That Israel is committing crimes against humanity on an industrial scale is no longer a matter of debate. In the past year, the Trudeau government has indirectly acknowledged as much, first by ceasing to issue new military export permits to Israel, and then by stating that it would arrest Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, now indicted by the International Criminal Court, should he enter Canada.

In spite of this, Ottawa continues to equip the Israeli military with the very weapons that it is using to slaughter Palestinian and Lebanese civilians. As Amnesty International has stated, Ottawa now “risks becoming complicit in violations of international humanitarian law—including war crimes—and a plausible genocide.”

For several months, the Trudeau government has responded to public concerns about complicity with tokenistic gestures that attempt to hide or downplay the scope of its ongoing military linkages to Israel. The result has been incoherence and hypocrisy. Canada now has approximately 200 active export permits with Israel, which are valued in the hundreds of millions of dollars. In September, Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly suspended 30 of these. She did not specify which permits were suspended, nor did she suggest that any have been cancelled. The government weakly defends its position by arguing that its standing permits are for “non-lethal” goods—a term that has no legal definition and is at odds with the broader language of Canadian and international law. In fact, these permits are for aircraft, ground vehicles, and components such as imaging technology and specialized circuit boards, all of which may be used to lethal effect.

Moreover, Canada continues to export military wares to Israel via the United States with little restraint or transparency. Last August, the US Department of Defense disclosed plans to sell $83 million in Canadian-made mortar cartridges to Israel. Responding to a swell of criticism, Joly blocked this contract only after it was disclosed by its broker at the Pentagon. “We will not have any form of arms or parts of arms be sent to Gaza, period,” she said at the time. “How they’re being sent and where they’re being sent is irrelevant.” But similar deals are likely occurring without public knowledge. We know, for instance, that Canadian-made components are contributing to the manufacture of F-35 jets and Apache helicopters, which the US continues to sell to Israel. We simply do not know the details or the full scope of this trade pathway because exports to the US are exempt from the normal permitting process. Contrary to Joly’s statement, the government has demonstrated no interest in proactively identifying and ending the military exports making their way to Israel through the American corridor.

The Canadian government also continues to purchase Israeli weapons. With their most recent deal, the Department of National Defence plans to purchase $43 million in missiles from Israel’s state-owned arms company Rafael Advanced Defense Systems. When this contract—which transfers funds directly from the Canadian public to the Israeli state’s military-industrial wing—was made public in December last year, the Israeli military had already killed approximately 20,000 Palestinians in Gaza.

The Trudeau government’s rhetoric has consistently implied that its posture towards Israel is a matter of discretion. At this point, it is a matter of law. Ottawa’s sustained military trade with Tel Aviv is a clear violation of Canada’s Export and Import Permits Act, which stipulates that the federal government shall not permit the export of any “goods or technology” if there is a substantial risk of it being used in violation of international humanitarian law. Ongoing military trade with Israel is also in violation of the UN’s Arms Trade Treaty, which Canada joined in 2019. Neither law stipulates that military exports should cease only when an international court has determined a genocide to be perpetrated by the receiving country. Rather, both dictate that military exports must end when there is a high likelihood that they would contribute to crimes against humanity—a line that has been crossed repeatedly. As findings from Human Rights Watch, the United Nations, and independent experts have shown, Israel has killed tens and probably hundreds of thousands of innocent Palestinians since October 7, 2023. Millions of others have been displaced, starved, injured, and psychologically traumatized.

For all of these reasons, yesterday morning I participated in the action on Parliament Hill led by Jews Say No to Genocide, demanding that the Canadian government reverse course and fulfill its obligations under domestic and international law. We demand that the Canadian government cancel all of its export permits, close all export loopholes, halt all weapons purchases, and implement a full arms embargo on Israel. Ottawa has the power to do this today.

Like our Palestinian allies in this struggle, we refuse to be patronized by Canadian policymakers. We refuse to be told that we are making a mountain out of a molehill. And we refuse to be told that we lack understanding by politicians who are in fact contradicting themselves, their stated principles, and the laws they claim to defend. Our demands are simple and we will not stop pressing for them until they are realized.

Niko Block is a PhD candidate in political science at York University, and a member of Independent Jewish Voices. He has previously written for The Guardian, Jacobin, The New Internationalist, Canadian Dimension, Social Text and covered news from the West Bank for Palestine Monitor.