The Media Roundup provides links to recent and archived articles, in both English and French, on immigration and diversity appearing in the national and local news. Some international content is also included. Articles are updated weekly.
The Globe and Mail – Palestinians face red tape, delays in applications to come to Canada, families here say
The federal government is facing mounting criticism over an immigration program that’s meant to reunite Canadians and permanent residents with their relatives who are trapped in Gaza. People trying to bring their loved ones here, and the lawyers representing them, say the program is restrictive, confusing and intrusive.
The Globe spoke with several Palestinian-Canadians and permanent residents, as well as lawyers who are counselling or representing them, about the challenges they’ve faced.
CTV News – Canadians’ families blocked from leaving Gaza, immigration minister ‘pissed off’
Canada’s immigration minister is “pissed off” that a list of people related to Canadians are being blocked from leaving the embattled Gaza Strip, he said Wednesday.
Ottawa started accepting applications last month to reunite as many as 1,000 people in the Palestinian territory with extended family members in Canada.
Canada provided an initial list of pre-approved people to Israel and Egypt, who jointly control the only border crossing out of Gaza.
The Globe and Mail – Yes, immigration has weighed on the economy, but it is not the enemy
Two pillars can be characterized as the lifeblood of modern economies – immigration and infrastructure.
Ideally, they’re dance partners – one always moving attentively in response to the other. A careful, constructed harmony.
In reality, they can and dofall badly out of step.
Right now, Canadians are experiencing the pain of that reality. Homes are desperately needed; too few are being built. Hospital wings and hospital beds are called for, none can be found. Overcrowded schools, roads and transit systems require renovation, and no workers can be hired to repair them.
CTV News – Here’s what international students wished they knew before coming to Canada
There are three basic needs international students in Canada deserve access to, according to student advocate Kairvee Malik.
These are education, housing and food.
“If you don’t have the basic needs, you lose trust, you lose interest and you are scared,” she told CTVNews.ca in an interview. “You don’t want to come to Canada anymore.”
CBC – Palestinian Canadians say their families are dying in Gaza while they wait to come to Canada
Maher Alanqar sat and watched his nephew suffer. The video — shot by a CBC News freelancer — captured every scream, every spasm as 10-year-old Adam Abu Ajwa called out for help after the home where he was sheltering with his parents and siblings in Khan Younis, Gaza was hit by a grenade on Jan. 17.
Adam suffered third-degree burns; his older sister Zeina, 26, escaped with burns and broken bones after being trapped under rubble for hours. They were the only ones in the house to survive. Their mother Hana and oldest brother Amr died and were buried in the courtyard of Nasser Hospital, one of the main hospitals in the central Gaza Strip.
“I stopped dead in my tracks” and felt disappointment and sadness, recalled the psychology major, who is minoring in business at Memorial University’s Grenfell campus in Corner Brook, N.L.
