Of course, this has been the headline news of the last couple of days, so there is no shortage of reaction, finger-pointing, and laying blame.

…in my view, the problem with responding to news of tragedy with policy ideas right away is that we tend not to realize in such situations how often our “proposals” are really expressions of psychological need. It’s human nature to respond to tragedy by fitting it into our preexisting worldviews; we instinctively restore order by construing the tragic event as a confirmation of our sense of the world rather than a threat to it.

This means that often we won’t pay a lot of attention to the details of tragedies and what caused them. We’ll just know deep down inside what happened, and what caused it, and how to stop it next time. Take [yesterday's] tragic events at VA Tech. If you’re committed to gun control, the tragedy probably proves to you that there are too many guns; if you’re against gun control, the tragedy probably proves the exact opposite. Given that people will tend to see in events what they want to see, turning to policy right away will come off as rudely “playing politics” to those who don’t share your worldview. And obviously this doesn’t foster a helpful environment for policymaking, either.

(Via Damian P., who points out that “the responsibility rests with one man”).

This pretty much echoes what I wrote after the shooting at Dawson last September. It’s tragic enough as-is; the finger-pointing and agenda pushing only makes it worse.

For the second year running, copies of Concordia University’s student newspaper, The Link, vanished overnight at the height of the campaign for a new student government. And while editor-in-chief Misha Warbanski doesn’t know who to blame, she’s sure of one thing — this is no coincidence.

Back when I was a student there, the Link was blatantly biased, being controlled by pro-Palestinian students who would get involved in the paper with an eye towards influencing campus politics through the media. I don’t know the current landscape, but if today’s campus politics are anything like what they were then, the things reported by the campus and mainstream media are only the tips of the iceberg. Corruption, dirty tricks, propaganda, “joke slates” designed to slander the opposition, and the ever-present ripping down posters are just some of the things that students seem to confuse with democracy.

I must say I’m glad to be out of there.

And that pretty much says it all.

Update – 3:45pm: It’s gone now, less than an hour later, replaced with a real – albeit preliminary – Wiki-page devoted to this now-infamous jerk. That’s more attention than he deserves. But the above screenshot is what was up there as of 2:20pm when I posted it. You’ll just have to take my word for the fact that it was a real screenshot and not photoshopped in any way. Personally, I think they should’ve left it that way. But that’s just me.

The young woman who succumbed to her injuries has been identified as Anastasia DeSousa. She was only 18 years old. Six more people are still in critical condition this morning, and hospital sources say that two of them are still “fighting for their lives”. My thoughts are with all their families this morning.

Also, we have more information about the shooter. He has been identified by the press as 25-year-old Kimveer Gill of Laval, a devotee of guns, the colour black, trench coats, death metal and – as many of you will have heard – blogging. In fact, he posted an entry on his blog less than two hours before going on the shooting rampage. No, I won’t post a link; it’s already hard enough to realize that these 15 minutes of fame were exactly what he was after. But here’s what news reports are saying:

In his profile on vampirefreaks.com, a website devoted to goth culture, Gill calls himself “Trench,” saying: “You will come to know him as the Angel of Death.”

“Work sucks… School sucks… Life sucks… What else can I say,” he writes. “Metal and Goth kick ass. Life is like a video game, you gotta die sometime.”

A photo gallery that accompanies the profile includes photos that show Gill brandishing a Barretta CX4 Storm semi-automatic rifle. In the last seven photos, he is wearing a black trench coat and holding the rifle. The caption below the last photo reads: “Ready for Action.”

Now he’s ready for nothing but infamy… and autopsy. Police are expecting their investigation to determine conclusively whether the bullet that actually killed him was shot by police or was, as has been widely speculated, self-inflicted.

What else is there to say about such a senseless tragedy? For the wounded, still fighting for their lives in hospital, we can only hope and pray. For the students and people who were in the building, shaken and in shock, we can only do whatever we can to offer support and understanding.

The politicos will point fingers, as they usually do, and I’m sure we’ll hear a lot of tough talk about increasing security (hard to do in a large public campus) and cracking down on guns (bring it on, but could that really have prevented anything?). Meanwhile, the rest of us need to go on with our daily lives, because one crazed gunman has already done more than enough damage.

But I must say I’m a little uncomfortable with the trauma-induced traffic spike thing. I know it’s a fact of life on the blogosphere, but I sort of feel funny about the idea of profiting from such a terrible tragedy. Luckily I don’t make any money from this blog, so I guess I can’t feel too guilty.

Anyway, here’s a roundup of the facts as they currently stand (as of 9:45pm):

Who? One shooter, it seems. There was strong, widespread speculation of a second shooter, but police at first refused to confirm this and now seem to be denying it outright. Reports of three or even four shooters seem to have been false. We know there’s an ongoing investigation.

The shooter’s identity is not yet known, but he has been described by many of the witnesses fairly consistently: white male, early 20s, long black hair, black trench coat, shaved head and mohawk, lots of piercings, possibly wearing black army fatigues.

There appear to have been approximately 20 people wounded, one of which has now been confirmed dead – a woman in her early 20s. Others are in critical condition at various hospitals and are being operated on.

What? The shooter seems to have opened fire first outside Dawson’s main building, wounding several students. He then headed inside to the atrium and opened fire again.

There were conflicting reports of how the shooter died, but it now appears to be confirmed that he was shot and killed by police officers on the scene.

Where? Dawson College is located in the western part of downtown Montreal, across from Alexis-Nihon plaza and connected to Atwater metro station. It’s also across from where the old Forum used to be, for those of you who are familiar with pre-90s Montreal tourist landmarks.

When? The whole thing seems to have started around 12:45pm and it took nearly 2 hours for the building to be evacuated of students. The investigation is still ongoing and details are still emerging.

Why? That’s the biggie, and the one we haven’t even begun to answer yet. By all accounts, it was the work of one lone, disturbed gunman. Please see below before speculating or putting together conspiracy theories.

I’ll try to keep everyone posted as more details emerge.

To everyone out there trying to use today’s shooting at Dawson to further their own political agenda, whether it concerns gun registries or separatism or mideast politics or Michael Moore or law enforcement funding or student psychological services or the price of tea in India…

Please, please, can you give it a rest?

We don’t know the motive of the shooter or shooters. We don’t know the condition of the victims. We don’t know what it all means. In all likelihood, this was a senseless tragedy, with no-one to blame but the shooters and no agenda to push besides trying to help everyone cope as best as we can.

When we know more, then you can spin the facts all you like. I might even read it.

But in the meantime, please, everyone, take a breath. Thank you.

The relative popularities and reputations of the schools tend to go in cycles, and in my year, Dawson was “in” and Vanier was “out”. Dawson, with its fancy new sports complex, coveted “Reflections” program with couches and coffee, and cool downtown location, was where it was all happening. Marianopolis was the other choice, for the “brains” or the “nerds”, but Vanier was having an “out” year for people bored with Ville St-Laurent and unimpressed with its aging building (since renovated). Abbott was too far out and, for most of us west-islanders, located in the wrong direction from the action.

I was undecided. Dawson or Marianopolis? Marianopolis or Dawson? I toured both schools (and toured Vanier as well, but if I recall correctly, that was just to get out of doing an oral presentation in Hebrew class that I’d forgotten to prepare for). March rolled around and I still couldn’t choose, so I flipped a coin. Literally. Marianopolis it was.

No regrets, either. I still consider cegep to be the best two years of my life. Many of my current friends today are people I met in cegep or people I met through them. The classes didn’t suck, the teachers actually seemed like they wanted to be there, and so did a lot of the students. And, unlike the students stuck in science, us commerce students put the school’s brainiac reputation to shame; we spent more time on the windowsills or in the coffee shop than in class, easily. Mostly, I had fun there.

But there was always an ongoing rivalry between Marianopolis, the “up the hill”, snobby, preppy private school, and Dawson, the “down the hill”, big, cosmopolitan public school. Really, they were only a few minutes’ walk apart, and we used to regularly go back and forth to visit our friends, or head down to Atwater to shop or use the metro. Dawson was very much a part of our lives.

So were jokes about Dawson. Ever ask a Marianopolis student how many first-year Dawson social science students it takes to change a lightbulb? The answer: that’s a second-year course at Dawson. And they had plenty of jokes about us, too. That we were run by nuns. That we hadn’t heard of lightbulbs cause we were too busy studying. The t-shirts at Dawson’s store read “Friends don’t let friends go to Marianopolis”. (The t-shirts at Marianopolis didn’t read anything at all, cause we didn’t actually have a store). Three years later, my sister chose Dawson and had a good time, and liked to tease me about having gone to Marianopolis and missing out on the unique opportunities offered by having a school located in a mall. Yep, the friendly rivalry between the two schools was as much a fact of life as assignments and exams.

Ultimately, though, the differences between our schools were superficial. Most of us enjoyed our cegep experience, we were all friends with each other, and many of us met up again in the same classes and programs at Concordia or McGill.

So to Dawson students and grads, I just want to say, as a Marianopolis alum, we’re really nothing but two sides of the same coin. And that today’s events could have happened to any of us.

Apparently, there’s been a shooting at Dawson College. Nobody quite knows what happened yet. Apparently, a gunman entered the cafeteria and opened fire. The online reports are saying at least two people were shot, the radio reports are saying at least four.

More details to follow as they become available.

Update: It’s been about an hour since the whole thing started, and according to radio reports, many students are still inside the building. One caller said he spoke to his daughter on her cell phone, and she said they’re hiding behind lockers. There still appears to be massive confusion.

Update #2: They’re now reporting that the shooter was a 22-year-old student and he was wearing – you guessed it – a long black trench coat.

Update #3: Latest police updates are saying that the shooter is still inside the building, barricaded. Police are apparently still trying to get as many students out as possible, but a hostage situation is looking more likely.

Update #4: Students are calling into the radio from their cell phones now, saying that students still in the building are hiding out and waiting for the police to secure the building to get them out. Witnesses are saying that the gunman started shooting outside the building first, and then went inside and opened fire again.

Update #5: There’s now speculation that there was more than one gunman. Some reports are saying there were two or even three different gunmen. These reports are unconfirmed at this time. Another report speculates that one of the gunmen may have shot himself. Again, unconfirmed.

Also, students who have gotten out of Dawson’s building are being advised to walk down to Concordia’s Hall Building, as the student union is setting up assistance for anyone who needs it. Concordia as a safe haven… go figure.

Update #6: Just got in touch with Marieke, who is thankfully out of the building and safe. I only spoke with her for two seconds because everyone she knows is calling her, but she said she had just left the cafeteria before it happened.

Update – 2:30pm: CBC’s television report is saying that RDI is reporting that two gunmen are now dead – one shot by police, one having committed suicide.

Also, CTV is reporting that one of the gunmen seemed to be chasing someone in particular. Though CBC is still saying eyewitnesses are reporting that it appeared to be random.

Now, they’re reporting that pretty much everyone is out of the building.

Update – 2:35pm: Police hotlines have been set up for parents and friends looking for information at 514-280-2880 or 514-280-2806.

Update – 2:40pm: RDI is now reporting that 4 people have been killed and 16 injured. Wire reports are saying that there may be a third suspect. Also, metro service on the green line has been suspended.

Update – 2:45pm: More details are emerging. The shooters are being described as having long black hair, piercings and long black trench coats. There may be a third shooter still at large.

For anyone reading this from outside Quebec who is wondering about the cegep system, cegep is basically an intermediary step between high school and university. Most of the students are about 16-19 years old, since the pre-university programs are usually 2-year programs that are roughly the equivalent of grades 12 and 13. There are also a large number of 3-year technical programs in fields such as nursing, photography, design and such, so there are many older students too. Dawson is one of the three major public English-language cegeps in Montreal, and about 10,000 students attend classes there. It’s located in the middle of the western part of downtown Montreal, attached to Atwater metro station and Alexis-Nihon plaza and across the street from where the old Forum was. Pretty much everyone knows someone who either goes to Dawson or went to Dawson, and understandably everyone is utterly shocked.

Update – 3:05pm: CTV now has it online that police are confirming that two shooters are dead – one by suicide, one shot by police. CBC’s television report just said that police had been crouched in the bushes outside Dawson, next to a nearby daycare center, chasing what may have been a third gunman.

The whole area is cordoned off to traffic and people are telling me that traffic elsewhere is crazy, so if you don’t have to drive near the western part of downtown right now, don’t.

Update – 3:30pm: Conflicting reports on the number of dead and injured. CJAD radio is reporting no deaths and 16 injuries. Global TV is saying at least two deaths. RDI is still saying four. CBC Newsworld just reported that 15 people have been admitted to the Montreal General Hospital, and of those, 6 are critically injured, 2 are seriously injured and the remaining 7 are stable.

Update – 3:45pm: Amazing to see Concordia Student Union students on television for something non-controversial for a change. One of the CSU VPs is on television and he is urging all Dawson students in the area to walk down the street to Concordia’s Hall Building for food and drink, counseling, support and a central location to organize people and find out about their friends.

Update – 3:55pm: The latest police statement says that a suspect has been “neutralized”, that they’re still worried there might be another suspect in the area, and that everyone is out of the building, there are no hostages. Still no more information about the suspect or suspects.

By the way, if you’re looking for info on Dawson’s website, don’t bother; it’s very slow (because so many people are logging on) but there isn’t anything updated on there at the moment. You’re probably better off checking with the media, the police hotlines, or calling people directly.

Update – 4:00pm: CBC is reporting that police are confirming that, contrary to previous reports, there was only one gunman. Still waiting on confirmation of that.

Update – 4:05pm: A statement on the Montreal police website now says a third hotline number has been set up, at 514-280-2805. The Montreal General Hospital also has a hotline in place for anyone concerned about injured relatives at 514-843-2839.

Also, metro service is reportedly restored on the green line, but trains are not stopping at Atwater; they’re merely bypassing the station.

Update – 4:20pm: CBC has photos from the scene.

Update – 4:35pm: The General is hosting a press conference live right now, and it’s being carried by all the media outlets. (The local CTV affiliate has even pre-empted Oprah to cover the story!) Anyway, the hospital spokesperson is saying that they have 11 patients that have been brought to the emergency room, and of those, 8 are in critical condition, 3 are currently in the operating room and 3 more will be operated on.

All of the injured are described as having suffered gunshot wounds to various locations – some to the abdomen, some to the chest, some to the limbs and one head wound. Presumably, the one patient with the head wound is among those in critical condition.

They’ve said that 3 more patients were sent to Jean-Talon hospital, and 1 or 2 more to the Jewish General Hospital.

Update – 4:38pm: A police news conference is also going on right now. For now, they’re only confirming news about one suspect, who died “following intervention of police officers”. They haven’t confirmed or denied the existence of other suspect(s), and they aren’t saying anything about what the suspect’s motive or motives may have been.

Update – 4:50pm: Just to give you an idea of how uncommon it is to hear gunshots in Montreal, CBC is interviewing one student who said she was in the other cafeteria at the time when they first heard the shots, and that for about 10 minutes afterwards, people just continued doing whatever they were doing before, because nobody actually realized they were gunshots until someone ran into the room screaming at them to get out. She said everyone assumed it was a joke, or fireworks, or just a random loud noise.

Update – 5:00pm: All the conflicting reports are finally starting to be constructed into a vague timeline. It seems a gunman first approached a group of students outside Dawson, on the street, who were hanging out or having a smoke, and opened fire, shooting at least 4 people. He then went into the building, proceeded to the Atrium and the Cafeteria, told everyone to get down, and randomnly opened fire. At least 20 people were injured, and the gunman is now dead, either having been shot by police or having shot himself.

Students rushed to exit the building, and some barricaded themselves in classrooms or hid wherever they could. It took well over an hour for everyone to be evacuated.

The shooter has been described as a 19-year-old white male, with long slicked-back black hair, a black trench coat and/or dark army fatigues, with tattoos and piercings, and using what has been alternately described as a sniper’s rifle, a semi-automatic weapon, or an automatic weapon.

Police were searching for other suspects, but though a second and perhaps even third shooter has been widely reported, they have only confirmed the existence of one shooter.

Update – 5:10pm – Of course, references all over the media to the Columbine school massacre, as well as, closer to home, to Marc Lepine and to Valery Fabrikant. It seems from the initial reports that the today’s episode bears more resemblance to the Columbine shootings and to the subsequent and oft-forgotten shooting at a high school in Taber, Alberta than to the previous Montreal shootings, but that probably won’t stop anyone from drawing parallels and from suggesting that school shootings are something of an epidemic here in Montreal, despite the rarity of these episodes.

Update – 5:30pm: A student eyewitness who was inside the atrium’s cafeteria at the time of the shooting just reported that the gunman had started shooting first with a handgun, and then he pulled out a semi-automatic rifle from his trench coat and loaded it and started shooting it. The witness sounded pretty confident about the type of guns used, though as I mentioned before, guns are pretty rare around here. A lot of people (myself included) probably don’t know much about guns besides what they see in the movies, so we may have to wait for more concrete confirmation about that.

