bodnaruk_34-35r.qxp_Canada Calling 2/3/22 11:41 AM Page 34
Canada Calling
PHOTO COURTESY MATTHEW BEHRENS
Palestinian Mother Issues Challenge to Canadian Government By Candice Bodnaruk
Jihan Qunoo (r), a Palestinian refugee from Gaza, living in Ottawa, Canada, her husband (l), three daughters and Matthew Behrens (center). LAST MAY, when Israel attacked Gaza, killing 260 people, 129 of them civilians, including 66 children, Jihan Qunoo saw video footage of her own three children running to escape the bombing and screaming for her. The Ottawa-based mother immediately took to YouTube, posting a message to both Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Immigration Minister Marco Mendicino, begging them to issue temporary residency permits for her children to come to Canada, or she would return to
Candice Bodnaruk has been involved in Palestinian issues for the past 14 years through organizations such as the Cana‐ dian BDS Coalition and Peace Alliance Win‐ nipeg. Her political action started with fem‐ inism and continued with the peace move‐ ment, first with the No War on Iraq Coali‐ tion in 2003 in Winnipeg. 34
Gaza herself to retrieve them. It was a desperate attempt to rescue her daughters. Veteran activist Matthew Behrens heard Qunoo’s pleas and decided to try to contact her, knowing that his experience working with the Ottawa-based Rural Refugee Rights Network could be a benefit to the family. Behrens, the founder of Homes Not Bombs, has been at the forefront of social justice advocacy and nonviolent direct action in both Canada and the U.S. for more than 40 years. During the Israeli attacks, Behrens was live-casting direct action podcasts focusing on the history of Canada’s complicity in Israeli apartheid and anti-Palestinian violence. “In the midst of this, I heard the story of Jihan Qunoo, an Ottawa refugee who applied for her kids to visit her over the
WASHINGTON REPORT ON MIDDLE EAST AFFAIRS
summer because it had been two years since they had seen one another,” he said. Behrens connected with Qunoo through social media and they began working on a Temporary Resident Application so her family could live in Canada while their permanent residence application was processed (a procedure that Behrens said, on average, can take 39 months). Rural Refugee Rights Network also presented a petition with 25,000 signatures addressed to Prime Minister Trudeau’s office and Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC). Qunoo’s bold challenge to the Canadian government and media campaign paid off. She had the permits 36 hours after she had broadcast her message. In June, Qunoo was reunited with her husband and daughters. “This inspired a dozen other families long separated from one another to reach out and seek our assistance,” Behrens said. The Rural Refugee Rights Network spent the summer helping families put applications together; a lengthy, intense and traumatizing process, requiring affidavits detailing the background of each family’s separation. The Canadian government could have issued special immigration measures to waive these requirements, but in Behrens’ opinion, officials don’t think Palestinian lives are important enough for them to do that. “We have won 13 permits for reunification so far, and continue to work on others, who have come forward asking for assistance in their reunification,” he explained. Behrens said the large amount of attention the Rural Refugee Rights Network received last spring was really the first time Canadian media had presented extended, sympathetic coverage of Palestinians. “Despite the warnings of some experts that we would never be able to get them here MARCH/APRIIL 2022
