Palestinian families in Montreal, Canada are suing the government of Canada over delays in issuing visas to escape Israel’s deadly Gaza war and gain temporary protection there.
The lawsuit alleges that the country’s special visa program has been hampered by inefficiencies on behalf of 53 Palestinians who live in the Gaza Strip and have relatives in Canada.
All of her clients, according to Hana Marku, a Toronto lawyer who represents the families, filled out a form expressing interest in the visas within the first month of the scheme’s launch in January 2024.
None, however, have the unique reference numbers required to proceed to the next step, which is submitting their relatives’ applications for Canadian visas.
The prolonged delay has left their Gaza-based relatives open to “life-threatening and inhumane conditions” in the Palestinian territory, where Israel has bombarded cities, neighbourhoods and refugee camps for 15 months, the lawsuit states.
“There’s no rhyme or reason to how the codes are being rolled out, and the fact that there’s no transparency here is — it’s emotional torture, frankly”, Marku told Al Jazeera.
The Canadian family members who commit financial commitments in the belief that doing so will increase their chances of removing their loved ones from Gaza experience emotional torture.
A few months after Israel attacked the coastal Palestinian enclave, Canada announced the special Gaza visa program on January 9, 2024.
In the middle of the war, Canadian citizens and permanent residents were able to apply for the visa to accompany their extended families from Gaza. If approved, successful applicants would , receive temporary residency for up to three years.
Families and immigration attorneys contend that the entire process was confusing and included in-depth inquiries that included questions that typically included questions about scars or injuries that required medical attention.
Additionally, they claimed that Canada did not explain why some Palestinian families were given codes to submit their applications while others were not.
The federal immigration department, known as Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada (IRCC), announced to Al Jazeera that it was reviewing a “large volume” of first-stage submissions and that processing times would vary for each case.
As of January 28, the government had accepted 4, 873 Gaza visa applications into processing, the department said.
1, 093 people who had fled Gaza without receiving assistance from Canadian authorities were given permission to enter Canada on that day. Of that, 645 people have arrived in the country.
When 5, 000 applications have passed the processing stage or when the program’s final deadline of April 22 is reached, the program will end.
“The transition out of Gaza is still very difficult because of circumstances beyond Canada’s control. The IRCC spokesperson said that this is still the main factor in how quickly we can process applications from Gazans.
However, Marku, a Toronto lawyer, stated that her clients only want the opportunity to submit the applications and not assistance in leaving Gaza or a favorable outcome regarding their relatives’ visa applications.
Without being given unique reference codes, she said, “They can’t go on to the next step in this process … they can’t even fill out the application forms.”
We’re merely asking for a Federal Court order to require the government to provide these people with unique reference codes. This is what we’ve had to litigate”.
In response to a question about the lawsuit, IRCC explained to Al Jazeera that privacy concerns prevented the government from making comments on specific cases.
According to one of the family members from Canada who spoke to Al Jazeera on the condition of anonymity because she feared retribution, the visa program appears to have been “designed to fail and not to evacuate people” from Gaza.
“They’re not serious about the process”, the person said of the Canadian government. “They don’t have a structured system. It’s just a bad system. You have to figure out things on your own, it doesn’t make any sense”.
The deadliest Gaza in the world are the relatives they were hoping to bring to Canada.
Given the bodies that have not yet been discovered beneath the rubble, a total of 48, 319 Palestinians have been confirmed dead, compared to 61, 709 according to the Government Media Office in Gaza.
Palestinians are in desperate need of urgent humanitarian aid and food, and there are also shortages of basic supplies because of a shaky ceasefire signed last month between Israel and Hamas, which has sparked a brief but temporary reversal from widespread bombings.
The relative in Canada claimed it has taken a toll to watch the destruction from afar while attempting to obtain Canadian visas. “I never … in my entire life]had] to experience such a thing, the pressure like this”, they added.
In addition, Marku claimed that the attorneys are “working against the clock” to ensure that the application codes are received before the program’s end in April.
The Canadian government has 30 days to respond to the lawsuit filed on February 6, and Marku said her team is anticipating that the Federal Court will hear their arguments quickly.
Source: Aljazeera
Leave a Reply