Update – 5:56pm: The euphamisms are over; the police spokesperson confirmed in plain English that the gunman was shot and killed by police.

Update – 6:15pm: A college spokesperson just announced that Dawson will be closed until Monday, with all classes suspended.

Update – 6:19pm: CBC is reporting that one of the injured victims just died of her injuries. She was 20 years old. Hospital spokespeople are not confirming this just yet.

Update – 6:50pm: One student inside Dawson took a video with his cellphone of the police and the shooter. The quality is very poor and so far I’ve only seen it on CTV, but I’m sure the footage will show up online shortly. If so, I’ll post a link. (Update – 10:50pm – CNN has the video available here).

And the Gazette is now confirming the death of one of the victims, as reported above by CBC. Still no official confirmation, with all questions about the victims or the shooters being referred to the SQ. There are rumours that there will be another press conference later this evening.

Update – 8:25pm: Just spoke to Andrea, who’s a med student doing a surgery elective at the MGH right now. She wasn’t directly involved, but was nearby, assisting in an unrelated surgery, and said one of the doctors who was supposed to scrub in came into the room to say “sorry, can’t, all hell has broken loose”. Andrea spoke highly of the efficiency of the hospital staff in preparing to receive the shooting victims. “They had the OR’s cleared in literally 5 minutes,” she told me. Amazing.

According to the news, many of the patients are still in surgery or in treatment, and there won’t be any official updates until tomorrow morning on their condition.

Update – 8:45pm: Just got off the phone with my mom. She was also trying to reach people all afternoon, and assured me that my cousin managed to get out of the building and is safe and sound. Also, her boss’s son escaped but apparently one of his close friends was shot in the arm. Insane.

Update – 9:30pm: There’s little new news to report at the moment. I’m going to close off the live-blogging thread at this point. I’ll post future updates on a new thread as more news arrives.

With the largest population of Lebanese-Canadians on their doorstep, Concordia University in Montreal and the University of Montreal have reopened closed application processes to students stranded by the war in the Middle East.

The two Quebec universities say they are fast-tracking applications from students who had planned to attend institutions in Lebanon this fall.

“It’s important that the current generation still have access to education,” said Guy Berthiaume, vice-rector of development and alumni relations at the University of Montreal.

[ . . . ]

Since Friday, Berthiaume said they’ve received more than 100 calls, mostly from local Lebanese-Canadians and many who were recently evacuated from the war-torn region.

The university is waiving tuition for the exchange students and is also raising funds for them.

“They will need money to live, pay rent and buy food,” said Berthiaume.

Meanwhile, an Israeli-Canadian friend of mine is having trouble getting her student loan and bursary application sorted out, because her parents live in Haifa and they can’t send in a bunch of the related paperwork because they’re, you know, living in bomb shelters.

Don’t expect any special treatment or fast-tracking there, though.

The one-year program, which is financed by a new grant from the Council for Higher Education, offers math, English, Hebrew, computer and learning skills classes. Students who do well in the pre-college program according to criteria established by the college will be able to enroll in B.A. programs without taking the psychometric exam that is required of all potential university students in Israel.

Following the government’s decision to initiate a process for granting the College of Judea and Samaria the status of a university earlier this year, the college came under harsh criticism from individuals and groups of left-wing Israeli academics and political activists, who protested against granting university status to an institution they considered to be located on “a settlement in occupied land.”

The students, however, feel differently:

Traveling home on Monday afternoon from the College of Judea and Samaria, nineteen-year-old Majdi Karaki explained why he decided to commute a total of four hours a day, four times a week, from his home in the Ras El-Amud neighborhood of east Jerusalem to Ariel, where he enrolled this week in a special pre-college program for Arab students.

“Sure, some of my friends criticized me for my choice of school,” Karaki told The Jerusalem Post. “They asked me why I was going to study in the same college with Jewish settlers, but I just don’t care about what they say.”

[ . . . ]

Like others among the 300 Arab students currently enrolled in the college itself, however, Karaki said that a good, government-subsidized education, rather than politics, were his personal consideration when he decided to enroll.

“A friend of mine studies here, and I think this is one of the best colleges in Israel,” Karaki said.

“Arab students that come to study here are fulfilling a dream,” said Rifat Sweidan, who received a Masters in social work from Bar-Ilan University and is now the College of Judea and Samaria’s academic advisor for Arab students.

[ . . . ]

Cohen-Orgad also said that the college did not require its Arab students to hold Israeli citizenship. “The college’s charter says that it welcomes anyone whose deed or behavior does not counter the principles of Israel’s declaration of independence,” Cohen-Orgad said.

“The past four years have been very difficult ones,” he added. “But they passed without tensions between Arabs and Jews, and with an Israeli flag in every class and every lab.” Indeed, according to Sweidan, no Arab students have complained “of feeling racism or prejudice.”

Nobody’s arguing that the situation for Israeli Arabs is great. All agree that prejudice – in schools, in the job market – exists. But, in this example at least, it seems that there are people trying to actually do something to improve the situation… and then there are people attacking them for it. And they’re not the people you might expect.

Of course, the Palestinians are reacting predictably:

Meanwhile, Palestinian professor Sari Nusseibeh, who last week urged an end to the boycott, has been under attack by many Palestinians who have been calling for his dismissal from his job as president of Al-Quds University.

Several Palestinian political and academic groups issued statements strongly condemning Nusseibeh, accusing him of normalizing ties with Israel and acting against the interests of the Palestinian people.

Leaflets distributed in some areas in the West Bank and Gaza Strip branded the widely respected Nusseibeh a “traitor” and “collaborator.”

Nusseibeh co-signed a letter with the president of Hebrew University calling for an end to the AUT boycott, which is what some think was the deciding factor in the reversal. The letter called for “problems to be resolved through dialogue”. Needless to say, those passing out leaflets branding Nusseibeh as a “traitor” don’t agree with that statement.

(Hat tip: Lynn).

Prosecutors say a stabbing on a local college campus is a hate crime.

Police say Philip Robertson, 22, stabbed Jordyn Lavin behind a dorm at Plattsburgh State University in September.

According to court papers, Robertson went after Lavin because Lavin is Jewish.

Robertson is charged with attempted murder and assault as hate crimes, and is being held on $10,000 bail.

More details can be found in a campus report:

Plattsburgh State student Jordyn Lavin remembers walking behind Wilson Hall to smoke marijuana with his roommate, then feeling a knife pierce his back.

During a preliminary hearing Friday in Plattsburgh City Court, Lavin testified that his then roommate, Philip Robertson, accompanied him to a wooded area near the Saranac River the afternoon of Sept. 1.

Robertson handed Lavin a pipe and gave him permission to take the first hit, according to Lavin’s testimony.

“He walked behind me, and I felt pain,” Lavin said. “I could see the knife was in me.”

After that first stab wound, Robertson allegedly asked Lavin if he is Jewish, saying Lavin sounds like a Jewish last name.

Lavin replied that he is not Jewish.

Lavin and Robertson were apparently roommates and friends, so it’s hard to say what truly motivated this attack. Was this a symptom of the increasing virulent anti-Jewish sentiment on many college campuses, or an isolated incident of an unbalanced individual? Details are too sketchy to say at this point. But it’s certainly worth watching carefully.

Following on Concordia University’s decision last month to call off a speech by former Israeli prime minister Ehud Barak, the Universite du Quebec a Montreal yesterday cancelled an address by the U.S. ambassador to Canada, Paul Cellucci.

Cellucci was to have spoken at 2 p.m. yesterday at a conference organized by the Raoul Dandurand chair in strategic and diplomatic studies.

[ . . . ]

Nobody was able to say what the nature of the security risk was, but this week a group calling itself Bloquez l’empire (Block the Empire) sent out a statement by e-mail urging Montrealers to rally to “stop Cellucci from speaking.”

The University claimed that RCMP and US Security Officials recommended cancellation. But spokespeople from both deny that claim, and say the decision was made by the University.

The violence-rules contingent is crowing over their success:

Cellucci represents a regime whose ambitions to political and economic domination are expressed ruthlessly, but have the merit, at least, of being openly acknowledged. His legitimacy, especially after the concerns raised about election fraud in the US, should not be recognised. The only place Cellucci should be allowed to speak is before a tribunal, trying him for complicity with crimes against humanity.

The cancellation is a minor victory, and a little indication of what can be done – especially around the coming visit of Bush to Ottawa (30 November-1 December).

If this keeps up, it will kill free speech everywhere. Mob rule is being permitted far too much success. Eventually, only one viewpoint will be represented: that of the groups willing to resort to violence to suppress all speech besides theirs.

Concordia has set a very dangerous precedent. What people need to realize is that yesterday, it was an Israeli former PM who wasn’t allowed to speak. Today, it was a US ambassador. Tomorrow, it may be your speech that’s suppressed.

This is an issue that affects us all.

Nov. 5, 2004 — Media coverage of a statement issued by Federation CJA yesterday may have caused misunderstanding about Concordia’s position regarding inviting Ehud Barak to speak at Concordia. Concordia’s position has not changed and the university’s primary concern remains the safety and security of our students, faculty, staff and our guests.

As Dr. Lowy outlined in his update to the community of Oct. 25 and subsequent opinion page pieces in the Toronto Star, The Gazette and Le Devoir:

“Concordia is presently reviewing its physical plant and general environment. Changes recommended by experts will be considered so that all speakers can then be welcomed on campus. And this will be done in a timely fashion with an eye towards implementing the necessary changes this academic year. Until then, we will continue to hold off campus under Concordia auspices any event considered not secure in our present facilities. Freedom of expression will continue to be supported as it always has been at Concordia.”

This has been Concordia’s position and remains Concordia’s position.

The university is examining possible locations from a security viewpoint with the intent of making the necessary modifications so an event of this kind can be held with the proper level of security, dignity and respect that such a visit demands.

In the light of the work that remains to be done, this will certainly not be possible in this calendar year. The university will try to make this possible before the end of the academic year.

This is spin 101: try to please everybody and offend nobody by saying contradictory things in the same statement.

The fact is, Concordia initially said no to the Barak speech, citing security concerns. Now they’re saying they hope they can host him in the current academic year on campus. Whether they admit it or not, that’s a reversal. And the right thing to do. But I wish they weren’t so cowardly about admitting it.

Backtracking on a decision that fuelled a furor over free speech, Concordia University in Montreal has agreed to invite former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak to speak on its campus.

The university reached the decision after “extensive discussions” with Jewish community leaders, according to a press release yesterday. Concordia says it will welcome Mr. Barak once it can upgrade security in one of its buildings.

Federation CJA has applauded this decision, and I hope that the support that the university receives from the public will convince them that they are doing the right thing by allowing the former PM to speak.

Many students will be upset by this decision, and I can understand why. They don’t want more tensions, more headlines, or the risk of another riot. They just want the situation to calm down and go away.

But ultimately I believe that this is the right decision. I hope that the average student can understand the importance of defending free speech – not just for rioters, but for everyone.

If the murder of Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh had any kind of lesson, it’s that certain kinds of speech are very dangerous, because certain groups have ensured that this is so. Upon hearing that news, Damian had this reflection:

It’s worth remembering a scene in Martin Himel’s Global TV documentary, Jenin: Massacring Truth, in which a cartoonist for The Independent is asked about his cartoon showing Ariel Sharon eating a baby, and why he wouldn’t draw Arafat in such a manner. He responds, glibly, that “Jews don’t issue fatwas.”

Martin Himel, you will recall, was also behind the controversial documentary Confrontation at Concordia, about the 2002 Netanyahu riots.

The point here is that certain people are willing to resort to violence in order to shut down speech they disagree with. They cannot be allowed to succeed. Otherwise, they will grow bolder and bolder, until eventually the only speech permitted will be their point of view.

Concordia made the wrong decision at first. I believe that strongly. And their change of heart is a case of better late than never.

To all of you out there who may have written leaders or participated in the awareness campaign about this event, I believe you had an effect. Thank you.

To the students and alumni who will be upset or angered by this decision – including some members of a divided Hillel – please try to understand the larger implications of this decision, and realize that defence of free speech – while not always smooth – ultimately benefits us all.

And to anyone considering rioting: you may have thought you were victorious. This new decision proves you were wrong. If you disagree with Barak’s message, feel free to mount a peaceful protest. That’s what freedom of speech is all about. But I hope you think long and hard before resorting to violence again. That has absolutely no place in a free society.

Let’s be fair and truthful. We have not compromised freedom of speech by our decision regarding Mr. Barak. We simply do not have the facilities that allow us to hold this particular event in a safe environment without disrupting the normal academic activities on-campus or those of our neighbors whom we consider an important part of our community. Nevertheless, freedom of speech remains alive at Concordia University as does our responsibility for the security of the community.

To support that claim, they point to a number of “controversial Jewish and Arab speakers” who have been hosted on campus.

Sadly, they have once again missed the point. It’s not enough to claim that a few controversial speakers equals freedom of speech. True freedom doesn’t exist selectively. Hosting speakers who the rioters find “acceptable” and calling that freedom is, de facto, allowing the rioters to dictate what speech is allowed and what speech is not allowed.

Concordia made a bad choice, and now they’re trying to defend it with faulty logic.

Protesters rushed into a university building where Quebec Premier Jean Charest was scheduled to speak on Wednesday afternoon, forcing organizers to cancel the speech.

The premier had just entered the hall where he was scheduled to address a cultural conference when about 150 students crowded into the area and chanted slogans. The students were angry at recent government cuts to bursaries.

The sad thing is, these students didn’t even have to let their protest turn violent. They just had to mass and threaten violence… and the university decided they couldn’t risk it.

Here is solid evidence that violence – or even the mere threat thereof – works like a charm in shutting down any viewpoints they oppose. This isn’t just about Israel, it’s about any kind of free speech… and the evidence took less than two days to appear.

From the Gazette:

“We were pleased to hear,” Lowy told us, “that it was Barak who was invited. Barak is quite different from Netanyahu. We were surprised to learn that there wasn’t a distinction made,” by some Muslim students and their allies.

Oh really? Then Concordia’s “risk-assessment team” is in for more surprises each time the extremists who won another round this week decide to escalate. How long will it be until some hapless professor who happens to be Jewish is deemed “a provocation” or “offensive” or “a supporter of war criminals”? When that happens will Concordia cave in again? No? Then why cave in this time?

From the Globe and Mail (subscription required):

Concordia University in Montreal has handed a stunning victory to the forces of violence and intimidation. By refusing to allow Ehud Barak, a former Israeli prime minister, to give a speech on campus, it has in effect handed a veto over free speech to those who would riot to make a point.

And from Monday’s Toronto Star:

But forced silence on controversial issues is a much greater threat to the university than protesters ever could be. By supplanting freedom of speech by forced silence, Concordia’s administrators have made a mockery of the university’s motto: “Real education for the real world.”

Almost two years after a violent demonstration outside Montreal’s Concordia University against former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, there was another protest.

Only this time, it was more vocal than violent.

About two hundred people staged a peaceful demonstration outside the university’s downtown campus Tuesday.

They were protesting the administration’s decision not to allow a speech by another former Israeli prime minister Ehud Barak.

I’m sure we’ll be seeing lots more on the 6 o’ clock news. This story was just a placeholder. But even in its brevity, it says a lot.

Hillel holds peaceful protests. The right to free speech in Canada incorporates – and in fact, depends on – the right to peaceful protest.

But when the line is crossed into violence, protest becomes thuggery. That’s what happened when Netanyahu came to speak.

And now, Barak is denied his right to speak because of the fear of a repeat of the violence of the 2002 Netanyahu riots. SPHR has succeeded in shutting down any speech it doesn’t like at Concordia, through the use of violence.

But when speakers came who Hillel disagreed with, they protested peacefully. So speakers continue to come who Hillel disagrees with.

In other words, the viewpoint that the violent thugs agree with gets to be heard. But the viewpoint that the peaceful demonstrators agree with gets shut down.

Concordia is sending a strong message here: violence works. Who will be the next groups to employ SPHR’s tactics to muzzle speech they don’t like?

That’s why this isn’t just an issue for pro-Israel or pro-Palestinian students. It’s not just an issue for Concordia students. It’s an issue for all Montrealers, all Canadians, and all people committed to democracy. We cannot let violence win.

“A small group of thugs are holding an entire university community hostage and deciding who is allowed to speak and who is not. All people who value democratic principles such as freedom of expression and speech should share our outrage with this intolerable situation.” – co-Presidents Jason Portnoy and Yacov Fruchter, in a press release.

“That peace that we all felt at Concordia was a Band-Aid. This was not resolved.” – Jason Portnoy, co-President, as reported by CTV news.

