Monday 30 January 2012

BANGASH EXPOSED! The radical plan to import the Iranian revolution to the Canadian Muslim community

In a follow-up to Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center's letter to the President of McMaster University in Hamilton, ON expressing alarm over radical Islamist Zafar Bangash's presentation on the university campus, Tarek Fatah spoke to SUN TV about Bangash's speech, and his outrageous advocacy of Mahmoud Ahmedinejad's murderous regime in Iran.





Tuesday 24 January 2012

FSWC protests presentation at McMaster University by anti-Israel supporter of Iran-Style revolution in the Muslim world


Dear Dr. Deane,

I am writing to draw your attention to yet another anti-Israel speaker coming to McMaster University this week – an occurrence which has regrettably become all too common at the McMaster campus. On January 26 the group ‘Hamilton Coalition to Stop the War’ (HCSW), - an organization with a decidedly anti-Israel stance, is hosting a rabidly anti-Israel, pro-Iranian speaker, Zafar Bangash, who has repeatedly issued calls for the ‘liberation of Palestine’ as recently as this past summer at a Queens Park rally in Toronto (a rally in which he sneeringly referred to US President Barack Obama as, “… this black man in the white house...”)

Mr. Bangash has been quoted in the past advising Israelis to go “back where they came from: the U.S., Canada, Europe, Russia, whoever is willing to take them in,” warning, “The struggle for the liberation of Palestine will not be easy; it will demand an even greater price in blood than has already been paid. But nobody ever said that the Islamic movement will find anything easy.”

Despite ongoing threats by the Iranian regime to Israel, and Iran’s subjugation of its own people, Mr. Bangash is committed to the Iranian theocratic model, stating, "Muslims must strive to overthrow the oppressive systems in their societies through Islamic revolutions…;” he supports the imposition of shariah law and was captured on video shouting at the Queens Park rally, “Inshallah I see that day when we, the Muslims, will march on Palestine and liberate Palestine . . .  under Islamic law.”

Monday 23 January 2012

RESPONSE BY FRIENDS OF SIMON WIESENTHAL CENTER FOR HOLOCAUST STUDIES RE: OBAMA ASSASSINATION COMMENT IN ATLANTA JEWISH TIMES


Toronto- January 23, 2012:  “The suggestion made by the newly resigned owner and publisher of the Atlanta Jewish Times in the US concerning the assassination of President Obama by Israel over the handling of Iran is shockingly irresponsible and outrageous,” said Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center President and CEO Avi Benlolo. “I am proud to note that, following the example of the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles, this repugnant statement has been rightly condemned by leaders of all mainstream Jewish communities in the United States. Violence is not a Jewish value,” he added.


Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center for Holocaust Studies Commends Canadian Decision to Deport Alleged Rwandan War Criminal


Toronto- January 23, 2012:  Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center for Holocaust Studies (FSWC) commends the decision by the Canada Border Services Agency to deport alleged Rwandan war criminal Léon Mugesera. Mugesera, a former Rwandan government official, is implicated in the genocide of at least 800,000 Rwandans in 1994 following a speech 18 months earlier in which he advocated the expulsion and murder of ethnic Tutsis and moderate Hutus by his extremist Hutu followers.


“As we learned from the efforts of Nazi war criminals who hoped to find safe haven in Canada, there is and should never be a place in this country for people who are responsible for heinous crimes,” said Avi Benlolo, President and CEO of FSWC. “The Canadian government is to be commended on deporting Mugesera. Canada should not become a haven for war criminals and mass murderers,” he emphasized.

FOLLOWING WIESENTHAL PROTEST, ARGENTINIAN PAPER APOLOGIZES FOR CAUSING 'ANGUISH OR PAIN'

Following a protest launched by the Simon Wiesenthal Center to the Argentine newspaper Pagina/12 regarding a comic strip mocking victims of the Holocaust, the paper has issued an apology.

The Simon Wiesenthal Center had expressed indignation at a comic strip titled “An Adventure of David Gueto (Ghetto),” in the weekly 'Young Culture" section of the Argentine daily Pagina/12, (http://www.pagina12.com.ar/diario/suplementos/no/34-5779-2012-01-19.html).

Its author, Gustavo Sala apparently sought to parody DJ David Guetta with a character named “David Gueto (Ghetto),” who promotes a dancing party for the prisoners in a Nazi concentration camp. When prisoners complain that “we are being gassed and exterminated,” a caricature of Adolf Hitler tells them that “some dancing won’t make you any worse,” adding that “if they are relaxed, you get a better soap.”



Tuesday 10 January 2012

Lemire's Right to Free Speech--and Ours

By Avi Benlolo in the Huffington Post


The question of Section 13 of Canada's Human Rights Act (CHRA) dealing with hate speech has come to a head over the case of Marc Lemire, who was the last president of the neo-Nazi white supremacist group, Heritage Front, and is now a webmaster of a controversial site created in the name of free speech. Lemire is currently challenging the constitutionality of Section 13 after he was vindicated on an earlier Section 13 complaint regarding his website. Undoubtedly, Lemire wants to free cyberspace from restrictions posed by Section 13 to allow him to post freely any and all information.
Clearly there are problems with the operation of Section 13 that deals with intolerable expressions and protects against specific forms of hate speech. In its own words, Section 13 empowers the Canadian Human Rights Commission "to deal with complaints regarding the communication of hate messages by telephone or on the Internet."