This year and last, the Canadian corn harvest was so plentiful that the prairies were at a bursting point. So large were the harvests that there were not enough rail cars to transport the bumper crop. In America during the same period the US harvest was decimated by drought, and a partial or substantial failure.
The dire economic situation that is currently causing chaos to the US economy, leading key credit ratings agencies such as Moody’s to warn of forthcoming recessions and possible downgrades, has left Canada relatively unaffected.
The US Federal Reserve Board, trying anything and everything from interest rate cuts to vast programs of quantitative easing (printing more money that doesn’t exist) are reeling from one crisis to another.
Canada’s central bank, by contrast, has said the Canadian economy no longer needs anything special to help the markets through this current climate. In fact, the only Canadian industrial sector adversely affected by the current and ongoing economic woes hitting the United States and the rest of the world, is the paper sector…All other sectors are doing just fine.
So fine in fact is the Canadian economy that the chief executive officers of two major Canadian banks say the credit crunch is actually a healthy development for Canada. There are indications pointing to the fact that the Canadian economy has just sailed right through this current economic crisis.
The contrast between the two neighboring countries could not be starker, so what is the real reason for this?
Canada and the United States have a symbiotic relationship. Where one prospers, so should the other. Equally, where one falters, so the other should falter. Yet this is clearly not what is happening and the question needs to be asked, why? There are many reasons, obvious and subtle, but I believe that the primary reason is Israel.
Quite simply, Canada clearly and without hesitation supports Israel, the United States does not. This is an obvious working out of Genesis 12:3, “those who bless you, I will bless; those who curse you, I will curse…”
Barack Obama obviously dislikes Israel and clearly loathes Benjamin Netanyahu. Obama wastes no opportunity to denigrate the Jewish State and holds them up to a standard of international accountability that he in no way extends to Israel’s Middle Eastern neighbors.
Obama is dismissive at best, and willfully complicit at worst about the very real threats Israel faces every day, even about existential threats to their very survival, such as Iran’s nuclear program. Obama is quick to offer public condolence to the family of a Palestinian terrorist killed by Jewish Soldiers while throwing fire bombs at them, but does not reciprocate in kind when innocent Jewish civilians who are killed by Palestinian acts of terror. (As a side issue, since when has it become official US policy to send presidential condolences to terrorists killed while in the actual act of terrorism itself?)
Obama has threatened to withdraw US veto covering in international forums, such as the United Nations, and has insulted and treated Israel’s Prime Minister with distain, discourtesy and barely disguised contempt.
Stephen Harper Prime Minister of Canada by contrast could not be at more opposite ends of the spectrum. Harper is a clear and instinctive supporter of Israel. He, along with a small group of other nations ceaselessly support and work for Israel’s best interests in all international forums where they have a say. Harper is quick to communicate Canada’s condolences to the innocent Jewish victims of Palestinian terror, and has left the world in no doubt about where he and the nation that he leads stand regarding the Iranian threat.
Harper has even made a strong and intelligent case internationally for the logic of a pre-emptive strike against Iran from Israel, “…if Harper is correct, virtually all measures, up to and including a military attack on Iran, might be warranted, or perhaps even required…” [1]
Harper has used his position in the G8 to lobby other nations in support of Israel against Iran and has opened an area of military and intelligence sharing between Canada and Israel that is unprecedented in recent history.
This has been dangerous politics for Harper personally as anti-Semitism is rife internationally, but his policies have seen Canada go from strength to strength. John Baird, Canada’s Foreign Affairs Minister has declared proudly, “Israel has no greater friend in the world than Canada.” [2]
This is also reflected by the general population of Canada who view Harper’s foreign policy as being “…about right.” This is reciprocated from Israel, and Netanyahu himself describes Harper and Canada as “…a true friend of Israel.”
Obama, by contrast spent the entirety of the recent 2014 Gaza War undermining Israel and doing all within his power to support Hamas. Obama did this while he publically declared Israel had a right to defend itself from what he himself acknowledged was a deadly threat, but behind closed doors was applying unimaginable pressure to Netanyahu to cease all hostilities at a point when Israel had not even begun to neutralize the very real dangers they faced from Hamas. He was trying to force Israel to lose the Gaza War.
Obama continued by insisting that the post conflict settlement include terms that were not only unfavorable to Israel, such as allowing terror tunnels to remain without destruction due a potential enforcement of a premature ceasefire, to actions that would actually empower and embolden Hamas. These actions, such as allowing Hamas to re-open the border crossings between Egypt and Gaza and ending the Israeli maritime blockade would have seriously prejudiced the ongoing national security of the Israel. Obama was attempting to put into place the necessary conditions not for Gaza to regrow, but for Hamas to rebuild its terror infrastructure.
When describing the US backed peace proposal for ending the Gaza War last summer, even the far left leaning reporter Barack Ravid of Haaretz declared it, “…might as well have been penned by Khaled Mashaal (leader of Hamas in exile). It was everything Hamas could have hoped for…”
Canada and the United States are similar in so many ways, but differ substantially on the most important one, Israel. While the US administration is now openly hostile to Israel, the Canadian administration has a burden for God’s people that motivate and form their policy. While public opinion in the US is swinging away from Israel, in Canada it is firmly entrenched behind them. Whilst Obama vilified Israel for defending itself during the recent Gaza War, Harper sprung to their defense and afterwards took active steps to encourage and strengthen the Canadian/Israeli economic relationship.
Canada is thriving in a way that the United States unfortunately is not. There is a reason for this and it is Genesis 12:3, “I will bless those who bless you, and curse him who curses you.”
It is a tangible, demonstrable, modern day example that when it comes to the Nation of Israel, God means exactly what He says, “…whoever touches you touches the apple of my eye…” (Zechariah 2:8b)
Endnotes
[1] http://opencanada.org/indepth/stephen-harpers-persian-problem-3/
[2] http://opencanada.org/indepth/stephen-harpers-persian-problem-3/