“I am truly embarrassed by such failures in a democracy in the 21st century. I am afraid to ask, but if my fellow students are not interested in free speech and inquiry for all of us on campus, regardless of a speaker’s political opinions, than what exactly are we learning at school?” – Tal Elharrar, in an opinion piece in today’s Link

Federation CJA:

“This is a day of great sadness for those who value freedom of expression in our universities and in Canadian society. Concordia University has allowed itself to be taken hostage by a small and violent group within its campus. With this decision, Concordia has demonstrated that the right to free speech is only as strong as the institutional will to protect it.” – Sylvain Abitbol, President, in a statement.

The university administration:

“It is unfortunate, but a reality nonetheless, that the safety of its community members and guests must occupy a central position in planning events at an institution dedicated to free speech.” – Concordia vice-president Michael Di Grappa, in a press release.

SPHR:

“It’s a matter of Canada respecting its own laws. You don’t allow someone into the country who’s an accused war criminal. [ . . . ] Bringing (Barak) to campus would have shown a general disregard for a very large number of people who don’t want him to speak.” – Erik Yingling, SPHR, in today’s Gazette

“He is a war criminal and he shouldn’t be allowed to speak at a public institution like Concordia. Free speech is not unlimited in Canada. I’m glad they learned from their first mistake and came to their senses.” – Chadi Marouf, SPHR, in today’s Globe and Mail.

“I want to make this clear, there would still be people who would not want him to come, he is after all an accused war criminal, but personally I would go to the speech and, if a question and answer period was guaranteed, I would call him out on the crimes he is accused of,” said Yingling. “That being said, I think the university exercised a good degree of common sense when rendering their final decision.” – Eric Yingling, SPHR, in today’s Link.

The Media:

“Freedom of speech is again under assault at Montreal’s Concordia University by administrators who seem to value tranquility on campus more than they do the rights of people to debate controversial ideas.” – Toronto Star editorial.

“[The SPHR] is amazed at its own success… they don’t even have to break windows again. Their reputation precedes them. The mere threat of violence was enough to get the university to capitulate.” – Tommy Schnurmacher, on CJAD radio this morning.

At large:

The contention that a speech by a former Head of State of a democracy can be classified as “provocation” is absurd; rather, it should be seen as a welcome beginning to open dialogue. The stigma associated with a “controversial” speaker represents a disturbing delusion. If a controversial viewpoint is defined as one that many people will disagree with, then controversial speakers are the ones who will most likely advance the course of debate on contentious issues. I’d far prefer to listen to a “controversial” speaker than one who attracts no dissenting opinions. – Josh Fisher, Concordia student in a letter to the Link.

“This would no doubt please the anti-Israeli activists who prevented Benjamin Netanyahu from speaking in 2002. With one riot, they’ll have managed to prevent two Israeli statesmen from speaking at a Canadian university.”- Jonathan Kay, posting to the National Post blog.

“Congratulations, my leftie friends. Concordia is yours. You will no longer have to suffer the indignity of viewpoints you don’t like being represented on campus. It may be some time before the dictatorship of the proletariat takes over society as a whole, but dang it, this is a start.” – Damian Penny.

• April 1, 1999: The Rob Green executive is first elected to CSU office, ushering in an era of far-left dominance of the Concordia Student Union. His slate was re-elected one year later. A member of this executive, Sheryll Navidad, would eventually defraud $196,000 from the Union… something which the executive hushed up until a week after the CSU won provincial accreditation by a student referendum, ensuring that the University would have limited or no say on the Union’s actions.
• September 2000: The “Al-Aqsa Intifida” begins in Israel, setting off a wave of escalating violence. At Concordia, pro-Palestinian groups step up their tabling, exhibit, and promotion efforts.
• November 27, 2000: The CSU, upon request by SPHR, holds a general assembly to vote on whether to pressure the Canadian government to cut off ties with Israel for (in their view) not respecting UN Resolution 242. Though the assembly was boycotted by Hillel and failed to achieve quota, the CSU nonetheless decided to add this as a referendum question on the next CSU election ballot.
• December 18, 2000: The CSU condemns Hillel after SPHR complains about material that Hillel was distributing.
• March 2001: The leftist slate ACCESS is elected to the CSU to succeed the Rob Green executive. The referendum against Israel passes with 54% of the vote.
• August 20, 2001: Two leftist CSU executive members, Tom Keefer and Laith Marouf, are expelled and banned from campus for spraying anti-Israel graffiti on campus and threatening a security guard. The ban is reversed eight months later, after Keefer and Marouf complained of being denied due process.
• September 2001: The CSU publishes its student agenda, entitled “Uprising” which, among other things, calls for “intifada, anarchy, and revolution” and contains numerous articles containing antisemitism, incitement to theft and flag-burning, and violence. Released just after the 9/11 attacks, the handbook comes under fire from a large number of people.
• September 2001: Angry students begin circulating a petition to recall the CSU executive and force new elections. The petition eventually amasses over 3000 signatures – more than the number of people who voted in the election in the first place.
• October 15, 2001: Faced with the inevitable fact of the recall petition being submitted, Sabrina Stea resigns as CSU president, blaming the administration and forcing new elections.
• October 31, 2001: The CSU considers suing B’nai Brith for what it perceived as “racist” remarks made against the CSU. The CSU hurries to launch the lawsuit before it is forced out of office, but it never proceeds very far.
• November 29, 2001: The moderate Representative Union slate wins the by-elections with a record turnout, despite initial disqualification for fraud allegations that were never proven. The results of the election are, however, contested, and eventually annulled by the CSU judicial board. An interim CSU led by Leftist perennial Patrice Blais is appointed, leading to widespread disgust by the student body who had hoped, briefly, that their votes might make a difference.
• March 20-21, 2002: SPHR sets up their “Concordia Under Occupation” exhibit, setting up phony “checkpoints” at student entrances and harassing students for ID, then transforming the mezz into a mock graveyard with a sign saying “made in Israel”. The exhibit was received with widespread disgust.
• March 29, 2002: The widespread disgust from the November by-election leads to voter apathy. CanDo wins the CSU elections, under the leadership of Sabine Freisinger, ushering in a fifth straight year of leftist control of the Union, and a perceived mandate to “shake things up”.
• April 2, 2002: Hillel holds a peaceful sit-in, with singing and instruments, to protest SPHR’s virulent attacks on pro-Israel sentiment on campus.
• September 9, 2002: A mob of angry rioters, backed by the CSU and SPHR, violently shuts down Benjamin Netanyahu from speaking in the Hall Building auditorium. Many rioters are arrested and 11 are charged. The police have to use tear gas to disperse the crowd. The Concordia administration – in a move that implies that Hillel shares the blame for the riot – calls a “cooling-off period” issues a “moratorium” on all events or speeches having to do with Israel or the Palestinians. It also issues a temporary ban on student tabling of any kind.
• December 2, 2002: The CSU shuts down Concordia Hillel on the grounds that it was actively recruiting for a foreign military by distributing pamphlets about how people can volunteer for an IDF program. This gets widespread international coverage and criticism. The CSU later agrees to reinstate Hillel only if it signs a “pledge”. On principle, Hillel refuses to succumb to blackmail.
• December 5, 2002: Hillel holds a massive Chanukah rally to protest the unfair treatment by the CSU.
• December 21, 2002: Hillel files a lawsuit against the CSU, asking for unconditional reinstatement and an unfreezing of funds. The lawsuit is eventually suspended on the grounds that it is an internal matter, showing a lack of understanding of Concordia’s discrimination on the part of the justice system.
• March 12, 2003: CSU pro-Palestinian “activist” Laith Marouf draws a swastika on an Israeli flag in an art exhibit. He was acquitted of harassment charges.
• March 28, 2003: “Evolution, not Revolution” wins by a landslide in the CSU election, representing the first time that a moderate slate successfully ousted a far-left slate in five years (not counting the annulled 2001 by-elections).
• May 9, 2003: Global TV airs its documentary on the events of September 9th, entitled “Confrontation at Concordia”. The documentary comes under fire for being too “pro-Israel” in its bias.
• October 22, 2003: SPHR brings Eric Ben-Artzi, an Israeli “refusenik” and a nephew of Benjamin Netanyahu, to campus to speak. He is billed as a courageous dissenter. This is just one of a series of lectures that SPHR is allowed to hold, without any riots, protests, or violence.
• December 10, 2003: CSU council votes to ban Operation SICK, an international group opposed to children being used in warfare, from seeking club status at Concordia, on the grounds that it was loosely tied to Israeli Hasbara. An SPHR member called the group a “whitey-whitey group telling visible minority groups how to deal with their children.”
• March 26, 2004: “New Evolution” wins the CSU election, ushering in a second straight year of moderate CSU leadership.
• October 4, 2004: The university administration denies Hillel’s request to bring Ehud Barak to speak. Hillel plans a protest.

It’s impossible to list all the relevant events, but the above is a summary. The point is, the situation at Concordia is not just a series of isolated events. It is a pattern extending back a number of years.

And this latest flare-up proves that, while things have cooled down in the last year or two, they haven’t been resolved. When Jewish and pro-Israel students have their freedom of speech denied merely because people are afraid of things getting ugly, that’s not resolution, that’s avoidance.

“This is a day of great sadness for those who value freedom of expression in our universities and in Canadian society,” stated Federation CJA President Sylvain Abitbol. “Concordia University has allowed itself to be taken hostage by a small and violent group within its campus. With this decision, Concordia has demonstrated that the right to free speech is only as strong as the institutional will to protect it.”

I wonder how long we’ll have to wait to see similar condemnations from Muslim community leaders. I wouldn’t hold my breath…

Update: The Montreal Gazette, the CBC, and Canoe all have the story. Lots more coverage sure to follow. I’m sure the university won’t know what hit them.

This time, Hillel submitted a request to bring Ehud Barak to speak at Concordia, but, according to a press release from Hillel, the university has denied their request for anywhere on both campuses – even Loyola. Now, they’re holding a protest:

FREEDOM OF SPEECH DENIED AT CONCORDIA

First Ehud Barak, WHO’S NEXT ???

Join us for a FREE SPEECH RALLY:

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 5, 2004

12 PM at the corner of McKay and De Maisonneuve

Please read the open letter below for more information.

Dear fellow student,

We are writing to ask for your support. Last week, Concordia University denied former Israeli Prime Minister, Ehud Barak permission to speak anywhere on campus – including the quiet, and more easily guarded, Loyola campus – hiding behind a “security risk assessment”.

They claim that they cannot effectively secure their campuses. We say that it is their duty to protect their students and to allow freedom of speech to exist on their campuses.

A small group of thugs are holding an entire university community hostage and deciding who is allowed to speak and who is not. All people who value democratic principles such as freedom of expression and speech should share our outrage with this intolerable situation.

This is not acceptable in our Quebec and Canadian society. We ask for your cooperation in FREEING speech. We will be gathering outside Concordia’s Hall building on Tuesday at 12pm (Corner Mackay and Maisonneuve) calling for the Board of Governors, the Administration, the Faculty and students of Concordia to reclaim their campus.

This is a historic opportunity and no matter what your political affiliation is… This affects you!

Today is a day of great sadness for freedom of expression at universities and in Canadian society.

We invited Ehud Barak so that we could all learn from him. We have been told that the Administration has restored peace to its campuses. This unfortunate incident has demonstrated that we have appeased the violent side but we have not achieved true peace. Peace should not be confused with appeasement.

We will know that we have peace on campus when we can all learn together- when we can all reason together, safely, intelligently and constructively. For that, we and our parents sacrifice so much- in order to pay tuition and learn at this school.

In return, all we demand, is equal treatment and a safe learning environment, just like everyone else.

Is that too much to ask?

Looking forward to your support,

Yacov Fruchter

Montreal Hillel President

Jason Portnoy

Concordia Hillel co-President

When the idea was first floated to bring Ehud Barak – a left-wing dovish former Israeli PM who offered Yasser Arafat a historic settlement at Camp David in 2000 – to Concordia, there were mixed opinions. Some students thought he would be an interesting and valuable speaker.

Others, however, worried that bringing a “controversial” speaker like Barak (I guess at Concordia, anyone associated with Israel is controversial) would disrupt the relative calm that has returned to students’ lives over the past two years, and bring back the chaos and divisiveness of the period before and after the Netanyahu riots. For example, this student:

Forget all the bickering over how dovish or hawkish Barak is, or whether he has a right to come to Concordia. He’s a legitimate politician of a democratic state, and of course he should be permitted to speak, here or anywhere else. That said, it would be better for all of us if Barak did not come to Concordia. I say this not because I have anything against the man, but because this is the first year in all my time at Concordia where I can go to class without passing people in the Mezz screaming at each other, or reading inflammatory letters about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in the Link. We’re not making national headlines because of riots, moratoriums or arrests; and people now are talking about tuition fee hikes, fair trade coffee, the excellent performance of this year’s CSU, and other issues much more relevant to Concordia students at home. I like this kinder, gentler version of Concordia, and would very much resent Hillel, SPHR, or any other organization’s attempts to sabotage that simply to make a point. Bring Barak to a synagogue or a community centre, and I’d be the first person to see what he has to say. But for the love of God, not at my school. Not at the cost of setting us back another two years. Signed, -Another Jewish student sick of it all.

I am all too aware of what it’s like to go to a school that is in the midst of hostile tensions. The atmosphere on campus is finally calmer and friendlier, and I can understand why students wouldn’t want to shake things up again.

I can understand. But I vehemently disagree.

You see, denying Barak’s right to speak means letting the people who rioted against Netanyahu win. They used violence to shut down Netanyahu’s right to speak. In the process, they ensured that nobody they dislike would ever be allowed to speak on campus again, because the university would be too afraid to let them. So pro-Palestinian speakers are more than welcome at Concordia – there were several last year – but Israeli speakers are shunned.

That’s victory to thuggery over reason. That’s victory to – and no, I’m not exaggerating – terrorism over freedom. Because using violence or the threat of violence to shut down free speech is in fact a form of terrorism. SPHR and their friends have terrorized the university, the student population, and the administration, into

Above all, that’s a lack of a free, open exchange of ideas, which is what education is supposed to be all about.

This isn’t really about Barak who – despite his dovish politics, is going to be as demonized by SPHR and the Palestinian lobby as any Israeli. It has nothing to do with whether I liked Barak’s policies or Netanyahu’s or Ariel Sharon’s or anyone else.

This is about a competition of ideas, and whether one set of ideas will be allowed to shut down and stifle another. It’s about the future of Jewish students at university campuses all over North America, and whether they will have the right to bring in speakers or openly proclaim their views without fear of violence. It’s about whether we – as a society – want to accept the notion that anyone can speak at a university campus… except an Israeli.

As a Concordia alum, I support Hillel in this call to action. It is my hope – though, sadly, not my expectation – that any reasonable student, regardless of political affiliation or background – who supports the right to free speech, will go out there and join them.

I won’t be there in person but I’ll be there in spirit. Please spread the word.

The riot forced cancellation of Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech, but that was just the short-term effect. It brought a campus war to a head, resulting in endless finger-pointing, international media attention that dragged Concordia’s name through the mud, and all-out political dissention that devolved into a CSU fight against Hillel. Concordia became known as “Gaza U”, as a hostile campus environment for Jewish students, and as a school that had pretty much hit rock bottom.

So what’s changed in two years? In March of 2003, anger at the CSU for the Netanyahu debacle was partly responsible for an upset victory for the moderates in the CSU elections. This was repeated in 2004, and the two years of relative calm have done a lot to help the student atmosphere. Activism is still alive at Concordia, but moderation is trumping extremism, and, on the whole, students are free to go to class without harassment. Speaking to friends who are still students there, I’m told that the difference between the atmosphere of two years ago and today’s campus atmosphere is like night and day.

But has progress really been made? Or is it just another sort of defeat? Could Hillel bring a pro-Israel speaker back to Concordia now, or would the event be shut down – not by violent protest, but by insinuations that they shouldn’t “rock the boat”? Is that really better?

For the past two years, the goal has been to ease tensions, cool everyone down, and neutralize the campus atmosphere. A lot of progress has been made on that front. But come March, if the extremists get elected again, things could go right back to the way they were. Unless the next step is taken: that of standing up for what’s right. Students need to be able to express their opinions freely, and not suppress them for fear of being provocative. They need to be able to do this in an atmosphere where they have the freedom to say what they think, without the risk of violence or being shut down. They need to be able to wear their support of Israel with pride, not hide it away because it’s not politically-correct.

There’s still much work to be done. Luckily, the new crop of student leaders seems to be rising to the challenge. I wish them luck and strength.

If you’re not reading Imshin, you should be. She has been blogging in her typically insightful fashion lately about Shavuot and Zionism’s true meaning, and about antisemitism at Berkeley.

