Carney’s Speech On Anti-Semitism – Nothing Changes

Friends, like many of you I was anticipating Canadian PM Mark Carney’s speech on anti-semitism today with anger and anxiety and some residual hope for improvement.  He did not mention Israel once!  Wonder why?

Carney defended the right of any Canadian anywhere to criticize any country on any subject.  Which means we are probably in for much more Israel-bashing.  If the comments in the public gallery of the National Post are any guide (and this is a pro-Israel newspaper read by many Jewish Canadians), Zionists and Jewish Canadians are in big trouble.  I almost wish our chattering classes and media would stop talking about anti-semitism.  They usually make it worse and invite harassment and copy cat attacks.

Canadians (including the talking heads and ‘explainers’ at the CBC) seem to be okay with condemning anti-semitism, but not anti-Israel sentiment and murderous anti-Zionist and pro-terrorist statements and hate crimes rationalized by opposition to Israel’s military actions and policies, or its very existence.  It’s hard to tell sometimes.  They don’t even call Islamist terrorists threatening Canada and western democracies by name.  They are ‘militants’.  Or misunderstood victims of Islamophobia.  Or something.  God help us.

In any case our human rights law protects freedom of conscience and speech and protects equality rights on grounds of ethnicity, creed, conscience, and national origin.  That includes Israeli Canadians, Jewish Canadians, and Zionists.  Make a note.  Before we sue for reparations.  I mean it.

For those who missed PM Carney’s speech, here it is in its entirety.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/carney-canada-failing-jewish-canadians-9.7219707

To give Carney credit, it was a well written and smoothly presented speech.  This is a man who is good at giving international speeches.  But, as the social and legal theorist Jurgen Habermas observed, in late capitalist welfare states in crisis (in which hate crimes against vulnerable minorities can be expected to increase), the important thing for government officials is to give the APPEARANCE of doing something to solve systemic problems, rather than actually solving them. This placates the electorate.

Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre came out swinging hours before Carney’s clearly choreographed and graciously received appearance at Toronto’s Holy Blossom Temple.

Poilievre suggested in a press conference on Parliament Hill that Carney owed Jewish Canadians and all Canadians a big apology for allowing conditions to deteriorate to the point that Jews are at risk in Canada, and urged our government to strengthen immigration scrutiny at our borders, to deport known terrorists in Canada, and to toughen our criminal laws and enforce them to ensure the safety of all Canadians, and Jewish Canadians at particular risk.  Poilievre also noted Carney’s record of speaking in different voices with different messages to audiences in synagogues and mosques.  Here is that link:

https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/video/9.7219183

Carney’s strategy seemed to play best with those like CIJA and the uptown Jews who have been co-opted into the Liberal Party and its new cross-cultural roundtable under the leadership of former Liberal Senator and well known Jewish community activist Marc Gold, under the direction of Canadian Liberal Minister of Culture and Heritage Marc Miller.  CIJA suggested in an interview with the National Post that the Prime Minister has the symbolic authority to demand action on antisemitism in Canada, and that his leadership SHOULD lead to concrete action.  From their mouths to God’s ears, as they say.

Here is the latest report from the National Post:

https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/carney-antisemitism-hate-canada

CIJA has been ineffective in its government lobbying for many years.  I regard them as the Judenrate.  They have regularly sold out individual Jews at risk in our communities in favor of their institutional agendas.  They continue to put Jews at risk in their obsolete efforts to ‘engage positively’ with cross-cultural communities on campus and in the LGBTQ community and to exploit well-meaning Jewish Canadians as PR pawns for Israel.  I avoid them.

The speech Carney delivered was very articulate, and hit all the major points one would expect – his visits to a Chabad synagogue in Ottawa, the Bondi Beach massacre, mention of the Holocaust and the sorry history of anti-semitism in Canada (which is caused by non-Jews in Canada), the turning away of the St. Louis, a commitment of $75 million to aid Jewish community security measures, as well as his statement that our civic compact has betrayed Jewish Canadians.

PM Carney called on all Canadians to stand up for Jews and stand against anti-semitism.  He even made reference to the IHRA definition of anti-semitism (rejected by anti-Israel activists) and quoted Eli Wiesel’s famous line that the opposite of love is not hate but indifference.

Newsflash.  Jewish Canadians are our highest educated, most literate, most liberated, and most economically productive demographic.  By allowing Jewish Canadians to be marginalized and victimized, Canadians are only impoverishing themselves.  We are already in a recession.  Canadians have yet to stand up for Jews meaningfully, and still don’t understand anti-Israel antisemitism.  Some of them believe anti-semitism and hate crimes are justified in protest of Israel’s military actions.

To my friends in Israel, I would note that I marked Carney’s speech by purchasing another Israel Bond, but I share the views of many Jewish Canadians and Jews around the world who wish Israel would gain a sense of international optics.  Your government and its army continue to put us at risk.  Please stop embarrassing us.  You make our lives much harder in Canada.

In his political theory, Jean-Jacques Rousseau distinguished between amour-propre (the love of propriety and honours and status found in civil society) and amour-soi (the healthy survival instinct and humble self-preservation of animals in the state of nature).

I would suggest that Carney’s smoothly executed speech was well suited to the uptown crowd in Forest Hill’s Holy Blossom Temple (many of whom are prominent Liberal supporters), but it remains to be seen how well it will convince average Jewish Canadians at risk.

As I have said before, I will believe in these Liberal government initiatives when I see the real results in terms of better community security and decreasing hate crimes and domestic terrorism and better enforcement of our existing laws.  If Mr. Carney means what he says, I as a Jewish Canadian am free to criticize our government, and Mr. Carney too, and that makes me no less Canadian than him.  More of us should pay critical attention rather than fawning on our Prime Minister and toadying Jewish Liberal MPs, grateful for any crumbs of recognition of the daily risks we face of harassment and hate crimes.

Meanwhile, I will continue to wear my Star of David necklace inside my shirt and keep a low profile and remain mindful of my security.  I would suggest you do the same.  Talk is cheap.  Actions speak louder than words, and the actions and track record of PM Carney and our Foreign Minister and their bureaucrats have spoken very loudly.

Stay well and strong.  Am Yisrael Chai.  We send our love from Canada.