can make without any further loss of life,” Rae replied.

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Ivison said the ceasefire calls for a diplomatic settlement, consistent with UN Security Council 1701, which ended the hostilities in 2006 and created a demilitarized zone between the Lebanon-Israel border and the Litani River, but which was never respected by Hezbollah. “Can Israel be blamed for not heeding a call based on that resolution?” he asked.

“You’re quite right, Hezbollah has hugely populated that area, not only with people, but also with underground tunnels, with all the other activities that we associate with them, and with rocket launching facilities, and so on. So I don’t think anybody thinks that the 21-day ceasefire line, if you like, is going to be the line that will ultimately be acceptable to Israel. But we do need to figure out how to get the parties to a table and to begin to get serious efforts at mediation underway,” Rae said.

“A three-week peace ceasefire is really an effort to do that. That’s why I think it’s been seen as an important objective to just give us some time to allow for some........

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