[Imc-beirut] Canada's McKay: Hezbollah a "cancer", "cold blooded killers"

[John Shafer]

   Thu. Aug. 3, 2006. | Updated at 12:33 AM Toronto Star

   MacKay answers government's criticsForeign affairs minister criticizes
   Hezbollah Tories pandering to U.S. policy, say
   New DemocratsAug. 2, 2006. 01:00 AMSEAN GORDONQUEBEC BUREAU CHIEF

   OTTAWA-Foreign Affairs Minister Peter MacKay used apocalyptic language
   to condemn Hezbollah and brush aside suggestions by opposition critics
   that he was absent during the early part of the latest Middle East
   crisis.

   MacKay held fast to the federal government's unstinting support for
   Israel, while also calling for an end to the bloodshed.

   The minister attacked Hezbollah as "cold-blooded killers" and "a
   cancer" that can't be trusted to suspend hostilities.

   The opposition parties, which have led a cacophony of criticism
   regarding Prime Minister Stephen Harper's characterization of Israel's
   actions as "measured," had their first chance to grill MacKay on the
   government's position at a special sitting of the Commons' foreign
   affairs committee.

   MacKay was also confronted after the session by three members of the
   Montreal-based Al-Akhrass family, which lost eight members - four of
   them children - in an Israeli air raid on the southern Lebanon village
   of Aitaroun last month.

   One pushed a photo of his father's corpse into MacKay's hand as
   another harangued the minister.

   Polls show the Tories' approach to the Mideast crisis isn't popular
   with voters.

   Though MacKay said "the utmost Israeli restraint is needed to avoid as
   far as possible civilian casualties" - the first time Ottawa has made
   such an admonition since fighting began three weeks ago - he left
   little doubt as to where his government stands on the conflict.

   "It is not our intention to shift the blame from the extremists who
   caused this violence and want it to continue ... there is a marked
   difference between a democratic country defending the lives of its
   citizens and a terrorist army intent on death and destruction," he
   said.

   He later told the committee that "it's not a difficult choice between
   siding with a democratic state with an elected government ... or a
   group of cold-blooded killers."
   "Lebanon is being held hostage by Hezbollah, let there be no doubt
   about that," he said. "Hezbollah are a cancer on Lebanon that are
   destroying democracy and stability within their boundaries."

   And though Canada supports an eventual ceasefire, MacKay didn't call
   for an immediate end to the violence, saying that even if a truce were
   brokered, he doubts it would be heeded by Hezbollah, which, as he
   pointed out to the committee, is listed as a terrorist group in
   Canada.

   "We are dealing with terrorists, I'm not even sure who speaks for
   Hezbollah or whether they can even begin to keep their word," he said.

   MacKay set out conditions to an eventual ceasefire that mirror those
   demanded by the United States: that three Israeli soldiers kidnapped
   by Hezbollah be returned unharmed, an immediate halt to the volleys of
   Hezbollah rockets targeted at northern Israel, and an end to targeting
   civilians.

   The position prompted accusations from New Democrat MP Alexa McDonough
   (Halifax) that Ottawa is an adjunct of U.S. policy and that the Tories
   have frittered away the country's international credibility as a
   middle power able to bring diverging interests together.

   "(This) puts us absolutely in lock-step with one party only and that's
   the Bush administration, and almost entirely, obscenely, out of step
   with practically every other member of the international community,"
   she said.(but her party voted for stopping funds to hamas - js)

   Bloc Québécois critic Francine Lalonde was similarly dismissive,
   saying "he was very nice to us, but his answers weren't convincing."

   The opposition also pressed MacKay to step up Canada's contribution to
   aiding the roughly 800,000 Lebanese displaced by the conflict, and
   demanded Ottawa formulate a strategy to evacuate thousands of
   Canadians who are stranded in the country's bomb-ravaged south.

   MacKay spoke gravely about the extent of the civilian death toll on
   both sides - which he called "heartbreaking and shocking" - and about
   the humanitarian crisis that now looms in southern Lebanon.

   While MacKay said Canada hasn't envisioned sending soldiers as part of
   an international "peace-making" force, he did say Ottawa plans to take
   a leading role in addressing the humanitarian dimension of the
   conflict, an idea sources said will be explored at a meeting of
   Harper's inner cabinet today.

   Proceedings were interrupted by Montrealer Hassan El-Akhras, whose
   father was one of eight relatives killed in an Israeli bomb attack.
   El-Akhras tried to address the committee, saying "my family was
   assassinated" and "I have a right to speak, I'm a Canadian citizen."

   Conservative committee chair Kevin Sorenson (Crowfoot) ignored the
   intervention, and an opposition political staffer led El-Akhras back
   to his seat.

   Later, El-Akhras and his cousins Rami and Mayssoun Al-Akhrass (the
   family uses several spellings of its surname) had an animated exchange
   with MacKay as he left the committee room. An aide to MacKay offered a
   meeting with the family to discuss their immediate concerns, which are
   the safe return of patriarch Ahmad Al-Akhrass - who is in hospital in
   Beirut after surviving the bombing - and of other relatives marooned
   in Lebanon.

   MacKay detailed how his department has evacuated 13,052 Canadians from
   Lebanon, and praised the work of the 860 civil servants who overcame
   major logistical hurdles and made it happen.

   Liberal MP Dan McTeague (Pickering-Scarborough East) attacked MacKay
   for foot-dragging in setting up evacuation efforts to help the roughly
   50,000 Canadians in Lebanon, saying, "Where were you, why were you
   missing in action?"

   MacKay shot back: "I was on the job, you may have been on television,
   but I was meeting with officials."

References
   0. http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1154470209962&call_pageid=968332188774&col=968350116467