LGF has the photo that proves just how little the UN can be trusted in the mideast. And Meryl has some biting commentary on the latest news emerging from Israel.

In Canadian news, the election talk that seems to be dominating the airwaves. But Damian Penny and David Janes have a disgusting story of racism interfering in custody cases that proves just how dangerous these “PC” policies can be for innocent children. As for the election, Paul Jané comments on the Liberals’ transparent scheme to make ridiculous healthcare promises at the eleventh hour that they clearly have no intention of keeping. (Anyone else remember the “no more GST” promise? Remind me again why I keep voting for these guys?)

In election results announced just moments ago, Chief Electoral Officer Tara Tavender has declared victory for New Evolution, who gained exactly 50 per cent of the vote in this year’s election.

This is good news indeed. New Evolution was the slate favoured to win by – among others – Concordia Hillel, as it has promised to take a moderate, apolitical stand on Mideast issues.

Of course, there could still be trouble ahead:

The victory may be short-lived, however, as contestations are expected from both Renaissance Concordia and Concordians In Action, claiming that the New Evolution slate violated election regulations to get more votes.

Contestations are almost a standard occurrance. And I don’t know enough about this election to know whether they will have a leg to stand on. We’ll have to see. In the meantime, the students have spoken, and they’ve spoken against rioting and turmoil on campus. Let’s hope they get their wish.

Tensions have been running high at York for quite some time. Last week, the campus chapters of Hillel and SPHR both had events on the same day. The Excalibur reports that Hillel’s event was a vigil to remember victims of suicide bombers, and SPHR’s event was a “tribute” to Rachel Corrie. It seems clashes erupted.

Flash forward a week. Today’s Globe and Mail reports that the university has banned both Hillel and SPHR from hosting events for one week.

Slap on the wrist, right? Not quite:

Ms. White said Hillel had permission to hold a vigil outside Vari Hall for those who have died because of terrorism.

The pro-Palestinian group gave no official notice to the university of its demonstration, although Ms. White said rumours were circulating around campus that one would be held. The university requires five days notice from a club if it plans to hold an event on campus.

Equal punishment for unequal crimes is what this sounds like to me. And it gets worse.

Hillel has issued two press releases. I’m posting the first in its entirety here because I can’t find online links.

Jewish Student Community Shocked as York University Suspends Hillel Club status and privileges revoked leaving students feeling vulnerable, silenced and fearful.

Students at York University are shocked by news that the university administration has suspended the club privileges of Hillel @ York, the recognized voice of York’s Jewish students. This statement from the University, which is purportedly based on the confrontation last Tuesday, March 16 in Vari Hall, where Jewish students defended themselves against an incendiary form of anti-Israel guerilla theatre, has left Jewish students on campus feeling betrayed, silenced and vulnerable.

As a group that has always respected university directives and strives to pursue a healthy working relationship with the administration, we are shocked by this heavy-handed crackdown, which affects all areas of our religious, social and cultural activities, not only our political advocacy, said Jordie Saperia, the President of Hillel @ York. We are also extremely nervous at the message that this disproportionate response to the Jewish student voice on campus sends to the entire student body. We feel betrayed.

On Tuesday, March 16th, members of Hillel @ York clashed verbally with pro-Palestinian activists who set up provocative and instigatory mock Israeli checkpoints in Vari Hall, an academic building off limits to political demonstrators. University Administration and security officials stood by, watching, during almost an hour of intense confrontation.

The disciplinary measures taken against Hillel are allegedly in response to Tuesday’s clashes, said Seth Winberg, Vice-President of Hillel @ York. But the record shows that the university has turned a blind eye to dozens of illegal and unauthorized rallies by opposing groups. It is only when Hillel members chose to begin defending themselves that the university decided to punish us.

Students are furious that such disproportionate, harsh action has been levelled against them for the simple act of verbally and non-violently opposing a highly insensitive and unauthorized demonstration, while in the past, rallies held in direct contravention of university guidelines have been ignored and glossed over. In contrast, the location of a Jewish Unity rally scheduled by Hillel for last Thursday was dutifully changed only twenty-four hours in advance when the university’s Office of Student Affairs backtracked on permission granted weeks earlier. We are confused and hurt by the university’s actions, said Talia Klein, the Director of Hillel @ York. Despite the marked instability at the Office of Student Affairs over the past few months, we have always maintained a close and mutually beneficial working relationship with university officials. Now it seems as if York has turned into Concordia.

For more information:

Jordie Saperia, President, Hillel @ York

Talia Klein, Director, Hillel @ York

The second press release has a long list of unauthorized rallies and demonstrations held in the past by anti-Israel campus groups at York. In each case, the administration issued no sanctions whatsoever. It seems it only felt it necessary to step in when Hillel held an event of its own.

I’ll try to follow the situation as it develops. If anyone attends York or can provide a firsthand account, please e-mail me. We can’t let this happen again.

Those of you who have been reading for a while know that this election is very important for students who don’t want more rioting, nonsense, and antagonism while going to school. Last year, the moderates swept to a much-needed victory over the extremists, and from what I hear, the school’s been a much better environment this year. This year I’m not really up on the details, but it seems to me that there isn’t as much anger about the student union as there was last year. A whole year without riots tends to restore people to their usual state of apathy, I guess.

So to all you Concordia students out there, make it your business to read up on the candidates and go out and vote.

There. That’s my public service announcement for the day.

A student group called Supporters of a Safe Israel at Virginia Commonwealth University wants to bring Daniel Pipes to VCU for a lecture. However, due to the current anti-Israel climate on many college campuses, whenever a group brings a pro-Israel speaker, the colleges demand extra security due to the protests and controversy that will ensue.

SSI needs to raise an extra $5,000, and they’ve only got about a month.

To those of us who remember the Netanyahu riot at Concordia, this argument is somewhat familiar… only that it goes even further. VCU requires the pro-Israel students to pay extra, but still allows their events to take place if they do. The argument at Concordia after September 9, 2002 went something like this: “Well, bringing Netanyahu was such a security risk that the university should have never allowed him to come in the first place”.

Either way, it’s backwards. The reason that pro-Israel speakers require extra security is because of a group of shit-disturbers who think that rioting is the new black. They are not content to merely voice their disagreements with opposing viewpoints; they believe in using any means necessary – including and especially violence – to shut them down. And they are the reason extra security is required in the first place.

If you ask me, it’s the groups who organize the riots who should have to fund extra security. After all, if they stuck to peaceful demonstration tactics – similar to those used by pro-Israel groups protesting anti-Israel speakers – no extra security would be needed.

Because if the rioters have their way, it will become prohibitively expensive to bring any pro-Israel speaker to a university campus. And then they will have accomplished their goal of shutting down the views they don’t like. Rioting will have won. And that, to me, is unacceptable.

“I challenge the Muslims and Arabs at Concordia to give proof of their love of democracy by inviting me to come speak and creating an open forum for debate and discussion,” said the 35-year-old Manji, who’s been labelled by The New York Times as “Osama bin Laden’s worst nightmare.”

When reached for a comment, the president of Concordia’s MSA, Ahmad Hussain, promptly declined Manji’s request for an invitation. “I don’t know why she didn’t extend the same invitation to MSA at McGill. It’s not fair and very provocative. She didn’t wait for the MSA.”

Hussain continued: “I think she’s angry with her experience with Islam. She’s a self-proclaimed scholar of the Koran and she doesn’t even read Arabic. Honestly, I think she’s looking for publicity. She’s quick and rash to judge and she’s not qualified. Her message is based on little more than rhetoric and personal anecdotes laden with speculations and generalizations. I’ve read many academics and journalists have dismissed her simply because the content of her message is unscholarly and unfounded as I’ve mentioned before. I think the only people who sponsor her speeches and hail her as “refreshing”, are those who already agree with her.”

Sounds like a lot of excuses to me. Could it be that MSA is afraid of Manji’s message?

-”We banned it cause it’s racist!”

That’s inconsistent to say the least.

-”No, I mean, we banned it cause it’s affiliated with Israeli Hasbara.”

So what?

-”We disagree with OpSICK’s political stance.”

But that doesn’t give you the right to ban them.

-”Whoops, I meant that my problem is really that it’s not honest about its affiliation with Hasbara.”

Well, you found out pretty easily; it can’t be THAT big a secret. Besides, how about a little honesty about who really funds SPHR?

-”Um, what I REALLY meant is that we banned it cause it’s redundant, there are already similar groups on campus.”

Again, so what?

-”I mean… I mean… hell, it’s run by pro-Israel people and we don’t like you and we’re not gonna let you become a club no matter what, so screw you and stop asking us for a legitimate reason cause we don’t actually have one!”

And that, of course, is the crux of the matter. Council had no legitimate reason to ban Operation SICK (which, by the way, does not focus only on Palestinians, but on groups from countries all over the world who use child soldiers or incitement of hatred among children). They just decided that it was a group run by their “enemies” (read: Jews, Zionists) so they would come up with some reason to ban it. Just like they came up with a ridiculous excuse to ban Concordia Hillel last year.

In a West Bank university election for the student leadership that focused on which party had killed the most Israelis, the violent Hamas swept to victory Wednesday, defeating Yasser Arafat’s Fatah.

[ . . . ]

At a debate, the Hamas candidate asked the Fatah candidate: “Hamas activists in this university killed 135 Zionists. How many did Fatah activists from Bir Zeit kill?”

The Fatah candidate refused to answer, suggesting his rival “look at the paper, go to the archives and see for yourself. Al-Aqsa Martyrs’ Brigades have not stopped fighting the occupation.”

Fatah set up models of Jewish settlements and then blew them up with fireworks. The display was meant to emphasize the group’s focus on attacking settlers and their communities – considered by Palestinians to be one of the most provocative elements of Israel’s occupation of territory they claim for a state.

Hamas countered by blowing up models of Israeli buses, a tribute to the dozens of suicide bombings its members have carried out in the past three years, killing hundreds of Israelis. Activists held samples of the group’s homemade Qassam rockets – often fired at Gaza Strip settlements and Israeli towns that border the coastal area.

Student issues were barely touched on because the Palestinians’ main problem is the Israeli occupation, candidates said.

[ . . . ]

[A university spokesperson] said the student elections have wider significance. “The Bir Zeit elections are like a barometer to measure the political mood on the Palestinian street.”

Suddenly, voting scandals, ripped-down posters, and debates over club funding don’t seem so bad. How many indications do we need like this one that the Palestinians have absolutely no interest in making peace? How much more crystal-clear does it get?

The conference had a six-point political basis of unity which conference participants must support in order to attend. The administration brought up two points they specifically objected to: unconditional support for the Palestinian right of return and the principle that a two state solution is not a viable option for the Palestinian people.

According to Susan Bloch-Nevitte of the department of Public Affairs, the conference’s basis for unity was exclusionary and therefore the university delivered an ultimatum: either abandon the basis for unity or abandon the booking.

[ . . . ]

The conference would have included sessions on the refugees’ right to return, the current situation in all of historical Palestine, women’s involvement and solidarity with feminists, and queer activism. Sunday would have been dedicated to a session on strategies for resisting what conference organizers called the “Israeli apartheid.”

Of course, conference organizers are, in typical fashion, up in arms denouncing the university’s “blatant trampling on students’ right to organize” and demanding apologies, yadda yadda yadda.

If you recall, pro-Palestinian students made (false) allegations that they weren’t going to be allowed to get tickets to hear Benjamin Netanyahu speak at Concordia last year… they even used it as an excuse for their riot. But apparently it’s ok to organize a conference where nobody but the most hard-line extremist viewpoint is allowed to be expressed, and people can’t even attend unless they’re committed to the destruction of Israel. And yeah, then they have the gall to be angry when their event is cancelled.

This is a very clear example of democracy, Palestinian-style: we have the right to put forth our hard-line views, they say, and you have no right to object or dissent. Our viewpoint matters, yours doesn’t.

(Via Bob).

Eric Ben-Artzi came to speak on behalf of the Refusenik movement – Israelis who would prefer to go to jail than serve in the IDF.

SPHR once again demonstrated that the only speech it will tolerate is speech it agrees with. As for Ben-Artzi, the only thing he proved – besides being shameless about trading on his family connections – is that he represents nothing but a fringe minority in Israel:

The bigger issue involves his repeated claim that he represents the Israeli centre, while he himself admitted that despite the million Israelis who serve in the army, and the six million citizens, only 550 make a point to refuse to serve. He went further and explained that 1,300 other Israelis signed a petition in solidarity. That still makes it far fewer than one per cent of the population.

If we were to have a legitimate discussion about people refusing to serve in the Israeli army, I think the focus would most likely be on the thousands of people who don’t serve due to religious exemptions. Or even on the under-the-radar Israelis who look for creative ways to skirt the draft, including medical excuses or “instead of” service. The first group – and even the second – are surely much more numerous than the “Refuseniks”.

Either way, even the fringe element that Ben-Artzi represents doesn’t want to see SPHR’s goal of no more Israel. But SPHR wasn’t interested in any of that. They saw an opportunity to exploit him for their propaganda purposes, that’s all. As usual. Only this time, the attempt was as transparent as glass.

In an Oct. 10 decision, the Quebec Court of Appeals found against Hillel’s appeal on lifting the suspension of their lawsuit against the CSU. The court also found in favour of the CSU’s cross appeal to force the inclusion of the Union’s Judicial Board in the process.

The judgment, in my (admittedly non-legal-educated) opinion, seems on the face ridiculous. After all, the Judicial Board consists of people chosen by the CSU Council. The chances that Hillel would have gotten a fair hearing by the JB on this issue last year were pretty slim.

In plain language, this sucks. The CSU Council had no business banning Hillel last year, and the court ruling shouldn’t force Hillel to submit to heavy-handed blackmail.

Oh, and P.S., for anyone wondering what’s been going on at Concordia lately, SPHR is up to their usual Israel-bashing:

A petition presented to the CSU last week by members of Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights has demanded the Union hold a general assembly on Nov. 6 to denounce Israel’s “apartheid wall” built along the border between Israel and the West Bank. Many human rights groups have condemned the wall, which groups say encroaches on Palestinian territory. The petition was signed by 250 students, even though only 100 are needed to force an assembly.

Yep, and if they called a general assembly asking people whether they thought all Zionists should be banned from the premises, it would probably get the 100 signatures in a heartbeat.

Great system, eh?

But there’s been lots happening lately. Check out some of the links on the left for more about the world’s reactions to the Malaysian PM’s antisemitic remarks, the hate-fest at Rutgers University that makes Concordia look like paradise, and of course, the Habs’ win over the Wings last night.

Hope to resume regular blogging soon. Sorry for the long hiatus.

They came to shut down free speech. They violently rioted, as explained in this widely-circulated eyewitness account. They didn’t want Benjamin Netanyahu to give this speech – or, indeed, to speak at all – and so they gathered to riot, cause mayhem, and rough up people trying to attend.

The fallout made international headlines, led to the blame game almost immediately, and caused a ripple effect that is still being felt.

September 9th, 2003:

They’d have us believe that everything has changed. There’s a new CSU executive, a big orientation party for incoming and returning students, and a lecture series on conflict resolution.

But ultimately, behind the scenes, very little has changed despite surface appearances. Hillel, which had its privileges suspended by last year’s CSU is still fighting to get them restored. The so-called “activists” are still defending the rioting. Benjamin Netanyahu has been invited back to Montreal but not to Concordia. Antisemitism still gets printed in the Link as “legitimate political criticism”. Indeed, there is still much work to be done.

One year later, some baby steps in the right direction have been taken. What happens from here, we’ll just have to wait and see.

A student panel at Concordia University has dismissed a harassment complaint against activist Laith Marouf for drawing swastikas on an Israeli flag during a March 12 protest at the downtown campus.

In a 2-1 decision, the board ruled that while “Marouf’s gesture was in very poor taste,” it was made during a tense confrontation and did not qualify as harassment under the university’s code of rights and responsibilities, or warrant expulsion or other sanctions.

Adam Spiro, the finance student and Hillel member who filed the complaint, said he’s disgusted by the decision.

“It sends a terrible message,” he said, noting his paternal grandparents are Holocaust survivors. “It says that in the heat of protest, there are no boundaries.

“It legitimizes the swastika as a symbol of political discourse, which it’s not. It’s the worst symbol of hatred, racism and the genocide of 6 million Jews.”

So what is this, complaint number 912 against Laith Marouf that he gets tossed out? He was banned from Concordia two years ago, along with his buddy Tom Keefer, for spraypainting anti-Israel vandalism and threatening a security guard. But the university lifted that ban, and he’s been merrily shit-disturbing and displaying his intense hatred ever since. Apparently anything goes as long as you wrap yourself in the Palestinian flag and make ridiculous excuses for your actions, like this one:

At a May 14 hearing, Marouf testified he drew “the inverted swastika, the Hindu circle of life, not the Nazi swastika” on the Israeli flag, as a lesson in symbolism. However, he conceded he realized some people might not make the distinction and would be deeply offended.

