Activists from Jews Say NO to Genocide are working to challenge the coordinated narratives around the antisemitic violence at Bondi Beach in Australia - narratives that help pave the way for dangerous legislation like Canada's own Bill C9.

Louise, also of Independent Jewish Voices, goes over Carney's pending Act to Amend the Criminal Code, and its possible ramifications. From the new intimidation offence, to the vague wording around restricted spaces and symbols, the case is made that this is another tool for the powerful to suppress opponents at will.

Toronto based activist, Molly Kraft, also of SURJ Toronto, talks about how the prioritizing the feelings of some at the expense of the rights of others is all just part of the larger scheme to suppress dissent and benefit, not Jewish people, but white, Christian nationalists, Imperialism and ultimately, Capital.

Gur Tsabar, of the Movement Media Hub and spokesperson for the group, says we need to be asking the hard questions in the immediate wake of events like Bondi Beach and October 7th. He insists its in those moments the machinery working against us goes into overdrive to lay the "moral foundation" for the horrors that come next.

Hosted by: Jessa McLean

Call to Action: Say NO to Bill C-9 (Action Network Petition)

Related Episodes:

1. Jews Say NO to Genocide (Dec 2024) The organization's first appearance on Blueprints to talk about the Jewish identity crisis purposely being crafted by the Israeli lobby.
2. Weaponizing Canadian Law for Israel (Jul 2024) Martin Lukacs on Toronto Police's Project Resolute and the secretive committee tasked with cracking down on Palestinian solidarity activism.

More Resources:

• The Independent: UK Terror Arrests
• CBC: On Bloc's Proposed Changes to Bill C9
• Toronto Star: Calls for Antisemitism Task Force After Bondi Beach
• Bill C-9 Threatens Freedom of Peaceful Assembly and Freedom of Expression in Canada – Canadian BDS Coalition & International BDS Allies
• Bill C9: Legislative Info

Be sure to check out our Substack for more content and resources for activists.

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There is only one

Greetings, friends. My name is Jess McLean, and I'm here to provide you with some blueprints

of disruption. This weekly podcast is dedicated to amplifying the work of activists, examining

power structures, and sharing the success stories from the grassroots. Through these discussions,

we hope to provide folks with the tools and the inspiration they need to start to dismantle

capitalism, decolonize our spaces, and bring about the political revolution that we know

we need. Good morning, everybody. We've got a few people in the studio with us today. So

we're just going to do a little bit of a round circle and have them introduce themselves.

I'm going to start with Louise, please. Hello. Thank you so much for having me here. My name

is Louise Smith and I organize with, I'm based in Toronto and I organize with Independent

Jewish Voices with Juicy No Genocide. And also once cities started creating bylaws that were

set up to Prevent protest. I was also involved with setting up a coalition. That's the Coalition

for Charter Rights and Freedoms. Did you just introduce me to something new? Oh, it's scribbling

in my notes there. Thank you, Louise. Molly, please. Hi, thanks for having me. I'm Molly

Kraft. I am a co-founder of Showing Up for Racial Justice Toronto, the first American

chapter of the, sorry, the first Canadian chapter of the American organization aimed at getting

more white people. to actively fight against white supremacy in their communities. And as

part of that, um one of the original members of the Juicy No to Genocide Coalition of anti-Zionist,

pro-Palestinian Jewish organizations in Canada that came together to organize after October

7th to make sure that there was a proud Jewish voice showing up for Palestinian movements

in Canada. You're involved with a lot of the organizations that I absolutely look up to.

I was at an event for Surge, an online webinar, and I have this write-up in my drafts ready

to go on. um It was migrant rights. You had the folks on there to raise funds, and I

thought you guys did such a good job in the event. I felt so energized, even though it

was a webinar. uh That's kind of a side note, but when you said you were Surge, I was like,

I have to mention that. That's awesome. Thank you. And Gur, Gur is back. Reminds the audience,

please. Yes, amazing, Jessica. Thanks for having us and being so generous with your platform.

I'm Gur Tsavar. I am a member of Independent Jewish Voices and a member and spokesperson

for Jews in a genocide and also the executive director of the movement Media Hub. All right.

