OTTAWA—Stephen Harper’s visit to Israel has been eight years in the making. But ideologically and politically, Israel has loomed large in Canada’s foreign policy since the early days of his government in 2006.

Mere months after taking office, Harper defended Israel’s military incursion into Lebanon with a controversial comment that it was a “measured” response, even though it would blow up into a month-long conflict.

With that statement, the Conservatives made clear that with the new government would come a new emphasis on Middle East issues underpinned by unflinching support of Israel

Now Harper is set to make his first visit to the country as part of a week-long tour to the Middle East that also includes stops in the West Bank and Jordan.

The welcome in Israel promises to be warm, a recognition of Canada’s strong allegiance to the Jewish state.

Canada’s formal position on Middle East issues hasn’t changed — it favours a two-state solution for Israel and Palestinians. But since 2006, the emphasis has undergone a sea change. Foreign Affairs Minister John Baird and Harper himself are fond of saying that Israel has no greater friend than Canada.

Harper has called Israel a “light of freedom and democracy in what is otherwise a region of darkness.”

“We understand that the future of our country and of our shared civilization depends on the survival and thriving of that free and democratic homeland for the Jewish people in the Middle East,” Harper told a Jewish National Fund of Canada dinner in December.

“That is why Israel will always have Canada as a friend in the world,” the prime minister said.

The support has gone beyond just words.

In 2006, Canada was the first country in the world to halt aid to the Palestinians after an election victory by Hamas, which Canada had designated as a terrorist group.

In 2009, Canada cast the lone vote at a United Nations human rights council, opposing a motion condemning an Israeli military offensive in Gaza. The motion, which called for an investigation into “grave” human rights violations by Israeli forces, was denounced as “unnecessary, unhelpful and inflammatory” by the Canadian representative.

In 2011, Harper used his influence at a G8 summit to ensure that the group’s communiqué omitted reference to Israel’s pre-1967 borders as a starting point for peace talks.

So why the pro-Israel strategy?

Domestic politics and a desire to win Jewish votes have been cited as one reason, though that is denied by Baird and other Conservatives.

“Going after the Jewish vote isn’t really a tremendous strategy. There aren’t a lot of Jewish votes in Canada,” said Sen. Linda Frum.

Instead, she says Canada’s approach has changed because of Harper’s deeper, philosophical view of Israel’s place in the world and the historic struggles of the Jewish people, a perspective learned at his father’s knee.

“I think that Harper has a particular affinity for the Jewish people and for the particular kind of suffering that our people have endured,” Frum said in an interview.

“His father was aware of anti-Semitism going on around him and he spoke to his children about how wrong it was and ingrained in them the need to be respectful of other religions and other cultures,” she said.

“That’s been why he has been such a champion because I think his own moral vision of the world is challenged when people challenge Israel,” said Frum, who was appointed to the Senate by Harper in 2009.

Shimon Koffler Fogel, chief executive of Canada’s Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, said the pro-Israel stance was first seen in the Canadian Alliance, precursor of the Conservative party.

“I think it extends pretty deep within the current caucus. It transcends religious consideration. There is certainly an evangelical component to the party that has expressed consistent and pretty intense support for Israel,” Fogel said.

But he says the government’s position is shaped also by the personal viewpoint of Harper.

“As he himself has explained it, it was born of a very personal sense of right and wrong and what obligations he felt the international community had to the Jewish people and the Jewish state,” Fogel told the Star. “I really think that was the driving consideration for him.”

Despite Conservative denials that it was done for political ends, Fogel says their stance has had a partisan payoff, both in votes and financial backing.

“Significant segments of the Jewish community shifted their alliance over to the Conservative party,” Fogel said in a telephone interview from Jerusalem, where he had gone earlier in the week in preparation for the visit.

Rafael Barak, Israel’s ambassador to Canada, says the Conservatives are “addressing our issues.

“I would say that they are not pro-Israelis. They think the way we look at it. When it’s right, it’s right. They are not shy to say that in public,” he said in an interview.

But he notes that the political backing extends to the New Democrats and Liberals as well, adding “on the basic issues, I feel that there is a lot of support to my country.”

Harper’s visit makes him only the second sitting prime minister to visit Israel — Jean Chrétien was the first in 2000.