Maybe it’s just cause it’s Friday, but I can’t seem to stop laughing at that one.

The Canadian Jewish News attributed some comments to Lowy, which alleged that the administration was going to ask the government to de-certify the CSU. This turned out to be erroneous but a coalition of “pro-Palestinian students and community activists” decided to take one of Lowy’s remarks out of context as an excuse to accuse him of their favourite charge: racism.

So by their logic, now all the students charged by the university in connection with the September 9th riots should have their charges lifted. Never mind that the sentences were handed down by a student panel, not by Lowy himself. Never mind that Lowy never actually said anything wrong – his words were twisted, that’s all. And never mind that the people charged in connection with the riot were actually guilty. Apparently, none of that matters:

Mouammar, a spokesperson for a coalition of pro-Palestinian students and community activists, is calling on the university to throw out internal complaints against students stemming from September’s protests against former Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu. She said Arab students in the protest were punished more harshly than non-Arabs.

More unsubstantiated charges of racism. That’s their favourite tactic, it seems. When in doubt, find a Zionist to accuse of racism. It helps if he’s also a white male and a capitalist, preferably in a position of power. Never fails, right?

In an attempt to send a message to the both the administration and to already beleaguered students, activist groups are planning to stage a massive protest, one prominent student politician tells me. At issue is the policy of the new Executive to put activism second and academics first. The act of civil disobedience will apparently “make the September 9 protest look like nothing. They will take over the entire Hall Building.” What’s more, people will be flown in from outside of the country “to do the dirty work.”

My source, who has strong contacts with many student associations (including the SPHR), assures me that this protest will take place sometime in the early fall, and that it will “show that only CSU slates that support activism will be able to maintain order at Concordia.” “People should have voted for Clean Slate,” he says, “because they support activism. The message is that Concordia is about activism.”

This is the way these people operate. They hail democracy as long as it works in their favour. But if students democratically elect people they disagree with, they try to blackmail the students by threatening violence.

Absolutely disgusting. Not too surprising, though.

(Via Wordniness).

Update: Having posted this on the Link’s website, in a response by Adam Slater, he seems to suggest that this may not be true. Well, I can’t confirm or deny it one way or the other. Maybe it’s true, maybe it’s not. But, like I wrote in response to Mr. Slater, there’s only one way to find out: if there’s a riot in September, then I guess it’s true. Although I’m sure the SPHR cronies will maintain that “the Zionists started it”, like they did after September 9th.

[Lowy] said Concordia has approached the ministries of education and justice to strip the CSU of its certification because it has not acted in the interests of the undergraduates it represents.

[ . . . ]

Quebec, he said, is the only province that permits student governments to be certified like labour unions. This status allows the CSU a great deal of autonomy, he said. It obliges the university to collect dues from students and turn them over to the CSU to use as it wishes. Currently, the CSU has $1.3 million at its disposal.

With Evolution’s victory in the CSU electons last Friday, this point may be seemingly moot. After all, a moderate slate has been elected, that will likely protect the interests of students without imposing a radical agenda like the past four years’ CFS-backed executives. So why bother trying to de-certify?

Well, the simple answer is that this is just one election. A year of peace will be very nice at Concordia, but there’s nothing to stop the Left from gearing up and getting right back into power next year. I’m sure they’re already strategizing as we speak. A CSU with drastically-reduced power may reduce Evolution’s power this year – but it would also ensure that the system was a lot less prone to abuse in the future. So hey, sounds like a good idea to me!

Sure, the Left will cry foul as it always does, and accuse the administration of trying to strip students of their legitimate rights to representation. But I bet that, with the exception of the radicals, nobody would ever miss the CSU and its ridiculous amount of power. When a union does more harm than good for its members, then what exactly is the point?

Update – 04/20/03: These reports appear to be erroneous as Lowy now claims he did not, in fact, ask the government to de-certify the CSU:

“The administration has not asked the government to de-certify the union,” he said. “Two years ago, when we were having trouble with the union, we put in a request that the four ministries responsible for accreditation look at the CSU. We felt [the CSU] were going beyond their mandate. We never asked them to de-certify.” Lowy maintains that the Quebec government decided against investigating the CSU two years ago, and the administration has never asked again.

That’s really too bad. At the very least, the government ought to review the expansive amounts of power given to student unions to ensure that, ultimately, they are accountable to someone.

Evolution, Not Revolution: 2533

Clean Slate: 1241

Renaissance Concordia: 312

New Vision: 152

Free Thinker’s Parliament: 102

The counts for council, senate, and board of governers candidates are also up.

A few interesting notes:

• Hillel activist Naomi Sarna was elected to council with 60 more votes than her brother Noah, a co-president of Hillel, who was not.
• And speaking of Noahs who are Hillel presidents, Noah Joseph was elected to one of two Board of Governer seats with five more votes than Sobia Virk, who is famous for having refused to attend a BoG meeting last year as an objection to the fact that alcohol was being served.
• Laith Marouf, SPHR activist and general pain in Hillel’s side, had the second-to-least number of votes for Arts and Science council. However, his buddy Trish McIntosh, a pro-Palestinian activist who wears a keffiyah, had the most votes in the same race. Hmmm, I wonder if he’ll sue her for stealing his votes?
• CEO Stephen Herman claims that between 4,600 and 4,700 students voted, which is about 40-45% more than the previous record turnout. Way to go! There are no counts for spoiled ballots announced, but adding up all the votes for executive comes to a grand total of 4,340 votes, so we know that at least that many votes were cast.
• Also note that more people voted for Evolution than the entire number of people who voted in some past CSU elections.

One last thing: today being April Fool’s Day, reports that the election has been annulled are a prank. And not a particularly inspired prank at that. Just in case you were wondering – or panicking. To clarify, the election has not been annulled.

More than half of council’s seats went to moderate candidates as well (although note that this year’s president, Sabine Freisinger, was elected to council, as well as a few of her buddies.)

All in all, this is a very clear message from Concordia students about what sort of union they want running their school next year. And it can only mean good things for the future and reputation of Concordia.

Update: It seems that the actual numbers will be slightly different, due to what the Link refers to as “misplaced tally sheets”. Updated numbers will be announced Monday, but the CEO says they will not affect the results.

Also, the first threats from the sore-loser leftists are starting to crawl out of the woodwork, for example, this comment on the Link’s site. They can’t be happy about losing the election, but I would have hoped they’d at least be more graceful about it.

Those of you who have been following my blog know all about the problems that the CSU has been causing at Concordia these past few years. I can only hope that this year is the one where enough students turn out to toss the professional shit-disturbers out on their butts where they belong, and elect some real leadership.

The two main slates in contention are Evolution, supported by a broad base of students opposed to the current CSU, and the ironically-named Clean Slate, made up entirely of buddies of the current and past few CSUs. A few other slates, Renaissance Concordia and New Vision among them, are also on the ballot, which may threaten to split the opposition, thus handing yet another victory to Clean Slate.

Will enough students turn out to vote in order to overcome the Left’s committed support from the pro-Palestinian and anti-capitalism crowd? Or will this same group get right back into power? Right now, it’s up to the undergraduate students at Concordia. So if you’re reading this, and you’re a Concordia student, make sure to vote!

It’s not so much that she chose to express her opinion (which pretty much consists of the standard leftist line on how the US was going to war for “no reason” and how it’s such a tragedy because innocent people are going to die so Bush can get oil, etc.). It was the fact that she allowed the rest of the class to use her opening as an opportunity to bash the United States. And of course, the inevitable non-sequiteur tie-in to Israel, as Rachel Corrie’s name was bandied about within seconds.

And I just sat there, fuming.

Of course, I could have said something. I could have said a lot of things. I’ve never had a particular problem of being in the minority — as I clearly was in this case. In fact, I think I was the only one who doesn’t consider it a badge of honour to have been out at the anti-Bush (er, anti-war) protest on Saturday. But I’ve never been one to shy away from debate before.

The point is, I felt it was inappropriate. It wasn’t the time or the place to get into a political debate. We were all there to learn about possessive pronouns, not possession of weapons of mass destruction. I thought it was horribly inappropriate for the teacher to start the conversation, and I didn’t want to compound it by turning the anti-American free-for-all into a full-fledged debate. In French, no less — and I must admit that being somewhat inarticulate in French was a factor that motivated me to keep my mouth shut. So I just sat with my arms folded and did my best to give the teacher a dirty look.

In the second half of the class, however, I decided I needed to say something — quietly. I told the teacher I felt uncomfortable with what had happened, and while I didn’t think it was appropriate to say anything at the time, I don’t share her political views and I’d appreciate if she kept differing opinions in mind. I talked about how I could have explained my position but I didn’t want to turn French class into world politics class.

Her reaction was interesting. She was very polite, and said it was never her intention to be insulting — and indeed, she never was. But she continued to hold that “it’s an issue that touches all of us” and claimed that she was very upset and needed to share her thoughts. She also seemed unable to comprehend that there were people out there who weren’t opposed to war in Iraq on principle. She took it as a given, and seemed genuinely surprised to hear that other viewpoints exist.

Still hoping to avoid a political debate, I ended the conversation right then and there. But I learned a few valuable lessons.

First and foremost, it’s all too easy to understand why an overwhelming majority of university students hold the same antiwar views. Quite simply, they want to fit in. They want to feel like they belong. And everyone else thinks it, and most of them don’t have enough background information to form a strong counter-position. So they just get swept along with the tide.

I also learned why even innocent offhand comments by a professor in a classroom are so dangerous. Freedom of expression, yes. Freedom of speech. But with the role of teacher comes the responsibility not to abuse that position. My French teacher is a very nice person, and she had absolutely no malicious intent. The problem is that not all professors are so innocent. Just check out Campus Watch for a few examples.

Certainly I don’t expect everyone to conform to my views. But there’s a time and place for debate, and that wasn’t it.

Concordia Hillel co-president Noah Joseph, who helped organize yesterday’s speech, said the protesters had “every right to be there” and did not cause any trouble.

“They even had the courtesy to tell us when they would arrive,” Joseph said, adding that similar events at Concordia University were often marred by violence.

“You have to worry about your safety at Concordia. The McGill atmosphere, on both sides, is much safer,” he said.

Of course, the Gazette’s coverage focused mostly on the protest against Pipes, with only a short line about the speech itself. What do you expect? But at least there wasn’t a riot.

Meanwhile at Concordia . . . A Palestinian student, Nidal Al Alul, was arrested for uttering death threats:

A dazed and disheveled-looking Concordia University student appeared in municipal court yesterday on charges of uttering assault and death threats against four people at the downtown campus on Tuesday.

Nidal Al Alul, 19, a third-year commerce student, spent the night in a police lockup after he was arrested.

The incident is alleged to have occurred at the Hillel information table on the mezzanine level of the Henry F. Hall Building on de Maisonneuve Blvd. W.

Three of the complainants are civilians, while a fourth is a Concordia security guard.

The French daily rag, Montréal Métropolitain, adds that Al Alul approached the Hillel table and an argument broke out about war. He was trading insults with the people at the Hillel table and it disintegrated from there.

Yes, tensions are certainly high.

A protest at York University over a possible war in Iraq ended in violence yesterday when opposing groups crossed paths.

Miriam Levin, a Jewish student, said she was intimidated and roughed up by the protesters. And a group that had a U.S. flag at its booth said members were attacked by demonstrators who marched through the university.

[ . . . ]

Later, the protesters entered classes for a few minutes to talk to students, said Joel Duff of the Canadian Federation of Students.

It was when the line passed a booth set up by the Young Zionist Partnership and the Canadian Alliance that a confrontation occurred. Students who ran the booth claim protesters shouted insults before charging them.

“Hundreds of people basically swarmed three people,” said Paul Cooper, president of the Zionist group. He said only a few people were confrontational, but everyone else “watched and did nothing to stop it.”

The anti-war student movement keeps showing its true colours again and again: antisemitic, anti-American, and all too willing to resort to mob violence.

After what happened at Concordia when Netanyahu tried to speak, there was an international outpouring of support for the Jewish community here. I have a feeling that after yesterday, the students at York could use some of the same.

Councillors debated the issue for an hour and a half, even though some tried to stop debate twice. Delays continued as councillors and the chair attempted to determine if seven out of 11 votes constituted a two-thirds majority. The use of calculators did not help matters, as arguments ensued over the proper rounding technique to use.

Remember, folks, these are university students.

His lecture is part of the larger 24 Hours for Israel initiative beginning at sundown March 12th and lasting all day on the 13th. Hillel, FederationNext, and several other organizations are teaming up to create an all-Israel day on university campuses around the city. At a time when morale is low – especially at universities – this is definately sounding like a needed boost.

As if pretending to be left-wing and concerned with social causes isn’t enough, this executive has done nothing but damage the Union, and make us more divided than ever. How are we to unite against the Administration when we are squabbling amongst ourselves? How are we to jointly pursue progressive, student-minded causes when the executive divides Union membership at every chance that it gets?

The constant involvement of the CSU in non-union issues such as the occupation of Palestine is the first nail in the coffin of Concordia student unity. In addition, the CSU executive should remember that Jews at Concordia are just as much students as their Islamic brothers and sisters. Why does it seem as if the executive constantly sides with the Muslim cause? Why is the CSU picking on Hillel? Why did it inflame tensions resulting from Sept. 9? The Union has gone the opposite direction of where it should be over the past two years, and has further divided students along ideological, racial and religious lines.

We need a cooling off period at Concordia. We need a Union that will grow out of this immature shell that it seems to have gotten itself into. We need a CSU that is no longer preoccupied with anarchist vs. capitalist, coloured vs. white and Muslim vs. Jew. The CSU elections are March 25-27. Students of Concordia: make yourself heard!

Ethan Moore, Communications

No longer a student, I can’t do much but watch from the sidelines. But around this time each year, I’m filled with a sort of optimism that maybe – just maybe – this will finally be the year when students wake up and make a positive change at the ballot box.

Maybe students are finally waking up to how damaging the past few CSU executives have been for everyone. If letters like the one above are any indication, it seems students are increasingly aware – or if they’re not, they should be – that their only opportunity to turn things around is by voting.

I hope I’m right.

The computer engineering professor charged with running the American operations of a Palestinian terrorist group was fired Wednesday by the University of South Florida.

Sami Al-Arian, who had been suspended since shortly after the 2001 terrorist attacks, was found to have abused his position at the university, USF president Judy Genshaft said.

“Dr. Al-Arian’s statements about his activities have been false and misleading and he’s failed to meet our high professional standards,” Genshaft said. “No longer will he be able to hide under the shield of academic freedom.”

Al-Arian, 45, was arrested last week. He and seven others are accused in a 121-page federal indictment of setting up a terrorist cell at the university and funneling support to the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, which the government says has killed more than 100 people in Israel and its territories.

Geez, and they accuse Concordia of being Gaza U . . .

The Union has failed to comply with the university’s demand (as required by the CSU’s own bylaws) to make detailed financial information available. They also ruled against a complaint that would have kicked “king Patrice” Blais out of office, as he is not even registered in any classes. The following conflicts of interest were also brought to light:

Reporting on behalf of the financial committee, councillor Patrice Blais reported decisions that were made which could be seen as conflicts of interest. Blais said the procedure for such matters is that the person involved would be absent for any deliberations and would not vote on the matter. Among the matters reported:

• $3,000-3,500 were allocated to a project creating a book about the history of the CSU. Both Blais and Adam Slater were involved in this project.
• A $2,000 budget advance to the student group Facing Reality, a group headed by CSU councillors, was approved.
• A newspaper about the situation following the World Trade Center terrorist attacks was given $3,000. VP Finance Sameer Zuberi was involved in this project.
• Four clubs with Financial Committee members as executives received budgets: $2,500 for Adam Slater’s Democracy Now; $5,000 for Bilal Hamideh’s Muslim Students’ Association; $4,000 for Trish McIntosh’s Praxis; and $6,000 for Louis-Éric Simard’s Debating Society (Simard resigned from the financial committee for undisclosed reasons).

Other motions shot down include one that would have gotten rid of any CSU member with a criminal conviction for financial crimes, one that would have compelled the CSU to keep a detailed book of financial records in compliance with their by-laws, and one that would have forbade people from using the general CSU mailing list to campaign for elections. (Tom Keefer used this list the night before the infamous September 2001 by-election, telling people not to vote for the Representative Union. RU won anyway and – surprise, surprise – the CSU overturned the election result.)

The worst part is that despite being the most anti-democratic, unaccountable group around, the same people risk being re-elected right back into power. Concordia students go to the polls at the end of March, and unless enough of them get involved enough to make a change, nothing much will improve. Sad, but true: Voter apathy is democracy’s worst enemy.