A few weeks ago, there was an act of gun violence in Australia that a lot of people started

talking about. Bondi Beach. Why are we talking about Bondi Beach? Well, because it led to

another discussion altogether. And the narratives that surround that event are important and

they will impact the work that we do. so also keeping in mind, it's a bit of a sensitive

time and a sensitive topic. We're going to ease into it a little bit. But Molly, in that

moment when you saw this happen in the news and it was clear that people who were targeted

were Jewish. What were your initial thoughts? That's such a good question and I think initially

there's always like a moment of shock and devastation and wondering like who has been killed and

why they've been killed and I think for many of us Jews on the left the first place we go

is like please don't let this be. like a Muslim or Arab person because we know that that will

make this all so much worse. And so I think for me, what I tried to do was just read as

much as I possibly could. And of course, within minutes, this act, like you said, which was

really an act of gun violence that ended up being an anti-Semitic act targeted at the Jewish

community in Australia pretty sort of like openly. was starting to be used to manipulate dialogue

about pro-Palestinian movements. And I think that's a terror that every Jewish person on

the left fears, which is that anti-Semitism, present everywhere, present for hundreds of

years, anytime it occurs, will be used to do further harm to Palestinians and to Muslim

populations, to anyone perceived as Arab around the world. Isn't that an awkward moment though,

right? Where folks are grieving and feel fear, know, whoever generated the fear or why it's

there, you know, it's there. And our thoughts are with Palestinians. This is not acceptable

by many people, right? Like taking that moment to push back against narratives. or to question

any of the official statements that come around tragedies like that is kind of like a no-go

zone for a lot of people. I'm sure in the Jewish community, but as non-Jews too, it's kind of

like, can we even speak on this right now? Is that a selfish thing to do to worry about how

this will impact the movement? And it feels really awkward. It feels callous at sometimes,

but it feels very similar to October 7th. to be honest, in how the media is responding and

how it kind of felt, how we can talk about it. absolutely. I think that for most of us,

know, white Jews, I'm sort of speaking for the three of us, like we know that our lives are

held as more precious and more sacred, the same as white Christians in Western societies.

And we know that when shootings occur of either of those populations, we talk endlessly about

the specifics of why it happened, what we're gonna do to crack down on it, and that not

all life is afforded the same kind of, we like to say, if every life is precious, then

every life is precious, but we know that that's actually not the way that our governments treat

human life, especially for white Jews in this moment. I think it is really sad, and I think

to your point, on the left, it's really important that we establish an ability to say that doesn't

make this killing right, nor does it make the motives in line with our political fight,

i.e. my political fight is for the freedom of Palestinians and the safety of everyone that

wants to live on the lands that they should live on, Indigenous peoples everywhere. That

doesn't mean that I'm aligned with the killer of Bondi Beach. It means that I can recognize

that that will be weaponized to do further harm in the movements that I support, which means

that I need to develop that analysis of I can recognize that those people should not, the

people, sorry, who were killed, should not have been killed simply for being Jewish. And I

can see the way in which their deaths will be used to do further harm in the movements that

I'm already showing up for as a Jewish person. And it is really sad because I think a lot

of us as Jews don't even really know how to take a moment to say, it's actually kind of

scary. It is actually kind of concerning that you know, I could go to a synagogue and face

uh increased rates of anti-Semitism or violence because Israel has been on a genocidal campaign,

not just for the last two and a half years, but for uh decades upon decades. And the global

impunity that they receive to do that killing means that I am less safe as a Jewish person.

Absolutely. One of the largest contributors to anti-Semitism right now is Zionism and

the actions of the state of Israel and the justifications that they use, the imagery that they use.

And since we're going to take the time and reflect on these lives more than others, right? Even

we're doing it now, perhaps, wondering why it happened, what it all means. What's missing

from the narrative? If media are going to latch onto this and spend time on it, how can they

be doing it better? Where to begin? um Yeah, I I think, you know, I go to perhaps more,

uh much more skeptical places when uh events like these happen. I am deeply concerned

by the machinery that is in place that gets activated the moment these events happen.

And I'm deeply skeptical. of the Israeli state and what they're capable of doing.

So I think what's missing is a lot of examination of the infrastructure that exists to

proliferate what happens right after these incidents take place. And there's a lot of

And what's also missing is a lot of investigation into how such incidents happen to begin with.

