Chris Selly posted his opinion on free speech in an article he wrote for the National Post. He is a regular contributor. His article is about “how capricious, self-serving and addlepated governments often are when dealing with rights.”
After discussing conflicting rights regarding the wearing of motorcycle helmets and the new policies regarding free speech at universities he wrote:
“Doug Ford is, after all, the guy who promised to ban Al Quds Day celebrations, where anti-Semitic speakers have been known to flirt with Canada’s hate speech laws.
“Blatantly racist or anti-Semitic ideology should never be permitted on the grounds of the Legislative Assembly of Ontario, or anywhere else in our province,” Ford tweeted. But neither racism nor anti-Semitism is remotely illegal. And crucially, in Canada, we punish speech after it happens, and only if it meets a high bar in the Criminal Code. We don’t ban free speech in advance because we’re afraid of it; that’s precisely what Ford’s government claims to want to prevent on campuses. If his government intends to micromanage this file, I can easily see the whole thing melting down into a hot mess of vexatious complaints and political stunts that leaves everyone worse off”.
So it is OK for Elias Hazineh, former President of Palestine House, to scream these words, an ultimatum to Israelis (Jews), loud and clear to a cheering crowd of 400 at the annual al-Quds Day from the Ontario legislature Toronto, Saturday, August 3, 2013?
“You have to leave Jerusalem. You have to leave Palestine.
“We say get out or you’re dead! We give them two minutes and then we start shooting. And that’s the only way that they will understand.”
What would happen if a Jewish group went out into the streets and called for death to the Muslims in Jerusalem?
From Al Quds Day 2018 in Toronto.
An eyewitness at the Parade reported that there were calls for “Death to Israel” in Persian. Another speaker praised Hezbollah and the Assad Regime. Another called for the collapse of the Zionist regime and the American Empire.
Canada listed Hezbollah as a terrorist organization in 2002 and currently has a no-contact policy with its members,” Global Affairs Canada spokesperson Rachna Mishra wrote in an email statement.
But it is OK to fly Hezbollah symbols in Canada as we saw in the Al Quds Day parade in Toronto 2018?
Look at this video; look at the symbolism, comparing the Jews to the Nazis. This is the total dehumanization of the Jewish state,a repeat of Nazi teachings.
In 2017 the Police were called in to investigate the antisemitic lyrics of a song that was played at the Al Quds day rally.
The translated lyrics to the song, Declare It A Popular Revolution, in part say:
“With a Palestinian woman (armed with a knife) we defeated them”… “fill (the bottle) to the top with gasoline, and snatch from him the M-16”…“stab whoever you see, five, six, ten, twelve.”
“Declare a popular revolution,” the lyrics continue… “Make us happy with bombing the bus” and then “cut off (their heads), stab (them), run over (them), launch an attack on them.”
What would happen if Jews played songs like this about Muslims?
And apparently it is not wrong for teachers to share their hatred for Jews. Mississauga Catholic elementary teacher, Nadia Shoufani, was temporarily suspended with pay for spewing anti-Israel rhetoric at the 2016 Al-Quds Day hatefest and urging attendees to “support the resistance (against Israel) in any form imaginable.” On her Facebook account she also expressed “glory to the martyrs” — including a member of a known terrorist organization who smashed the head of a four-year-old Israeli girl on beach rocks.
In her al-Meshwar article, she contends that despite the “racist discrimination” to which she’s been exposed, they (her Zionist oppressors) “did not succeed in breaking the power of resistance” within her.
Shoufani ended her lengthy article by vowing to continue to expose “the crimes of the occupation” and to continue the work of “boycotting, imposing sanctions and divesting from the usurper Zionist entity.”
She also makes it quite clear that she will not stop quoting the words of Ghassan Kanafani, a leader of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, defined by the Canadian government as a banned terrorist group.
In 2016, keynote Al Quds speaker, Ali Mallah,stated that Palestinians “…have the right to resist their occupation by any means necessary.” He added: “In the United States, if somebody makes a mistake and walks into somebody’s home he will be shot, right? Here in Canada, if somebody attacks us we will attack and shoot them, alright? So why is it is okay then to occupy Palestinian land and oppress Palestinian people?”
Mallah is a former member of both the federal and Ontario NDP Executives and is a prominent member of the Canadian-Arab community, having served as the Ontario Vice-President of the Canadian Arab Federation (CAF). That organization had its federal funding stripped by Ottawa in 2014 due to its promotion of antisemitism and praise for terrorist organizations such as Hamas and Hezbollah. CAF appealed this decision all the way to the Supreme Court, which declined to hear the case in March, 2014.
Can you imagine the outcry if Jewish people stood up and condemned the actions of Muslims? Oh wait. The Jewish Defense League has been called a racist organization. A “fringe hate group.” For supporting Jewish causes and Israel as a Jewish state.
The Southern Poverty Law Centre (SPLC) has written,
“The Jewish Defense League (JDL) is a radical organization that preaches a violent form of anti-Arab, Jewish nationalism. Its late founder, Rabbi Meir Kahane, claimed that Jews face fierce anti-Semitism domestically and abroad and must protect themselves by any means necessary.”
And “The JDL’s position with regard to Israel is denial of any Palestinian claims to land and the calling for the removal of all Arabs from the “Jewish-inherited soil.”
This is a crime!
But it isn’t a crime to call for the eradication of the Jewish state or the ethnic cleansing of all Jews from Israel.
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau told the CBC in January 2016:
“Islam is not incompatible with Western secular democracy.”
He has not retracted that statement.
As far as I am aware there have been no arrests. Nothing. These actions and words do not rise to Selley’s high bar nor the high bar in the Criminal Code regarding hate speech?
So when does free speech become hate speech?
From the Ethics of the Fathers: “Rabbi Tarfon used to say, it is not incumbent upon you to complete the task, but you are not exempt from undertaking it.”