A Quebec Superior Court Judge has granted Canadian Jewish Congress (CJC) leave to intervene in the action filed by Hillel students against Concordia University’s Student Union (CSU). Since the outbreak of the current Middle East violence, the CSU has abetted a climate on Concordia’s campus that became increasingly hostile and intimidating for Jewish students.

In December, the CSU, with no prior notice, abruptly withheld its funding of the Hillel group at Concordia. Hillel initiated legal action against the CSU and CJC sought the intervention to support the Jewish students fighting the discriminatory disenfranchisement of their campus club.

I have no doubt that within minutes, we’ll hear some snide comment about the “powerful Zionist lobby” attacking the CSU. Good. Let them spew. The important thing is that this lawsuit a case of Jewish students at Concordia saying Enough! and it’s great that organizations like the CJC are getting behind them. They need all the support they can get.

To express your support, you can write to concordiajews@hotmail.com.

Samer Elatrash, 23, was found guilty of all five charges against him under the school’s code of rights and responsibilities.

The charges, which include rioting, assault and harassment, stem from a violent protest in the Henry F. Hall building last year that prevented former Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu from speaking on campus.

In an article in the Link, Elatrash levels his usual myriad of accusations against the university administration, the hearings panel, the police, Benjamin Netanyahu, Hillel, and of course the Zzzzzionists.

Verdicts against the other accused students are to be announced this week.

I wonder if they’ll riot this time . . . after all, Nusseibeh has publicly called for an end to Palestinian violence. Then again, MIB calls him a “prominent intellectual voice of reason calling for peace between Palestinians and Israelis”, and I think that’s going a bit too far. After all, he called “martyrdom operations” a form of resistance and refused to condemn them.

Most people have listened to Nusseibeh’s statements in Arabic and interpreted them, and concluded that he only plays the moderate. He’s been given that role, in order to make it seem like there are dissident voices in Palestinian society. But he’s just play-acting, and it seems like the Montreal Jewish Community is buying his act hook, line, and sinker.

Still, I somehow don’t predict any riots.

At university and college campuses across North America, students were given the opportunity to vote in a “mock” Israeli election. The goal was to foster interest among students in Israeli democracy. The results, though for all practical purposes useless, are nonetheless interesting. Likud won by a landslide, with 42% of the vote – even higher than among Israelis in the real election. The Green Leaf party, calling for the legalization of marijuana, made a strong (but perhaps predictable) showing in fifth place.

Well, at least students have their priorities in place!

On college campuses across America, teachers influence students by running down America, demeaning capitalism, exaggerating “oppression” against minorities and women, and denouncing Republicans in general and George W. Bush in particular.

Actually, there is a dangerous trend in the United States whereby secular universities are moving further to the Left, and Christian religious colleges further to the right. This is creating a divided society among the “leaders of tomorrow” because what happens to the secular right? The religious left? Most of all, what happens to the centre?

Education, ideally, isn’t learning facts but is learning how to think critically. However, anyone who pretends that education isn’t a form of brainwashing is kidding themselves. After three to four years studying in a university, faculty, or department with a certain ideological bent, most people are absorbed into it no matter what happens. If the education system is only giving half of the picture, that’s a giant failing.

For example, in this week’s online version of the Link, an article discusses the possibility that Sheila Copps may run for the leadership of the Liberal party. An online user poll then asks students if they would vote for her as prime minister. The options – while predictably lame – don’t give any choice for students who wouldn’t because they find her too far to the left – only not left enough.

Concordia’s campus politics reflect a similar picture. There’s no left, right, and center in most CSU elections. There’s only left, lefter, and leftest. Of course, this is a union election, so that’s to be expected to some extent. But it does create a particular problem where the most left-wing slates automatically have an entire platform essentially custom-written for them. All they have to do is steal the latest ideas from socialism and – voila – a platform built on “human” (read: Palestinian) rights, aid for the poor, disabled and homeless, fighting for gender advocacy, support services, anti-corporate control on campus and in the media, and lower tuition. They don’t even have to think about it, and in an election campaign their issues come across as credible, well-researched, and powerful.

Anyone running in opposition has two choices. They can present a clear alternative to them by putting forth a more right-wing platform, which is immediate political suicide. Even a hint of it is enough to kill a campaign. Take last year’s CSU elections for example. The main group opposing the current extremist CSU was tarnished with allegations of being “right-wing” even though its politics probably fell slightly left of the NDP. The other alternative is to put forth a sort of non-platform, with issues that seem to be much less important. Either way is recipe for disaster.

Students who believe that tuition should be raised in order to improve education quality, those who don’t mind and even welcome advertising in the bathrooms, and those who believe that a person should be hired on merit, not skin colour, to administrate the university find that they are quickly drowned out. For professors, it’s even worse; academia being what it is, hold the wrong views and profs find themselves ostracized, unpublishable, and virtually unemployable.

I’ve said many times that too far Left is just as bad as too far Right. What is happening on university campuses deserves some attention.

First the administration, caving to threats of violence, initially cancelled the speech. Then, showing great courage, they decided to let it go ahead after all. Then, York was forced to bring in tons of riot police in hopes of avoiding a reprise of the Concordia fiasco. It seems to have been averted, but not without incident. Leftists “occupied” a floor of the administration building in attempt to get the university to cancel the speech. And after Pipes left, someone called in a bomb threat to the building.

Freedom of speech means freedom for speech you don’t agree with to go ahead as well. When will the Left get it?

York University could have waffled and cancelled Pipes’ speech, but it didn’t. It took a stand for freedom of speech and against threats and intimidation. And the students who invited Pipes could have caved as well, but they didn’t. Kudos all around (except to the idiotarians who felt it necessary to try to shut down Pipes’s speech).

For Laith Marouf, a member of Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights, the answer is a resounding Yes. “To us, Arafat is corrupt; he is a criminal himself,” Marouf said. “We can’t have a double standard. We will protest criminals whether they’re Muslim or Arab or Israeli.”

[ . . . ]

“I’m sure the protest would have been loud, but I doubt it would have been violent,” said Yoni Petel of Hillel Montreal.

“Let Arafat speak. I would love to ask Yasser Arafat a few questions. I think he’s pure evil, but I’m not afraid of his ideas.”

Although Petel agreed the pro-Palestinian organizers of the Netanyahu protest largely despise Arafat, he said they wouldn’t have tried to stop him with the same zeal.

“Can you imagine (Samer Elatrash) standing up on a car screaming with a megaphone that he (Arafat) is a war criminal and we have to stop him?” said Petel in reference to the Palestinian activist’s actions in the Netanyahu protest.

“I doubt it very, very much.”

The hypothetical situation would pose a dilemma for Elatrash. On one hand, the Concordia student said he’d want to denounce Arafat’s corruption; on the other hand, he wouldn’t want a protest against the controversial leader to be misinterpreted as proof Palestinians are unable to govern themselves.

“I would try to stop Arafat from speaking but not if Hillel were part of the protest,” he said. “We wouldn’t want to lend our help to delegitimize Palestinian self-determination.”

Afraid that you might be aligning yourself with the Zzzzionists, Samer?

As always with a purely hypothetical question, the answers are predictable – and meaningless. Because nobody knows what would have happened since the situation itself never occurred. Laith Marouf can make the self-serving claim that of course SPHR would have rioted. Yeah right. And while I know that Hillel would have never resorted to the kind of disgusting display that we saw from SPHR, they probably would have tried to go through proper channels to voice their displeasure.

All that is missing the point, though. Lampert’s hypothetical is drawing some kind of equivalence between Netanyahu and Arafat. Netanyahu, a former elected representative of a democratic state, and Arafat, a dictator with the blood of thousands of innocent civilians directly on his hands.

Despite the Left’s best efforts to villify Netanyahu, he is not – nor has he ever been – a war criminal. They don’t like Netanyahu, they don’t like Sharon, they’re threatening more violence if Sharansky were to come to Concordia . . . the point is, they find it perfectly okay to use violence to shut down any speech that doesn’t fit with their world view. If Arafat were to come to Concordia, he’d probably look around and decide it felt a lot like home. He might even make it his new headquarters. A whole new meaning to “Gaza U”? Hmmmmm . . .

Jaggi Singh is a test case for Canadian democracy. Can he exercise his right to freedom of assembly? Or his right to protest peacefully? Or speak freely? We’re not doing too well on the democratic front if Singh is anyone to go by. The answers to those three questions are no, no and no.

There are several problems with Bagnall’s argument, however. First of all, Singh’s right to “protest peacefully” is not in question. But as everyone knows, September 9th was anything but peaceful. All the people whining about the criminalization of dissent don’t seem to get that they can’t excuse criminal behaviour by calling it dissent. Protesting something doesn’t give you the right to beat people up, destroy property, or instigate violence.

Secondly, Singh is not a Concordia student, and the university is under no obligation to allow him to hang around campus. If every time he shows up there’s trouble, it’s perfectly reasonable to kick him out.

Thirdly, Bagnall is basing her opinion on the following claims:

I find it hard not to conclude that in some way university administrators and justice officials take Singh’s views, and his insistence on defending them in public, as a personal insult. This is genuinely worrisome. He has not physically attacked anyone. He has not damaged property. He has not led a riot or a protest. He has exercised his rights to freedom of speech and freedom of assembly, and here he is, once again, arrested. This comes a little too close to a police state.

However, the police had enough evidence to arrest him. So Janet Bagnall seems to be simply taking Jaggi Singh’s word for the fact that he didn’t lead a riot or a protest, or attack or destroy anyone or anything. Last I checked, his say-so wasn’t exactly credible evidence. He’s made so many ridiculously faulty claims in the past few months that anyone who chooses to take his word on anything ought to have their head examined. If the courts find enough evidence to convict him of a crime, then that is the true test – not Bagnall’s hero-worship of the man.

Singh was not arrested for the protest last Monday, which was mainly peaceful, but for his involvement in the disgusting riot of September 9th. This alone should prove an important point: Nobody’s trying to shut down protest, even when they disagree. They’re trying to shut down violence. And it is the rioters who are seemingly incapable of seeing the difference.

Cim Nunn, a spokesman at York, said that while Mr. Pipes attracts strong opinions, and students likely would protest against him, the university is a place for free expression.

“We wouldn’t move forward with this event if we weren’t satisfied that we were going to be able to do so in a way that ensured that everybody participating was going to be able to do so safely,” Mr. Nunn said.

The public lecture was to take place at the Student Centre’s restaurant, the Underground, but it was cancelled when a number of student groups expressed concerns.

In other words, York was afraid of turning into the next Concordia. It wanted to avoid a riot. So it initially caved to pressure and cancelled the speech.

Granted, the Middle Eastern Students Association spokesperson claimed that he would urge students to protest “peacefully”. But then, the CSU and the SPHR claimed that the Netanyahu protest would be peaceful, too.

The tactic of the anti-Israel contingent to try to shut down any speech they disagree with is seemingly common. Daniel Pipes has been un-invited from several campuses across North America recently.

Pipes, best known for his site Campus Watch, where he monitors antisemitism on campuses, is persona non grata to many of Israel’s greatest critics. And, as with Netanyahu, they’ve decided that any speech that doesn’t fit with their politics shouldn’t be heard, and they threaten violence in every instance in effort to get most of them shut down.

Luckily, some universities are coming to their senses. Université de Québec à Montréal reversed a decision back in December and allowed a scheduled speech by journalist Gideon Kouts to go ahead, after initially shutting it down due to threats. And now, Daniel Pipes will be allowed to speak at York University after all.

It looks like universities are learning, albeit slowly, that caving to threats of violence is to let violence win. Academic freedom can only exist if everyone has a voice.

The poll results indicate, among other things, that:

• Nearly one third of Americans fear that a Jewish president may have divided loyalties when dealing with the state of Israel. (This apparently relates to the announcement by Senator Joseph Lieberman that he will seek the Democratic nomination for President in 2004).
• Nearly one in four Americans between the ages of 18 and 34 believe that Jewish control of the media distorts the news.
• Twenty percent of Democrats and Independents tend to “view Jews as caring only about themselves,” compared to only 12 percent among Republicans.
• 34 percent of Americans agree that “Jews have too much influence on Wall Street.
• 37 percent believe that the Jews were responsible for killing Jesus Christ.

The poll results were disturbing to Gary Tobin, President of the Institute for Jewish and Community Research in San Francisco:

Gary Tobin, the president of the institute, said the results appear to reverse a post-World War II and post-Holocaust trend of declining anti- Semitism in America.

The academic survey of 1,013 randomly selected adults was conducted from May 2-7, 2002. But Tobin suspects that the trend has only deepened since then because of the escalating Israeli-Palestinian conflict and the buildup toward a possible U.S. invasion of Iraq.

“We’re not saying that all criticism of Israel is anti-Semitic,” Tobin said.

“But college campuses have become bastions of anti-Israelism. In places like Berkeley or Santa Cruz, the demonstrators’ signs say ‘Stop Israel’ and ‘Stop the Jews.’ That’s what we picked up in this survey.”

To me, it’s appalling that Tobin even had to include the disclaimer about not saying that all criticism of Israel is antisemitic. That he had to say that at all indicates that Jews everywhere are on the defensive – about Israel, about our beliefs, our politics, and our identity.

This defensiveness is precisely what the existence of the State of Israel was supposed to eliminate. Zionism instilled a sense of pride in being Jewish, and all over the world, Jews no longer had to hide or be ashamed of their heritage. At least that was the theory.

The poll results are showing the opposite trend, though. And it’s scary as hell.

But I guess McGill thought that Concordia was having all the fun, because Singh give a talk at McGill today about Global Migration. I’m sure the McGill-ites were oh-so-thrilled with his presence, too. (Insert sarcasm here.)

My favourite quote comes from the quasi-paper, Rabble News:

“Why is ‘Gaza U’ a derogatory term?” Singh asked during yesterday’s speech. “Concordia should be proud to be compared to Gaza.” He praised the resistance of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip and other occupied territories, and said that the struggle of Concordia students in the face of repression is important, but it cannot be compared to the heroic efforts of the Palestinian people.

Singh has also said that he felt the rioters on September 9th at Concordia “had no choice but to riot” and also that he thinks that suicide bombings are a “completely understandable response” to the Israeli occupation of Palestinian territory.

Doesn’t this guy just make you feel all warm and fuzzy inside? Sheesh!

1) Claims that what happened wasn’t really a riot at all, but a few isolated incidents of violence or rowdiness amidst an overall peaceful protest.

2) Claims that “both sides” were equally involved in the rioting, and that the pro-Israeli people who were there to hear Netanyahu speak were somehow engaged in just as much violence than the pro-Palestinian side.

Usually, when these people fabricate facts, it’s not so obvious because they’re talking about events on the other side of the world and events that happened decades ago. So many of their lies get successfully passed off as truth. But this time, they’re talking about events that happened not even six months ago, right here in Montreal. There’s media footage, security tapes, and plenty of eyewitness testimony to contradict their bullshit. But this doesn’t seem to bother them at all. Why? Because they realize the dirty little secret that if you repeat a lie often enough, people begin to accept it as truth.

So the next time someone presents you with supposed “evidence” of so-called “atrocities” going on in Israel or anyplace else, this should serve as an example of little credibility they really have.

Seems the rioters and their supporters have gotten wind of the poll because the total is running 55.38% No right now.

If you have a minute, head on over there and vote. Not only should people involved in a hate-spurred riot be expelled, they should be arrested and tossed in jail.

The CSU is unconditionally defending the people arrested in the Sept. 9th riot at Concordia. They didn’t condemn the rioters or stand up for the innocent students attacked by them.

On Monday they’ll be gathering in the Hall Building to reemphasize their opposition to free speech and civil discourse.

Enough already.

COUNTER-PROTEST

11:30 AM

Monday, January 20th

Corner Maisonneuve and Mackay

Should be interesting.

The footage of the riots focused on chants of “free Palestine” and clashes with riot police. Not a single mention was made of the many Jewish people who were roughed up, pushed, shoved, and spat upon. Not a word was said about the disgustingly antisemitic character of the riot. And words like “waiting to happen” and “provocation” continued the myth that the riot was the fault of everyone but the rioters.

Misleading quotes gave the impression that Hillel was somehow just as wrong as SPHR. Pamphlets distributed by Hillel were highlighted as being controversial – in fact, these flyers were perfectly legitimate, but the anti-Israel forces were looking for something to pick on. No mention was made of the blatant outright racism of most of the SPHR material. And the CBC’s blatantly self-serving attack on Izzy Asper has no business in reports. Watching the two organizations battle it out in the public eye is not only distasteful, it’s leading to biased reporting.

Concordia has enough problems, but this news report is only going to give encouragement to the CSU and their supporters. And as always, it is the students who will suffer the most.

Apparently, it’s not enough for the CSU to use student money to pay the legal fees of those arrested. Now Yves Engler, VP Communications of the CSU, wants students to come out and demonstrate their support for these same students.

