Securing the Economy and Economizing Security: An Analysis of Material Influences Underpinning Canada’s Position on the Israel-Palestine Conflict

This thesis explores Canada’s relationship to Israel using a document and policy analysis in an attempt to reconcile discursive elements with actual bilateral relations between these two nations. Using a Marxian approach to interpreting Israel’s military-industrial complex from the geopolitical perspective of Canada, this research highlights how Palestinian resistance contributes to the labour required for the production of security commodities within the capitalist world system. Documents retrieved via Canada’s Access to Information Act reveal how the bureaucratic processes needed to facilitate capital accumulation are carried out between Canada and Israel. Despite Canada’s historic rhetorical position as a neutral mediator, findings suggest that Canada is in collaboration with Israel’s colonization of Palestine and positions itself in accordance with its own interests of capital accumulation. Moreover, they suggest that while pushing towards productivity is not the reason Israel and Canada colonize Palestine, it is the means by which they colonize Palestine.