We talk about October 7th and this feeling similar. And I think a perfect example is

something like the Hannibal Directive, which if you think about the beginnings of October

7th, the infrastructure the media ecosystem laid the foundation, the moral foundation for

everything that happened next. And what we didn't hear about uh and still have not had anywhere

close to a reckoning about in Western media, though it has been widely reported in Israeli

media, is something like the Hannibal Directive. And what Israel's contribution was to that

day and how deep that contribution ran. We have no idea, but what we do know for sure from

an Israeli, from the Israeli defense minister at the time, who's since spoken publicly about

giving the Hannibal directive orders is that the Israeli war machine actually targeted Israeli

citizens that day. And if that was known on day one, then perhaps we would have a very

different reality than what's transpired over the past couple of years. And so I think part

of this is all of us need to not be, it's not accidental that we're not talking about

this, right? We've been made to fear this conversation because of the accusations of antisemitism.

And I think that word has now been so drained of its meaning by Zionists. that I think it's

incumbent upon all of us to take a much, much harder look at how all these, you know, what

is actually happening. uh Because what I can tell you for sure is things are not as they

seem on the surface. tend to see a real generalization. It's just a blanket hate, right? That that's

it. It's just this kind of Yes. Blind hatred coming from... That's the story we're pitched

immediately. Terrorists, right? And then that is then personified by the entire Arab population.

That's right. The Islamophobia that builds up around these incidents is incredible in the

worst way. It greenlights it and it's scary. We did want to challenge this head on. do see

you folks doing that, but it comes with such incredible blowback, doesn't it? Especially

in moments of tragedy, right? Which is why that machinery that you mentioned is activated in

those moments, right? It's incredible. I feel like a conspiracy theorist. I felt very validated

when you used the word machinery because it was like cut and paste. They all had the same

statements. I mean, the mayor. of Toronto and global on all levels. They were all saying

the same thing like that. We've all tried to get messages out there before, right? We've

got all kinds of tools at our disposal. Okay, we're all going to talk about Bill C-9 on Tuesday,

this day. Nothing ever looks like that, right? This huge bombardment and most of it against

globalized the Intifada. they really grabbed onto this phrase. Correct. Particularly in

Australia, like they've already worked that into legislation they passed within two weeks,

which has got to be really quickly for our democracies. Does anyone want to theorize

on why this phrase now? Like we've saw from the river to the sea that had kind of like,

we could probably map this, girl, do you have one of these maps at home where? uh They've

gone after certain phrases and maybe like just couldn't. It was like fetch. They couldn't

make it happen. Right. And but now globalized the Intifada is being criminalized globally.

Yeah, it's the it's the word. Was that a concerted effort? And like, let's let's talk about that,

like how folks use that moment of tragedy to to really pitch this one line. Right. Like,

and it's going to have ramifications. Yeah, and think we need to start with just asking

the basic question. How is it that that entire mechanism united around that phrase within

hours after this tragedy? ah And we are now seeing, you know, a weeks out, we're now seeing

exactly what that plan is meant to be about. We're seeing it Toronto. We're seeing it being

talked about in the in the papers right now. ah Like it is literally, and we have to not

be scared to ask that question for fear of being labeled a conspiracy theorist or for fear of

being labeled anti-Semitic. ah Because it's, you need to ask like, how is it possible that

we've all circled around this so fast and why this phrase this time, right? Why not something

else? But I'm sure uh Molly and Louise might have different opinions. uh I have a point

that Gore and I sort of differ on, but I think it's important for the left to be able to debate

this actually really carefully and thoroughly, which is that it's important when we have a

conversation about these mechanisms and the sort of what feels like a concerted effort

to criminalize something like globalizing the anti-fata to be really clear that on the left,

there can be a likeness to a far right view that it's like, the Jewish global conspiracy

through Israel, like the tail that wags the dog, so to speak, like how does this outpost

of a state, this tiny little state, have so much control over the US? And just to be really

clear, that that dog only exists by having places like Israel do mass weapon purchasing, ah

know, checking for oil in territory that is not theirs. you know, a white outpost to fight

the like global war on terror. These are not uh accidents and they're part of global Christian

hegemonic control over uh many conflicts. And in fact, they look almost identical to what

you might see in Venezuela, what we saw in Iraq, what we've seen in other countries where an

imperial power chooses someone else to be in power over an indigenous population to have