He will see firsthand a region that rides a seemingly endless rollercoaster of optimism on peace talks and despair over acts of violence that threaten negotiations.

Now, there is another round of peace talks, led by U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry who has been conducting shuttle diplomacy between Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas.

Baird says Canada stands ready to help however it can. However, critics say Ottawa’s pro-Israeli emphasis has cost it the ability to play a role.

Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading... Loading...

“The Harper government explicitly rejects even-handedness in the Middle East. It shows no interest in being ‘fair-minded,’ ” former prime minister Joe Clark writes in his new book, “How we Lead: Canada in a Century of Change.”

“Those outspoken positions limit, or eliminate, Canada’s capacity as a mediator, or even as a calming influence,” said Clark,

He said other “friends” have been prepared to challenge the Israeli government on controversial issues like settlements, land swaps and borders.

But the Conservatives have avoided publicly challenging the Israel government on such issues. Whether such tough talk is reserved for private discussions is impossible to tell, Clark says.

“We don’t know whether the high-octane public support that Canada delivers is accompanied by that kind of frank advice in private,” writes Clark, who also served a lengthy tenure as foreign affairs minister under Brian Mulroney.

(Clark had his own Mideast misstep in 1979 when he mused about breaking with international tradition to move the Canadian embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, ground zero in Israel’s territorial disputes with the Palestinians.)

U.S. President Barack Obama didn’t pull punches during his visit to Israel nearly a year ago. While saying the “easiest thing” would be to just express “unconditional support” for Israel, Obama instead waded into the divisive issues during a speech in Jerusalem.

Acknowledging the security threats that confront Israel, Obama also urged Israelis to look through the eyes of Palestinians, whom he said “have a right to be a free people in their own land.”

“It’s not fair that a Palestinian child cannot grow up in a state of their own,” Obama said.

And Obama said Israel “must recognize that continued settlement activity is counterproductive to the cause of peace,” referring to expansion of Israeli settlements in the Palestinian West Bank.

On paper, Canada says it does not recognize “permanent” Israeli control over territories occupied in the war in 1967 — the Golan Heights, the West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Gaza Strip. Israel’s military forces withdrew from the Gaza Strip in 2005. The foreign affairs department also says Israeli settlements in the “occupied territories” are a violation of the Geneva Convention and a “serious obstacle” to peace.

However, the Conservatives have steered away from such blunt talk, a point Baird drove home earlier this month when he refused to be drawn into a discussion about Israeli plans for new apartments in West Bank settlements. Baird said only that he didn’t want to “pile on.”

On Friday, Harper’s spokesperson refused to even affirm whether the statements on the foreign affairs website stand as official government policy. Pressed for clarification, Jason MacDonald wouldn’t specifically discuss settlements, saying only that Canada opposes “unilateral” action.

So it’s not likely Harper will deliver the kind of message that Obama did, though some observers would welcome it.

“I’d like to hear Prime Minister Harper pronounce himself on where Canada stands on the key issues of the peace process,” said David Viveash, a long-time diplomat who served as Canadian representative to the Palestinian Authority and more recently worked with the Carter Center in both Ramallah and Jerusalem.

“Where do we stand on settlements. Where do we stand on Jerusalem. Where do we stand on the refugee issue,” Viveash said in an interview.

“There have been long-standing government positions on all of those issues. But I haven’t seen them reaffirmed or reiterated by the Harper government,” he said.

The Israeli ambassador is hoping that Harper, like world leaders who have visited before him, takes away a new perspective of Israel’s security situation. The country is smaller than Vancouver Island and surrounded by nations it has battled with over its history.

Indeed, Harper’s visit to the Hula Valley in northern Israel and the bird sanctuary that will one day bear his name bears that out. A short distance to the west and north is Lebanon; to the east, Syria and the Golan Heights captured by Israel in the 1967 war.

Barak says Israelis live daily with the ever-present security worries.

“We live in two worlds, in a way. We feel a little bit schizophrenic. We live in a very difficult region with challenges, existential challenges to us as a democracy, the only democracy in the region,” Barak said.

“This is part of our security challenges. This is one half. The other half is the normal life that we try to keep on going. We try to be a normal country,” he said.

Read more about: