“Antisemitic mobs take to the street shouting, ‘From Palestine to Lebanon, Israel will soon be gone.’ … Will the government clearly and unequivocally condemn these genocidal chants from hateful mobs on our streets?”
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre asked this question of Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly in the House of Commons on Oct. 7, the first anniversary of the most heinous attack on Jews since the Holocaust. On that day, Hamas terrorists invaded Israel, raped and murdered around 1,200 people and kidnapped over 250. Ever since, they have been busy spreading antisemitism, including on the streets of Canada.
Joly responded by reading the names of hostages whose families she met with and pledged: “To Jewish people, we stand with you, we won’t relent until the last hostage returns home.” But she did not answer Poilievre’s question. So, he asked it again and received a similar non-answer from Justice Minister Arif Virani.
Poilievre then accused Joly of continuing to “pander to Hamas supporters” to bolster her chances for the leadership of the Liberal party. Predictably, all hell broke loose. Outside the chamber, Joly fumed that Poilievre was politicizing the day and that, “You don’t frickin’ gaslight people.”
So why has she and her government gaslit Canadians for an entire year? Indeed, since the October 7 massacre, this government has propagated a moral equivalence between antisemitism and Islamophobia. It cannot denounce one without denouncing the other. But they are not the same. And it is important to understand the difference.
Antisemitism is defined as discrimination against, or hostility toward, Jews, but often manifests as opposition to the very existence of Jews. The term was coined in Germany in 1879, but the hatred dates back to biblical times, when Jews were accused by Christians of killing Jesus. After being expelled from the Land of Israel, Jews were persecuted wherever they settled, with the worst atrocity being the Holocaust, in which six-million Jews were slaughtered by Nazi Germany and its allies.
The term “Islamophobia” originated in the early 20th century, but became commonly used after Sept. 11, 2001, when al-Qaida terrorists slammed planes into the Twin Towers in New York City and killed nearly 3,000 people. Those attacks were followed by a surge of assaults on mosques, schools and individuals, and in 2004, United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan said the word “Islamophobia” had to be coined to “take account of increasingly widespread bigotry.”
Islamophobia literally means “fear of Islam,” and is considered an irrational fear. But Islamic terrorists like Hamas want people to fear them. Their goal is not to live in peace, but to impose their fundamentalist way of thinking across the Middle East — and the West, too.
They want Jews to be afraid. Why else would their disciples shout “go back to Europe” and “do not negotiate with Israel, except with the gun” outside a Jewish seniors’ home in Ottawa? Why would they shoot bullets into the windows of Jewish day schools in Toronto, or march through Jewish neighbourhoods calling for the destruction of Israel?
Worse yet, since October 7, Hamas has co-opted legions of everyday people to its cause, both Muslim and non-Muslim. Union leaders like Fred Hahn post anti-Israel screeds on social media. Crowds picket and deface Jewish-owned businesses such as Indigo and Cafe Landwer. Teachers took schoolchildren on a “field trip” that included an anti-Israel march.
We don’t see pro-Israel marches terrorizing predominantly Muslim neighbourhoods. We don’t see them picketing Muslim businesses. We don’t see them attempting to sow fear. So why won’t Liberals acknowledge the difference? Why won’t they call out this blatant antisemitism and do something about it?
The answer is votes. Through their moral equivalency, the Liberals want to preserve the electoral support of both the 400,000 Jews and 1.8-million Muslims in this country. Unsurprisingly, this hasn’t worked. Jewish voters in the recent Toronto—St. Paul’s byelection defected to the Conservatives, while Muslim voters are increasingly leaning toward the NDP.
Joly is right about one thing: Canadians don’t need gaslighting. They need politicians willing to shine a light on cold, hard truths, take a stand and say “never again.”
Postmedia Network
Tasha Kheiriddin is Postmedia’s national politics columnist.