Canadian court rejects motion to dismiss UNRWA lawsuit, Oct 7 families to proceed

Canada's federal court has rejected Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's government motion to dismiss a lawsuit over Canada's decision to resume funding for UNRWA, Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA) announced on Friday. The court's ruling means that Canadians whose relatives were murdered by Hamas on October 7 can proceed with their lawsuit, which draws on extensive evidence relating to the ties of UNRWA and its workers to Hamas. 

The Honourable Madam Justice McVeigh rejected the Government’s claims that the decision to dismiss the lawsuit was not reviewable by the courts.

As a result, a lawsuit led by Dikla Mizrachi, mother of Ben Mizrachi (killed at the Nova festival); Iris Weinstein Haggai, daughter of Judih Weinstein Haggai (whose body is held by Hamas); Jacqui Vital, mother of Adi Vital-Kaploun (murdered in Kibbutz Holit); Raquel Ohnona, mother of Alexandre Look (murdered at the Nova festival); together with CIJA to have the decision to resume UNRWA funding (March 8, 2024) declared unreasonable, will continue before the Federal Court.

Richard Marceau, Vice President of CIJA, said “We are pleased that the court determined that reviewing the government’s decision to resume funding to UNRWA does indeed fall within their jurisdiction. We can now focus on the real issue: that legally, morally, and politically, Ottawa’s decision to resume funding for UNRWA was wrong."

“The Canadian families who lost loved ones in Hamas’ barbaric terrorist attacks on October 7 have faced the most unbearable of losses, which is why, together we are fighting to reverse the decision and disqualify UNRWA from further Canadian funding.”

Co-counsel for the applicants, Lawrence Greenspon, said that while no one was disputing the need for humanitarian aid, "UNRWA cannot be the agency to fulfill this responsibility."

"This is not an application to stop Canadian funding for humanitarian aid; it is an application designed to ensure that humanitarian aid actually gets to the people of Gaza who are in desperate need.”

UNRWA's ties to Hamas

The lawsuit was brought about because of "UNRWA’s well-documented ties to Hamas, a Canadian-listed terrorist entity, and its employees’ history of moonlighting as Hamas operatives" according to the CIJA statement at the time.

At the beginning of August, UNRWA fired nine employees for directly participating in the October 7 massacre. An UNRWA spokesperson said, "For nine people, the evidence was sufficient to conclude that they may have been involved in the seventh of October attacks."

A hostage released from Gaza in the November exchange revealed that he was held for nearly 50 days in an attic by an UNRWA teacher.

On multiple occasions, the IDF has eliminated terrorists or destroyed terrorist infrastructure within UNRWA schools.