This is a call to all those who protested in support of human rights and dignity, on September 9th, 2002.

Currently, there are 12 students who are being scapegoated in the university’s ongoing facade, in their attempt to avoid its own culpability in the events of September 9th. None of the students currently charged were in fact violent. The university is simply trying to show to its many lobbies that they are punishing ‘those responsible’, by identifying a select few of those who were present on the escalators, and by alleging that their protest inside their own school somehow constitutes ‘illegal assembly’.

[ . . . ]

According to Rector Lowy, all those who were present on the escalators are deemed worthy of punishment. Therefore, all of us who were present will identify ourselves to show that we are not ashamed in having participated in a demonstration, inside our own university, against one of the world’s most racist and violent men, Mr. Benjamin Netanyahu.

What, Mr. Engler, one riot a year wasn’t enough for you?

Note the twisted logic that is being used here. The CSU and the SPHR have been on a campaign these past couple of months to try and downplay the riot, claiming that it wasn’t a riot after all, just a case of a few individuals making mischief. This disgusting revision of not-so-distant history has been going on for a while over at the Link’s website. They’re also trying to make the claim that this wasn’t the case of anti-Israel demonstrators rioting in a racist, hateful manner, but the case of “two groups facing off” – thus implying that the victims of the riot were just as guilty as the instigators.

Then, the CSU tries to blame the administration for “unfairly persecuting” those arrested. Never mind that arrests were only made after careful and exhaustive revision of video footage and accounts from the day. But in CSU lingo, anyone arrested is being “unfairly” persecuted by the “brutal” police.

Then, Engler tries to justify the riots by vilifying Netanyahu.

We’ve heard this before. It’s the same old song and dance. And I can’t say I’m surprised at the CSU. Disgusted, yes, but not particularly surprised. I just want to add one thing, though: if these people are so clearly and obviously lying about what happened here, in our own city, just a few months ago, why should anyone take their word on anything they say about events taking place elsewhere?

Anyone involved in the disgusting riot of September 9th ought to be ashamed, and punished. The fact that Mr. Engler and his CSU cohorts are proud of what happens should tell you all you need to know about what kind of people they are.

AN Australasian Union of Jewish Students (AUJS) executive member was physically attacked as last week’s annual National Union of Students (NUS) conference descended into violence.

[. . .]

Conference observer Sibella Stern said that a brawl broke out during the debate on anti-terror legislation when about three students were hit.

“That was very scary for me. It was a moment of panic. We didn’t know what was coming next, what it would turn in to,” Stern said.

The following day, during a debate on Iraq, a knife was found on the conference floor prompting calls for police intervention.

I’m detecting a pattern. Student unions are becoming bastions of antisemitism, intimidation and violence against Jewish students, and prejudice against Israel. University campuses are emitting some of the most virulent hate. Concordia is certainly not alone, as this latest Australian episode proves.

But why is that? Why, when centuries of chronicling racism and hate have shown that it is usually more prevalent among the uneducated or narrow-minded, are universities leading the way for the new antisemitism? Universities! The exact places where people are supposed to learn to think critically, to broaden their horizons, and to make their place in society!

I’d be tempted to say it’s merely the association of the Left with the “Palestinian cause” that has led to student unions turning into cesspools of anti-Israel hatred, but I don’t think that’s it. Why specifically students, as opposed to other unionized people or left-wingers?

Of course, students have long been associated with movements for change, ever since the radical movements of the 60’s and 70’s. Idealism is found more among the young, who believe they have the power to change the world. That in itself is usually a good thing. So where does it go wrong?

As they say, a little knowledge can be a dangerous thing. Buoyed by the false nostalgia for their parents’ generation’s activist politics – which they regret missing out on – many students are choosing to take a limited number of facts and interpret false conclusions from them. This continues when they then teach those conclusions to other students, and so on, and so forth, until we have entire international movements of people who buy in. And they’ve shown repeatedly that they’ll do whatever it takes to shut down their political opponents – including resorting to violence.

The question is, where does it end?

The Canadian Jewish Congress is supporting Hillel’s lawsuit against the CSU, and has set up a legal fund to solicit donations from supporters. See the press release for more details. B’nai Brith Canada is also seeking intervener status in the lawsuit on behalf of the Hillel plaintiffs.

Classes resume at Concordia this week, so look for more updates as the news happens.

“Jews in Belgium live today in a new reality, one in which they cannot express their sympathy for Israel in any way,” reflects a historian at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel, the Free University of Brussels. His angry comment came in response to death threats aimed at two Jewish students who put up pro-Israeli posters on campus earlier this month.

Benjamin and Nicole, who agreed to be identified only by their first names, study natural sciences at the Free University, and belong to the Friends of Israel association. Two weeks ago, they and a few other students put up some pro-Israel posters in the student union area of the Brussels campus. The posters conveyed messages such as “Which was the first state in the Middle East which gave Arab women the right to vote,” or “Terror attacks against civilians are an abomination.” Along the bottom of the posters was written “If you’re for tolerance, don’t rip this off the wall,” in anticipation that a leftist group would be likely to remove the new posters.

The next morning, the two students received phone calls from an anonymous caller who had a Middle Eastern accent, and threatened to attack them. “We know who you are and where you live,” the caller threatened, in the call to Nicole. “We also know that you have a brother, as well as the license number of your car and the place where you park it.” The caller continued: “If the flyer isn’t removed by the evening, we’ll burn the car, and harm you and your family.” Benjamin, 22, received a similar phone call.

The students reacted by taking down the posters, because those threats and follow-ups convinced them that their personal safety was at risk. But they later helped stage a rally that drew 1,000 people in support of free speech.

The point is, freedom of speech doesn’t seem to extend to Israel’s supporters on campuses around the world. Incident after incident of this ought to be enough for the alarm bell to sound. You can put up posters in support of Palestinians, Iraqis, Pagans, Wiccans, the Falun Gong, snowboarding, amateur radio, or people who pick their noses. That’s all allowed. But any kind of pro-Israel activity is being met with extraordinary efforts to shut it down.

In the wake of last year’s events, we decided some pro-activity was needed. We offered a speaker, Edwin Black, who wrote IBM and The Holocaust, to the student union. They helped to book a room, and put up posters around the school. [ . . . ] That subject was right up the alley of the anti-corporate types. The Jewish community has far too much pro-capitalist rhetoric, and apologists for corporate extremism.

Nobody’s disputing the CSU’s willingness to be accommodating to people whose speech agrees with theirs. Of course they roll out the red carpet for anyone who wants to bring in an anti-capitalist, anti-corporate speaker. That fits right in with the CSU’s politics. Nobody’s disputing the rights of someone like Edwin Black to be heard. I even agree that there has been too little attention paid to the role of certain corporations in the Holocaust. All that, of course, is besides the point.

No, this dispute is about freedom of speech extending to those with whom the CSU disagrees. True freedom means allowing anti-corporate types to speak, and also pro-corporate types. It means allowing pro-Palestinians to speak and also pro-Israel speakers. It means helping left-wing, right-wing, and non-wing alike to be heard.

The letter goes on to criticize the Jewish community leadership compared to the CSU:

And let’s not keep calling these people anti-democratic. We never voted for the leadership of Montreal’s Jewish community. In fact, we find their unabashed support for Israel, no matter what is done there, to be an embarrassment. When will our community welcome dissent, as a sign of strength and not of weakness?

Ah, but there’s a key difference. Nobody voted for the Jewish community leaders because we all have a choice whether or not to be represented by them. We don’t pay tax to these people, we give donations. We can choose to agree with some of these community groups some of the time and disagree other times. These groups are interest groups, and their views are pro-Israel. Mr. Wallace and Mr. and Ms. Bailey have every right to dissent.

Concordia students don’t have this choice. They have to pay fees to the CSU or else they can’t take their classes. The CSU legally represents all students, whether they like it or not. CSU fees aren’t voluntary – they’re compulsory. And that is why the CSU’s flagrant abuse of democracy is so disturbing. When CSU executive members illegally annul by-election results and appoint themselves to remain in power after being recalled by the students, when council members elected to represent their constituents instead use their positions to advance their own political views, and when thousands of dollars of student money is used to defend people who assaulted some of those same students, then that’s abuse.

The CSU may act nicely towards people with whom they agree. But the true judge of an elected representatitve is his or her ability to act nicely towards people with whom they disagree.

Shalom Chaverim,

As most of you should know, Concordia Hillel is proceeding with the lawsuit against the CSU. Don’t be mistaken, despite announcements in the media, Hillel has not been re-instated. The CSU is still withholding our funds and are making a thinly veiled attempt at blackmailing us into submission. Our rights have been trampled upon. Be it known that we will not back down.

Concordia Hillel is an association of students but has no legal status in and of itself. The club can’t take action in its own name. As such we are seeking volunteers from among Hillel’s constituents (i.e. Jewish students of Concordia) to serve as plaintiffs in our case against the CSU.

Plaintiffs have to be available for time-consuming depositions and court appearances. Court records and proceedings will be public, so potential plaintiffs should consider that their anonymity cannot be preserved. As well, in the unlikely event that we should lose, the plaintiffs COULD be sued for court costs, but not to worry as the Hillel Foundation would cover it.

If you’ve read through all of this and are still interested in filing suit with us, please get back to me ASAP as we’re proceeding soon.

Sincerely in your service,

Noah Joseph

Co-President

Concordia Hillel

For more information, contact Noah.

UQÀM officials would doubtless protest – without question truthfully – that they haven’t an anti-Semitic bone in their bodies. And yet they evidently failed to discern the larger pattern: Kouts, after all, is not the only prominent Israeli recently prevented from speaking at a Montreal (read: Canadian) university. In September, glass-smashing thugs silenced former Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu at Concordia.

Apologists quickly absolved the pro-Palestinian hooligans responsible for the window breaking. Blame, they argued, belonged to Mr. Netanyahu for being so controversial. Concordia, they maintained, was at fault for letting such a controversial politician speak. No violent controversy would have occurred, they insisted, had the university foreseen the security risk inherent in Mr. Netanyahu’s appearance.

Mob violence, in other words, wasn’t the fault of the violent mob. Responsibility, rather, was placed on those who saw no reason for a mob or violence. Windows were smashed because the university failed to install glass strong enough to resist pounding fists.

Sounds an awful lot like Jaggi Singh’s arguments, doesn’t it?

Anti-Semitism thrives because slandering Israel is the only aggression against a minority that is encouraged by the rules of political correctness.

Along similar lines, universities have allowed Middle East departments to disseminate anti-Israel propaganda to an extent unimaginable a generation ago, representing violations of intellectual honesty and academic impartiality that may be unique in our academic life.

Worth a read.

This is just weeks after NDP MPs Svend Robinson and Libby Davies spoke outside Concordia – after an injunction prevented them from speaking on campus – in support of the CSU and against the temporary moratorium on mideast events. I guess Alexa McDonough just wanted to make it really really clear, for anyone who was confused, that the NDP supports the alliance between the Palestinian movement and the Left.

NDP leader Alexa McDonough spoke out yesterday in heartfelt support of Canadian Muslims. Since the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, she said, “they have been on the receiving end of hateful sentiments.”

McDonough received a standing ovation from the crowd of about 100 people at Concordia University. She appeared on a panel, Citizens Under Siege, organized by the Canadian Muslim Forum and Alternative Perspective Media.

Of course, speaking out against racism is never wrong. But McDonough was making a political statement by holding her speech at Concordia, and by specifically only referring to anti-Muslim racism and supporting the “Palestinian cause” at a site where anti-Jewish racism has been especially rampant.

The NDP leader noted that her party had been Ottawa sponsors of the UN-sanctioned International Day of Solidarity With the Palestinian People – though “some irresponsible members of the media will portray that in a dishonest way. Thank God for the alternate media.”

McDonough urged Palestinian activists not only to speak out, but to reach out to build coalitions with other people. But she admitted, “It’s not always easy to get beyond the dire circumstances at the centre of your cause.”

In true NDP fashion, a bit of America-bashing and Bush-bashing was thrown in for good measure.

The NDP leader deplored the “message of hatred” set in motion by U.S. President George W. Bush, when he told the world: “Either you’re with us or you’re against us.” McDonough dryly commented, “Most of us see much better choices.”

Yeah, most of us do see better choices . . . certainly we see better choices than you, Ms. McDonough.

Council has authorized Christmas bonuses for the CSU’s executive. President Friesinger will get $600, while the remaining five executives will get up to $300 each, plus an extra $100 for those with a perfect attendance record at Council meetings.

Note that these “bonuses” come straight from student money, which all undergrads at Concordia are forced to fork over each term or else they risk being de-registered from their courses. So nice to see democracy in action.

As you may know, Concordia Hillel has filed suit against the CSU for failing to provide us with due process when passing a motion to ban Hillel on campus, thereby violating our right of association, expression, and religion.

Following a meeting with our lawyer, Michael Bergman, the following is what we need from the students at Concordia who feel the CSU does not represent them, (or has not in the past) and feel their rights have been violated:

We need students to come to the Hillel house on Sunday December 15th @ 11:00 a.m. (3460 Stanley street) prepared to make a statement if you feel you have been offended by the actions (or lack thereof) of the CSU. Only Concordia students came make statements, but non-Concordia students are welcome to help us prepare for trial.

We need help sorting through the piles of evidence we have against the CSU.

The following is what we need help researching specifically:

• Everything about the CSU meeting December 2nd, when the motion was passed to ban Hillel on campus
• Chronology of events surrounding the Benjamin Netanyahu visit
• Any anti-Semitic, or anti-Zionist materials published, speakers or events approved by the CSU (last year’s agenda, SPHR’s tombstone display, posters put up by the SPHR approved by the CSU, emphasis on the role of the CSU and CSU executives in any of these events, etc)
• Violations of the moratorium
• How the CSU controls space on campus
• Anti-Israel, Anti-Semitic resolutions passed by the CSU over the past two years

If you have any personal knowledge of any or all of the above, and you’re a Concordia student, please take the time to go over there and make a statement.

The following article, entitled Student ‘tolerance’: Palestinian activists brook little opposition on a Montreal campus by Shafer Parker first appeared in Report Magazine on December 18, 2000:

Simmering discord between the two groups erupted into open conflict last month when the local chapter of Hillel, an international Jewish student support group, displayed on their information table a widely circulated column entitled “Myths of the Middle East,” by Arab-American journalist Joseph Farah, who serves in the U.S. as editor and chief executive officer of the on-line magazine WorldNetDaily (www.worldnetdaily.com). The column, which first appeared in the Jerusalem Post, argues that the Palestinian fight for a homeland and for control of Muslim holy sites in Jerusalem are merely a cover for the Arab world’s intention to erase Israel from the Middle East.

[. . .]

But instead of refuting Mr. Farah’s assertions, an Arab student group, Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights (SPHR), insisted that the offending material be immediately removed from the information table. It then passed a resolution within the Concordia Student Union (CSU) condemning Hillel for disseminating material that was “racially, ethnically and religiously discriminating.”

Hillel spokesman and Concordia business major Yossi Lanton says the official condemnation was unnecessary because Hillel took steps to undo the damage as soon as they were told their material was offensive. “We had that column off the table 20 minutes after it first appeared,” he says. “Later we apologized. But that wasn’t considered good enough because the apology was made in the CSU council meeting to the Muslim Students’ Association, not in public to the SPHR.”

But what rankles most with Mr. Lanton is his perception that the CSU supports a double standard in regard to the SPHR. “They repeatedly play videos in the student centre that show things like an Israeli policeman beating a Palestinian,” he says. “And when the SPHR held a march this fall to protest the ongoing violence in the Middle East, they had banners that equated the Star of David with a swastika. Someone tried to burn an Israeli flag, and when a Jewish girl ran to rescue it, the crowd started chanting ‘Down, down with Israel.’” When Hillel asked for an apology, spokesmen for the Palestinian group denied responsibility, blaming non-member “extremists” for the excesses.

CSU president Rob Green brushes off Hillel’s accusation that the SPHR is allowed to distribute material offensive to Jews. “No one has ever shown me any SPHR material that opposes the Jewish culture, people or religion,” he says. “The SPHR is focused exclusively on the behaviour of the Jewish state.” Confusion over what materials are acceptable arises, he says, because “the minute anyone says something against the state of Israel, the Jews start crying anti-Semitism. But it’s not the same thing.” Which is a shame, he adds, because “a lot of Palestinian students want nothing more than a democratic debate on these issues.”

Hillel’s concerns over the abuse of democracy rose to new heights on November 27, when a CSU resolution calling for Israel to enforce UN Security Council Resolution 242 was supposed to be debated and approved. Resolution 242, which was originally approved in November 1967, calls on Israel to withdraw from all the territories it occupied at the end of the Six Day War and to “achieve a just settlement of the refugee problem.” Concerned that the Palestinians could easily approve the resolution in overwhelming numbers, Hillel called for a boycott of the vote.