control over usually oil resources and it's very important that the left be able to say

that instead of oh my gosh this Israeli state manages to hold so much power and that uniqueness

is because of their Jewishness because that is a global conspiracy theory that comes

from the deepest roots of antisemitism from 500 years ago, a thousand years ago. And it's

not helpful because it actually just like if the political spectrum was a circle, it just

moves from one end of the political spectrum and meets the far right crazy peoples on the

other side where they say, yeah, you're right. Those Jews do really have a lot of power and

they really do get to dictate the conversation. But like Gore said, we have to say very clearly

the dictation of this conversation comes from a global. effort to silence the Palestinian

right to that land. And that is part of Western Christian hegemonic interests of maintaining

power over, in this case, I believe, resources. We could all debate that. That could be a whole

other podcast. But it's important to say that so that then we can say, you cannot criminalize

a term, globalize the Intifada, because that is a people's call to take their land, the

Indigenous peoples of that land. and to have it and to survive and to thrive. And any use

of saying, well, it's anti-Semitic to say otherwise is absurd. And it's imperative that the left

is able to parse apart those things and say, no, it's not. It is anti-Semitic to believe

that Jews own that dialogue and that media narrative. But it is not anti-Semitic to say that we must

challenge that and we must be in the streets fighting it. And we need to show up. for our

Palestinian comrades in Toronto and our Arab and Muslim comrades in Toronto who will be

criminalized by this process. I love this. Molly is so good at explaining it all in such beautiful,

beautiful terms. And I 100 % agree with everything she said. And I think part of what I personally

try to do is, and what is, without getting into the far right conspiracy theorists world is

to also just help validate for people what it is they're like on a very basic level, on a

very surface-y level, what it is they're actually witnessing because part of all of this is

we're constantly being gaslit, right? We're constantly trying, we're being told that what

we're seeing with our own eyes is not actually true. And so I'm much more like on the, know,

Molly is like in the academic plane and I'm much more on the street just being like, no,

this is actually what you're seeing is right. It's a beautiful combination. It is. Brings

such balance. think the point Molly made too is important and made more obvious when we

start to look at the criminalization and the tools the powerful start to generate for themselves

using this narrative. It clearly benefits the powerful. right? All powerful capital and

imperialism and gives them the tool to criminalize all dissenters. Right? So I think like when

people start to look at the ramifications of the narratives that they're using, their motivations

start to unravel because, you know, they're saying they're doing it to protect this community

and that community and they're not, they're, doing it all to protect their own power. Um,

because that is ebbing away. Right? The mask has fallen, people are rising up. There is

a global intifada. There's not a call for one. There is a call for one, but it is already

happening. Molly says you can't criminalize it. I wanted to correct you. They are. Right?

Like we're going to push back against it, but just I'm going to spit a few figures out before.

And then I'm going to Louise. Right? We're going to talk about Canada. I won't steal any of

your thunder there, but. You know, in the UK, we're already seeing, and we've talked about

this a little bit on the show, like hundreds, we're in the thousands now. It's like the last,

this year, just 2025, we're not even done yet. 1,630 arrests linked to Palestinian action,

which is like a 660 % increase on terror charges. These are terror charges that carry like minimum

seven years, max 14. That's about 30 people a day. being arrested in the United Kingdom

for simply saying they support Palestine action, right? Not for committing acts of what you

would consider acts of terrorism, like kind of textbook, even though there isn't one

that we would all agree on. that's another topic altogether. you know, like literally

sitting there, know, Greta Thunberg is one of the examples that you can most recently see

cross-legged holding a cardboard sign. I oppose genocide. support Palestinian action and

that could get you seven years in prison. Two arrests since Bondi in the UK have been directly

linked to chanting globalize the Intifada. So even though that wasn't part of the legislation,

no court has kind of ruled on that. It has already been worked up into the patterns that are

happening there. And I mentioned this briefly, Australia did in fact pass legislation. they

will include in hate speech globalized intifada. And Gur, you hinted towards to Toronto, I

mentioned chow there, but Pasternak, our favorite counselor to hate right now, is suggesting,

you know, even the Palestinian flag itself is a form of harassment and should be, the use

of it should be curbed. So it's so obscene, like the obscenity and the entitlement. the

entitlement to be so obscene about other people's reality is there are no words, literally

