(St. John’s) Two Palestinian sisters from Newfoundland are among families across Canada seeking to obtain the limited number of special visas in hopes of saving their loved ones from the war between Israel and Hamas.
Marilyn and Miran Kasken say their younger brothers, Talal, aged 20, and Fahed, aged 21, share a tent in Rafah, near the Egyptian border. They have no water, no food, no toilets, no electricity and no internet.
They were living in Gaza City when Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, killing 1,200 people. Almost immediately, Israel responded with near-constant bombardment throughout Palestinian territory. The brothers hid bombs in basements and walked past demolished buildings and dead bodies on their journey to Rafah, Marilyn Kasken said in an interview in St. John’s, Newfoundland.
To speak with her brothers and confirm that they are still alive, Marilyn says she needs to contact a friend in the West Bank who can make a local call to try to reach them – if they have managed to find electricity to charge their phones.
The women say that since the war began, their uncle was killed and their grandparents had to stay in Gaza City because they were too old and frail to be evacuated. They haven’t heard from their mother for a week and they don’t know if she is still alive.
“The fate of our brothers and sisters is now in the hands of the Canadian government. If they want to save them, they can. They are lucky,” said Mme Kasken, aged 24.
She says that every day her brothers spend in the Gaza Strip diminishes their chances of survival.
“I don’t want to lose another member of my family. »
New visa program
The federal government on Tuesday launched its new special extended family visa program for residents of Gaza. Immigration Minister Marc Miller announced the program in December, after months of advocacy from Palestinian Canadians asking the federal government to help save their loved ones.
PHOTO SPENCER COLBY, CANADIAN PRESS ARCHIVES
Immigration Minister Marc Miller
The Kasken sisters hired an immigration lawyer through an online fundraising campaign. Marilyn indicated that the lawyer was busy Tuesday morning updating the online application for the portal with the documents ready, waiting for the first opportunity to submit it.
The application process involves several steps. First, families must provide the federal government with basic information about the people they wish to bring to Canada and their relationship to each other, as well as the government documents of the Canadian family member.
If the government deems the information complete, they get a unique code to apply for the visa. The federal Immigration Department has warned families to complete their documents quickly when they receive their unique code, as it accepts a limited number of applications.
“If all available places are filled before you have submitted your complete application, your application will not be processed under the temporary public policy,” the ministry said on its website on Tuesday.
The program offers visas to up to 1,000 people with extended family members in Canada. This would allow them to seek refuge in Canada for three years, if their families are willing to support them financially during this period.
The existing program in Canada only covered immediate family members of Canadians, including spouses and children.
The expanded program will include a limited number of parents, grandparents, adult children, grandchildren and siblings of Canadians and permanent residents of Canada, as well as their immediate family members.
The ceiling of the program criticized
The National Council of Canadian Muslims has criticized the cap of 1,000 applicants and says it has already been in contact with more than a thousand people trying to evacuate their families from Gaza.
More than 23,000 Palestinians have been killed – about two-thirds of them women and children – and more than 58,000 have been injured since the start of the war, according to local health authorities in the Hamas-controlled territory.
Marilyn Kasken echoed these frustrations, pointing out that Ottawa has welcomed more than 210,000 Ukrainians fleeing Russian attacks on their country since 2022.
“It says that the lives of the Palestinian people do not matter,” she argued.
Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada defended the cap and said the visa numbers reflected the volatility of the situation on the ground and the difficulties faced by Canada and other countries in getting people out of Gaza through the closely-knit border. controlled with Egypt.
Mr Miller said in a statement on Tuesday that the situation in Gaza was “difficult and volatile”.
“These new measures provide a humanitarian path to safety and recognize the importance of keeping families together given the ongoing crisis. We will continue to monitor developments in Gaza very closely and will adapt our intervention accordingly,” he said.
Those who manage to obtain a visa and flee Gaza will be given funds for a two-night hotel stay while they undergo screening and fingerprinting.
Once in Canada, they will be able to apply for a free work or study permit and will have access to settlement services and federal government medical coverage for 90 days.
The Kasken sisters met Monday with a staffer of Seamus O’Regan, Liberal MP for St. John’s South–Mount Pearl, but said the meeting didn’t leave them with much hope.
“I want to wake up from this nightmare,” Marilyn Kasken testified. I stop myself from thinking most of the time, but it doesn’t work. »
The sisters arrived in St. John in October, thanks to the federal Human Rights Defenders Program, which resettles people who fight for basic freedoms but are at risk in their home countries.
“I don’t really feel like I have a fresh start in Canada, because I can’t feel good things while I’m constantly afraid of losing my friends, my family and my brothers,” a- she indicated.