Prime Minister Stephen Harper was supposed to make his first visit to Israel this week. Instead, he cancelled his trip on June 6.

Harper’s four-day visit was to have run June 16 to 19, and would have
brought him to Israel, Jordan and the Palestinian Authority to meet
with regional leaders.

Reports out of Israel said Harper decided to nix the excursion to keep a distance from embattled Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s ongoing corruption scandal, which has thrown the country’s government into a state of flux.

Olmert is suspected of having illegally received hundreds of thousands of dollars from Jewish American businessman Morris Talansky. Talansky told a preliminary hearing at Jerusalem Magistrates Court that he gave Olmert $150,000 over a period of 15 years.

Harper’s staff never confirms a trip until shortly before the PM leaves, so the change was not characterized as a cancellation, but the trip had been talked about publicly.

Calls to the Prime Minister’s Office were not returned by The CJN ’s deadline.

The Conservative party is considered very friendly toward Israel. In the recent past, both prime ministers have spoken to each other by phone – Olmert called Harper last December from the Annapolis peace summit to personally ask for Canada’s help in the Middle East peace process – and, as reported by The CJN in March, the two countries signed a declaration of intent to co-operate further on security matters of mutual concern.

But the current political climate in Israel seems to have given Harper pause.

Norman Spector, a former Canadian ambassador to Israel and a chief of staff to former Conservative prime minister Brian Mulroney, said: “The domestic situation in Israel, quite frankly, is scandalous… Harper has no business being there when his counterpart is two steps away from the gallows.”

Moshe Ronen, chair of the Canada-Israel Committee, told The CJN his organization was informed by the Prime Minister’s Office that Harper had contacted Olmert in advance to advise and “discuss” the cancellation.

He said the committee has since been in talks with the PMO to reschedule the visit for this fall.

“While we’re disappointed that [Harper’s] not going… we know that the trip had not been confirmed for a variety of reasons, some of which had to do with the PM’s concern that he would land in a politically hectic and charged Israel,” Ronen said.

He added: “That’s the judgement call they made. But considering both the domestic reasons and some of the political considerations [for not going], that’s a fair position. In our view, Stephen Harper does not have to defend his credentials on Israel. This is not a cancellation, it’s a postponement. The PM very much wants to go to Israel.”

With files from Ha’aretz