no words for that. I'm always like, we all are, we're all always just like with our chins

on the floor for what people like Pasternak are capable of doing and asking for on a daily

basis. It's obscene. Yeah, they're looking to the UK and being like, yes, more please over

here, right? They would. fill the jails. We don't even have capacity for that. I mean,

they'll create capacity, but it's like, they think these are just, we think that they're

just throwaway comments, right? Oh, that councillor's going off again. They're laying the groundwork

for actual legislation. Right, Louise? Yeah, absolutely. And I feel like so many of these

threads and things that both Molly and Gore are talking about have been so obvious in following

the debates that have been happening. around Bill C-9. uh And it feels like people's racism

is fully on display. Like no one is pretending, they're not trying to mask it anymore. um It's

very upfront and center in the conversations that have been happening about the legislation.

And it's been interesting to see m as it evolves and the... m the infighting between the political

parties about which rights are going to be taken away and for which people. It's been

really revealing. And I don't know if I should first do kind of an overview of what's actually

in the legislation. Is it now a helpful time? Let's do that. But please make sure you put

a pin. I want to hear your reflections on that infighting and how that looks for Canadian

politics. Yeah, it's been. really interesting to see how animated the conversations are uh

and sort of the posturing between the parties on this. So I'll say that the Bill C-9, the

Combating Hate Act, was introduced by the Liberals and as part of a campaign commitment that

they had made to introduce this legislation. So I can just speak to some of the key changes

that the legislation introduces and then we can kind of like unpack them a little bit.

So one of the... upfront elements that they have is right now the attorney general has

to consent before hate charges can be laid. They're looking at removing that requirement.

They've created a hate symbol offense that says that it is a crime to promote hatred

against an identifiable group if you are displaying certain symbols. And the symbols that some

of them are explicitly named, so there are some Nazi symbols that were explicitly named in

the legislation. Then they also say symbols that are associated with entities listed on

Canada's terrorist list. And then the craziest part of it is that there is a third category,

which is symbols that closely resemble symbols of one of those terrorist entities. If it

is seen to be close enough, to one of those, then that can also be an offense. And we'll

come back to why that one is particularly terrifying. Alarm bells are already going off in the audience's

mind. Right? I mean, you can just see how it's going to be misused. And on that one, it feels

like the centering of most of the mainstream conversations about this legislation that I've

seen at least in mainstream media has been like a one sentence, this bill will mean that

you can't bring a swastika to a synagogue, is sort of like the high level. um attention that

it gets paid from the mainstream media, which is a real failure of our media because obviously

that is, you know, an emotional issue that most people hearing that would be like, yeah, sure,

you shouldn't bring us Wastaka to a synagogue. But that's not actually what this legislation

is about. um It is lazy journalism to like just pick that one specific thing and say,

see, this legislation is totally valid because of this one tiny thing, which we know is not

how this is going to be used. And then the other ones that I find really terrible are an intimidation

offense, which says that you can't intentionally provoke fear in people trying to access buildings

that are being used for religious worship or by identifiable groups for social, cultural

or other purposes. So if people inside a building feel that you are impeding their access by

making them fearful, um you can be charged with up to 10 years in prison. and uh a related

offense to that around obstruction. So if you are seen to be obstructing people entering

those kinds of buildings and the buildings that they name, it's really broad. Cultural

centers, sports arenas, if they are used for an identifiable group. Similar to the bubble

laws. Except in some ways worse because there is no distance. There's no boundary for this

law. It's basically people's feelings. So if people are feeling fearful and accuse protesters,

let's say, for making them feel fearful, then the police can charge people. If people are

in a crowd and they see somebody holding a black flag with white Arabic writing on it,

they can say that it resembles an ISIS flag. It could say, peace on earth. But if it resembles

an ISIS flag, they can be charged under this legislation. And we know who gets targeted

by these types of laws. And we can see it directly in the debate that this is largely about

Palestine solidarity. And one of the ways we can see that unfolding, I'll just mention

two other private members bills that have been introduced that have gone thrown into this

discourse around the Combating Hate Act. And that is that the conservatives introduced

a private members bill that would criminalize their languages promoting any terrorist activity,

any terrorist group or any activity of a terrorist group. And what we know from the way they've

talked about this is when they see Palestine solidarity activists in the street, doesn't

matter what people are calling for or where they're protesting, you know, if they're like

on Parliament Hill, if they're outside an MP's office, it doesn't matter where the protest

is happening. The claim will be that they are Hamas supporters, that they are promoting

terrorism. And now they're trying to make that the next link to that, which is to say

that if you are in the street, support of Palestine, you are supporting Hamas. Therefore you are

supporting a terrorist group and you can be charged under this proposed private members

bill. they've been making those claims right for longer than two years now, right? Hamas

feels no ways about using that language to describe all protesters, right? Hamas supporters.