Which may have worked, says dean of students Donald Boisvert, because only 411 students showed up, 111 short of the number needed to form a quorum. “But then again,” he says, “we’re approaching exam time. A lot of students may have decided they needed to study.” Mr. Boisvert says that even though Hillel was prevented from distributing a particular piece of information, he sees no need to defend their right to free speech. “We stand back from ruling on what is appropriate and inappropriate,” he says. Nevertheless, he insists he would never allow anyone to distribute hate literature. Asked about the banners equating the swastika and the Star of David, he replies, “Well, I can’t get into what an individual Palestinian decides to do or not do.” He acknowledges the Palestinians are numerous enough to dominate campus discussions. But he cannot say how many of each group are on campus. “We don’t ask for that kind of information,” he says.

The real issue, says Mr. Farah, whose column sparked Concordia’s recent unrest, is whether freedom still exists on North American campuses. He sees a growing intolerance for meaningful free speech within academia that, in his opinion, seems even worse in Canada than in the U.S. “But these days campus demonstrations everywhere are often in opposition to free speech,” he says, “which is ironic considering student activism began in the 1960s with the free-speech movement.”

Freedom is also the reason why even Arabs ought to support the existence of Israel, Mr. Farah says. “I’ve travelled extensively throughout the Middle East,” he says. “And I can tell you that unlike Israel, Arab-controlled lands are one giant police state. Until the Arab world demonstrates it believes in individual rights, Arab students in the West ought to be most concerned about what’s going on in their homelands.”

Just replace Yossi Lanton with Noah Joseph, and Rob Green with Sabine Freisinger. Anyone feeing a sense of deja-vu?

These are just a few of the articles with updates. If you come across more, let me know.

I couldn’t be there to give a firsthand account but apparently over 100 people showed up to support Hillel. Kudos to everyone who went! At any rate, the Link has an extensive article covering the issue, along with several photos. Definitely check it out for more details.

I’ll just add that Hillel’s having an open general meeting this Sunday, December 15th, at 8pm. Anyone who has ideas, wants to help out, or is simply pissed off and feels the need to do something, is invited. For details on location, e-mail Noah Sarna, co-president of Concordia Hillel.

Lawyer Michael Bergman said yesterday he plans to file a civil action against the Concordia Student Union in Quebec Superior Court by next week seeking annulment of the suspension of Hillel’s rights and privileges.

The university will be named as a co-party to the action, and be asked to “take control of its own space and property” and enable Concordia Hillel to carry on its religious and secular programs.

If necessary, Concordia would be asked to place the CSU under trusteeship, Bergman warned.

Hillel would also seek “significant” punitive damages for infringing on “the freedoms, liberties and constitutional rights of Concordia’s Jewish students and their association, Concordia Hillel,” the group’s co-presidents said in a statement.

As many of you know, the CSU will be meeting tonight to attempt to pass motions forcing Hillel – and other groups – to sign agreements before their club can be reinstated. On this point, Hillel’s lawyer said the following:

The student government has since backtracked, saying Hillel can be reinstated if it signs a commitment not to distribute material that promotes war.

A motion is to be presented at a council meeting tonight calling for Hillel’s immediate reinstatement, while another restates that all campus clubs sign the commitment.

Bergman, acting as Hillel’s counsel, said the group will continue to refuse because “signing it would mean we are against the war on terrorism, a war against Iraq, a war in self-defence, a war to protect Canadian soil.”

Essentially what it comes down to is the CSU’s refusal to accept that others may not share their views, but still have the right to freedom of speech. The CSU’s politicians are anti-war. Hillel – from my view, normally a peace-loving organization – is being asked to sign an agreement to share that view, or else it will not be allowed to operate on campus.

Hillel’s views on peace or war are irrelevant. What is relevant here is the principle of the thing. The CSU cannot dictate to any of its member clubs what to believe or what political views to hold. If Hillel wants to be a pro-Israel club, the CSU can’t ban it from operating because the CSU is pro-Palestinian. If some other student group wants to endorse free trade, the CSU cannot ban it because the CSU is anti-free trade. And if tomorrow, a group of students wanted to form a pro-war group, then the CSU really has no right whatsoever to disallow it on the grounds that they are “demilitarized”.

Freedom of speech applies to everyone – agree or disagree. And that is the real issue at stake here. The CSU is going to try to pass more motions against Hillel tonight. See below for the appeal to the community to show up and protest.

STAND UP TO THE CSU!!!!!

As many of you know, the CSU banned Hillel Concordia on campus, the only representative voice of Jewish students at Concordia. On Thursday December 12, 2002 the CSU will be convening to pass motions regarding Hillel. Please meet us at 8:00 p.m. in the Hall Bldg. (De Maisonneuve ave. between Mackay and Bishop) in front of room H110, so we can walk into the CSU meeting together. This is your chance to be heard, represent yourself, and take a stand.

(Non-Concordia students welcome)

Unfortunately I’ll be out of town so I won’t be able to attend. But if you are in any way capable of going, please do. And spread the word. Concordia Hillel needs our help.

For those of you who are a little confused with the chain of events, I’ll attempt to clarify:

Hillel sent a lawyer’s letter by bailiff to the CSU last week, informing them that legal action would be taken if the resolution to freeze Hillel’s funding and suspend its privileges was not rescinded by Monday (yesterday) at 5pm. By that deadline yesterday, the CSU had failed to respond.

In a JTA article, the CSU was said to have “conditionally reinstated Hillel’s privileges”. But the CSU didn’t actually restore Hillel’s funding and privileges. Instead, first in a proposed deal by CSU president Sabine Freisinger, and now in proposed resolutions by council, they’re aiming to reinstate Hillel under certain “conditions” only.

The “conditional” reinstatement of Hillel is unacceptable. The CSU screwed up, and now they want to impose conditions to try and make Hillel pay even though it did nothing wrong. That’s like stealing a car from a guy, and then demanding $1000 to return it.

Hillel deserves nothing less than a full apology and a reinstatement of all its privileges – unconditionally. Anything less is not only an insult, but a travesty of justice.

Stay tuned . . .

But the following may shed some light into why the university cancelled the planned talk in the first place:

Desmarais said the university received two threatening phone calls after posters advertising Kouts’s talk were put up around campus on Wednesday.

The anonymous callers threatened the event with the same type of violence that marred the anti-Netanyahu protest.

“Suddenly, some people became very tense at UQÀM,” Desmarais said. “It was asked, ‘Are we going to have the same things happen here that we saw elsewhere?’ – namely Concordia.”

Kudos to UQÀM for not giving into this kind of bald-faced blackmail. And to the cowards who made those calls, if you’re out there, know this: We have no tolerance for your kind of mob rule here in Canada. This is a free and open society and even people you disagree with have the right to be heard.

(Kouts) said he is surprised and more than a little mystified by the university’s decision to scrap his appearance. “I’m not inciting anyone. I’ve never killed anyone. I’m just a journalist and a university professor who was coming to talk to Jewish and non-Jewish students about my experience (in Beirut),” said Kouts, who was to speak tomorrow.

Hillel’s ads for the event consisted of posters and handbills showing a Star of David with a slash through it, and the words “De Durban à Beyrouth, l’exclusion d’Israel et des juifs”. Looks like Montreal has to be added to that list now too.

Kouts is the same journalist who had his credentials revoked at the Francophonie Summit last October for being Israeli and filing reports with an Israeli TV station. Anyone in Lebanon with Israeli nationality is subject to arrest and deportation. So Kouts is no stranger to controversy. But he’s still perplexed at the turn of events at UQÀM.

“In my mind, it’s censorship. It astounds me that this could happen in a free city like Montreal . . . I’ve never had this happen in France or in any Arab country I’ve visited,” Kouts said.

Kouts will deliver his speech at the Federation CJA Building instead, but won’t have the opportunity to address students.

This is a clear case of censorship and the repression of the right to free speech. Just like at Concordia, pro-Israel speakers and students at UQÀM are having their rights trampled on. This needs to be fought wherever and whenever it happens.

Everyone who gets upset with what’s going on at Concordia blames the administration, but they are totally powerless on the issue. The CSU is a separate and legal institution, and as such the admin has no recourse against them unless they start breaking laws. I know that it’s hard to understand, because the CSU is ON university premises, and therefore people wonder why the admin just doesn’t step in and stop them.

Problem is, the CSU successfully won an “accreditation” vote in September 2000, which gave it official status as the representative of Concordia undergrad students. It legally owns it’s office space on the 6th floor, it owns the Reggie’s space, it owns the Java U space, it co-owns the Mezz space on the 2nd floor, it owns the Hive at Loyola, and it collects approximately $600,000 from students every year, which is part of it’s annual overall budget of approximately $1.2 million. This is not a trivial student club; it is a powerful, legal, and resourceful institution that is being run by legally elected members of the student body. The admin is literally not allowed to step in and do anything to it unless it has just cause. And as long as whatever the CSU is doing only affects students, the admin can’t do a damn thing: in the eyes of the law it’s up to the students to change things because they’re the members of the student union.

So, as a result, it’s pointless to attack the admin because they are the CSU’s BIGGEST enemy, and the enemy of your enemy is your friend. Trust me when I tell you that if the admin could take down the union in ANY way possible they’d do it at the drop of a hat.

In other words, the fight is against the CSU, not the Concordia admin. The real change needs to come at the ballot box.

After I posted the admin’s official response, and took a jab at them for their failure to take a firm stand, several people criticized me for criticizing the admin instead of the CSU. After all, they said, the CSU is a separate legal entity, and the admin has no control over them (despite desperately wishing it did, at times). The CSU has a long history of trying to demonize and villainize the admin at every turn, and loves to make blanket antisemitic accusations about the “Zionist-controlled, corporate-controlled administration”. Furthermore, it is clear from this article that the CSU’s goal all along was to attempt to use this to make the admin look bad:

The other loophole is that Hillel’s club privileges are suspended, not permanently, but just until the university administration investigates and clears them. Slater explains the reasoning, “CSU has a reputation for being hostile to Hillel. We wanted the final decision to be in someone else’s hands.” McIntosh adds, “The university could clear Hillel tomorrow and we’d restore everything. Of course, that would make the university an accessory to the crime and that suits us just fine.”Slater agrees, “The university will have trouble with the Arab and Muslim students if they clear Hillel and trouble with B’nai Brith if they don’t.”

For the most part, I agree with readers that criticizing the admin plays right into the hands of the CSU. If you read what I wrote following the September 9th riots that shut down Netanyahu’s speech, you’ll see that I came to the same conclusion:

I’ve seen petitions calling on the university administration and on the police to deal with the perpetrators of the violence, but blaming either or both of these groups only plays into the hands of those who are trying to pass the buck. I’ve heard of people withholding donations from Concordia until the school cleans up its act — but the school administrators would love nothing more than to get rid of these thorns in their side; their hands are tied, and they’re just as frustrated with the situation as we are.

I still believe that. I cannot emphasize this enough. The group to blame here is the CSU, not the Concordia administration. And in terms of the actual decisions and actions that the admin has taken, I think they are absolutely right to refuse to let the CSU pass the decision to them on this one. It is the CSU’s responsibility, and therefore, the CSU’s failure to exercise its power responsibly.

My reasons for taking a dig at the admin have very little to do with this specific issue, and more to do with the general lack of strong leadership at Concordia. One of the reasons the CSU has been so successful in taking over the school in the past few years is that nobody’s willing to stand up to them. Not the “silent majority” of students who don’t bother to vote in elections. Not the faculty. And not the admin.

Without getting directly involved, the admin could have made its opinion stronger. Instead of worrying about staying on the fence to be politically-correct, it could have taken a stand and stated firmly and clearly that what the CSU did was wrong. That doesn’t mean they have to step in to change anything – and it doesn’t mean people should be blaming them for something that is the CSU’s fault. But when you have a situation where there are no moral checks and balances, the loudest voice gets heard the most.

Still, if you’re angry about the CSU’s actions, blame them, not the Concordia administration. I just want to make that clear.

Dec. 6, 2002 – The university has learned that the CSU Executive has apparently reversed the recent decision of the CSU Council with respect to the sanctions taken against Hillel. They have, however, imposed new conditions for the reinstatement of Hillel. The university remains concerned about the original Council decision, which effectively shut down the operations of Hillel, one of the CSU constituent organizations. The original CSU Council actions were based on the charge that Hillel was allegedly distributing materials on campus recruiting for the Israeli military.

The CSU Council meeting was held Monday, December 2, the last day of classes for the fall term and on the eve of the university’s examination period. The resolution was considered at approximately midnight. Only 9 of the 27 CSU counsellors were present and the resolution passed by a margin of 8 to 1. Subsequently, CSU Vice President – Communications Yves Engler has stated that the CSU would reinstate Hillel’s privileges if the university administration requested them to do so.

It is important to note that the CSU is an autonomous corporation accredited under the laws of Québec. Through this accreditation, the CSU essentially has the status, power and responsibilities akin to that of an accredited labour union. As such, they are accountable to their own board and beyond that to the Québec government, whose laws afford them this status.

The CSU has the authority and the responsibility to monitor the actions of its constituent organizations and sanction them for appropriate reasons. It is our understanding that they sanctioned Hillel for distributing information regarding recruitment for a foreign military force which, the CSU alleges, is illegal in Canada. It is unclear whether due process was followed before the CSU Council decision was taken. In fact, the university has been informed that Hillel has engaged an attorney who has sent a formal legal demand to the CSU outlining a number of procedural irregularities and demanding that the decision be reversed by 5:00 p.m. on Monday, December 9.

More to the point, it is the duty of the CSU to exercise its authority in a manner which is fair, equitable, and above all, proportionate and non-partisan. In the university’s opinion, the current sanctions against Hillel are wholly disproportionate and should be modified.

In light of these facts, it is obvious that Mr. Engler’s statements are inappropriate and self-serving. The CSU has asserted on many occasions that, as a result of its accreditation, it is illegal for the university to intervene in CSU business. Therefore, it is particularly offensive to request the university overturn CSU Council decisions on an invitation-only basis when it is to the advantage of the CSU. The CSU Executive has the authority to take the same action that they have requested of the university administration. We cannot absolve them of their responsibility and legal duty to conduct their affairs in a fair, equitable and non-partisan manner. And the university certainly cannot, and will not, intervene on a periodic basis or by invitation only, especially when it does not have the legal authority to do so.

If the CSU feels that it cannot carry out its legal responsibilities in a manner that is fair and equitable, and if they believe that they require help to do so, then they may turn to the government for help in the form of a government-appointed trustee who would be legally empowered to oversee the CSU.

If the CSU believes that it is exercising its legal authority fairly and in a non-partisan manner, then it is the responsibility of the students at the ballot box each spring to decide whether they agree..

*Sigh* As usual, they’ve taken a position that’s about as firm as quicksand. Come on, guys, would it kill you to once – just once – take a stand?

MONTREAL, December 6, 2002 – Concordia Hillel has concluded its internal investigation into the circumstances surrounding the suspension of its club privileges by the Council of Representatives of the Concordia Student Union.

The allegations that Concordia Hillel violated the Foreign Enlistment Act by distributing a flier recruiting for the Israeli Defence Forces are entirely unfounded. The flier in question was not a Hillel flier, but rather the brochure of an independent organization with no ties whatsoever to Hillel. The flier was not put out by Hillel, or by any official representative thereof. Though the flier was allegedly found on a Concordia Hillel information table, it was never approved or endorsed by Concordia Hillel or any agent or official thereof. Further, the presence of the flier on the Hillel table was not brought to the attention of the Hillel leadership until the matter was brought before the CSU Council in a surprise, politically motivated motion to suspend Hillel.

Hillel is the Jewish Student Union at Concordia and represents the Jewish students of the university. Its mandate is to provide programs and services to meet the cultural, social, religious, and advocacy needs of Concordia’s Jewish students. It does not, nor has it ever, recruited for the IDF or any other foreign agency of any kind. The motion passed by the CSU, in violation of the rules governing the adoption of such motions, was a deliberate attempt by certain forces within the CSU to smear the good name of Concordia Hillel and, in doing so, to silence their political opponents on campus. The resulting motion is a violation of the rights of Concordia Hillel to due process and, in effect if not intent, of the rights to freedom of religion, freedom of expression and freedom of assembly of the Jewish student at Concordia.

In light of this information, we call on the CSU to immediately, and without condition or qualification, rescind the motion passed at the last meeting of the Council. We further call upon them to issue a full public apology to Hillel for failing to provide us with due process. The CSU has been duly notified that we intend to take legal action against them should they fail to comply with these demands.

Well, there you have it. I don’t intend to hold my breath waiting for a CSU apology, though. I think I’d be blue in the face before they’d admit to wrongdoing.