And like we've been saying for so long, like this language fucking matters. And now we're

seeing like this next step, Louise, right? Where it's codified criminalization, not just a

smear, right? Not just, oh, I'll make it harder for you to get a job. I'll make you look bad.

I'll discredit your story and your point of view by using this language. This is, I will

take away your freedom. and put you in prison for 10 years. Yeah, 100%. And there's so

much more I want to build on that. But first, just to say that there is a third bill that

also gets in the mix here. And that is that the Bloc Québécois, they are secularist. So

um they are on an ongoing campaign to remove any religious-related protections in general.

m And so They have an ongoing mission to try to remove an exemption that's in the criminal

code right now, um which is that you can't be convicted of promoting hateful or anti-Semitic

speech if it is expressed as a good faith opinion based on belief in a religious text. So that

exists right now, that exemption, and the block is trying to get it removed. And because of

the political disagreements on whose rights we want to take away first and how, The conservatives

refused to support the liberal Bill C-9. So the liberals and the bloc came together and

the liberals agreed to support the removal of the religious exemption so that the bloc would

support C-9. So yes, but the conservatives lost their minds about this because obviously they

wanted to be the ones to be both continuing to defend Israel to continuing to use their

racist campaign against Muslims. um But they lost the ability to have that, to be able

to hold the liberals, right? Because the bloc agreed to support the legislation. uh And then

by introducing the religious exemption removal, suddenly the conservatives had to protect the

interests of all of the Christian organizations that want to protect their ability to be anti-Semitic.

To be anti-Semitic. And anti-Muslim, anti-LGBTQ, like all of these things that right now is

protected by these protections that are given to religious speech. So in the committee hearing

around Bill C-9, suddenly, there was all this vested interest in protecting Christian rights.

So the whole conversation has sort of devolved into everybody trying to defend the people

that they think are deserving of the ability to have speech that is not criminalized and

whose speech is justified to be criminalized. So it was just such a microcosm. You really

can't make this up. Full of hypocrisies, right? Like just saturated. Full of hypocrisy. Yeah.

And Jess, I'm so sorry, because there's so much in what Louise said that I think is important

in terms of like the politics, but I just want to pick up on something to make sure that listeners

heard this. When you have feelings being used as like codified into law around hate speech,

everyone should be up in arms because... We already have laws to protect people from hate

speech, but the allowance and the sort of flourishing, and as you said, this began after October 7th.

I mean, it actually began before, but in a bigger way, it sort of came to be after October

7th where a Jewish person could say, I feel uncomfortable. I feel that you are being anti-Semitic

because you support Palestine. And now what Louise is saying is that idea that a feeling

is enough to then criminalize someone is absolutely crazy. And we have it, it's not just like,

this isn't like a hypothetical, they're actually using this for discussions about charter rights

and freedoms, I almost had feelings, which has allowed conversations about a traumatized population,

which is basically a post Holocaust population of people who are deeply traumatized Jewish

people in Canada, as who I'm referring to, who the vast majority of identify overly strongly

with Zionism in the state of Israel are saying any criticism of that is anti-Semitism because

I feel that it is, even though that's an absurd idea. So just to make sure that people caught

that, that the feeling then becomes the law, which is just like, no one ever wants that

for any group of people. Yeah. And just to build on like the real world implications of that.

So we've seen so much, obviously, within Palestine solidarity about how that happens. And in

us, writing to federal members to say like, you have to understand how this translates

into real world things. And so one of the things that we've quoted um in what we shared with

them was that last year at a meeting in Ottawa, the Ottawa Carleton District School Board meeting,

one of the trustees, Neely Kaplan-Murth, stated that the sight of a keffiyeh, Palestinian

scarf, worn by a presenter was an act of aggression. And She wanted an apology. She wanted it stopped.

was like somebody's article of clothing. And it's bigger than the Palestine Solidarity Movement.

um And there's also, you we also looked at research around how black men are perceived

um and what it means when you allow people for their fears to justify their behaviors and

their actions. We're talking about comms. Yeah. And so there's a study by the University of

Toronto. that showed that Black men are perceived to be larger and more threatening than similarly

sized white men. And there's research to show that unarmed Black men are more likely to

be shot and killed by police, and that often when police talk about it, they reference the

physical size of the person as part of how they were assessing the situation. So it's already

these things translate into justification for bad behavior um that can put people's lives

at risk by elevating how important somebody's feelings are, instead of unpacking, why are

they afraid? Is that fear justifiable? Is there an actual risk to them? But those conversations

aren't happening. In court cases, they're almost unable to happen, right? Because fear is a

personal, it's a perception. There's no way to go in and verify if that person is actually

fearful or not. And that's what happens in a lot of police defense cases, right? Where

the You know, the court is left going, well, if he said he was fearful, that's all that

we needed to acquit. Right. And I can't challenge that because that is an internal manifestation

that is unique to everybody. It has me looking at my magnet there that says your feelings

are valid. It's right there. And I'm going, they're valid. Right. That fear can be valid,

but there's a but, right. There's but it cannot lead to the infringement of the charter rights

and freedoms and stuff like that. that Louise was talking about. Exactly. And when the

Christian right then aligns with that uh kind of movement, the group that always will remain

in power, you you touched on this before, Jessa, the group that always remains in power and

that is actually able to uh change all these policies is the Christian uh dominant uh political

parties and institutions. And what they will ensure is that allowing a dialogue in which

Jewish feelings matter more than other people's feelings contribute to anti-Semitism. And who

does that benefit the most? It benefits the Christian right because now we have the classic

perfect scapegoat of every time period ever, the Jew, which is to say that this whole thing,

C9, can be blamed very easily and you wouldn't be wrong to look as an average Canadian to

look and say, God, Jews get really special treatment in this country because their feelings are

privileged over every other group of people. And you're not wrong to have that feeling.

It's that it's actually being propped up by Christian dominant powers that be that say,

let's make sure we treat these people with absolute kid gloves so that we can then have a scapegoat

when things go awry for us, which is when the economy is bad, when we know that there is

anti-immigrant sentiment on the rise, which are all things that are happening in Canada

right now. Let's go back to Bill C-9, the increase in maximum sentencing. Is that the 10 years

that you were talking about? Yeah, it's really terrifying, the potential prison terms for

some of these offenses. And again, disproportionate to what the actual charge is, right? The charge

of making somebody afraid to enter a building that can land you in for 10 years in prison

and When we see the vitriol and the way that people really draw out what is being said

and reinterpreted, when people claim that saying, from the river to the sea, Palestine should

be free, actually means exterminate the Jews. It is outsiders who are claiming that that's

what that phrase means. And to make that be the way that the police are allowed to interpret

things, we don't do that for other things. People keep trying to say like, what they

are calling for is freedom from an oppressive regime that has been in place for decades,

that is well documented to be an apartheid state, to be an occupying force, to be committing

war crimes and genocide. Like there have been like so much documentation of all of these

things. And when people are saying that right now what exists within Israel and Palestine

are anti-democratic and not the way anybody should be forced to live. that calling for

that freedom is actually about violence is such an inversion of what's happening, right?

Like people are saying we are subjected to apartheid laws. We do not have freedom on our own land.

There is no equality. And that is being twisted into something that is actually about Jewish

suffering. And then to say, We're going to grant the police the ability to decide whether

or not that means somebody should be in prison for 10 years. It's so disproportionate. the

courts, there have been rulings by courts in Canada that have looked at the use of that

phrase and have said, actually, it's not anti-Semitic. For the University of Toronto encampment, there

was a case brought against people who were occupying U of T. And one of the claims that was made

was that the basis of that movement was anti-Semitism, which again is like absolutely centering the

wrong people, right? It's not about, this isn't about Jews, this is about the Israeli state.

In that court proceeding, the judge found that the slogan was not anti-Semitic uh and said

himself that while these expressions may be perceived as hurtful and threatening to Jews,

uh he did not see evidence that they were being used with intention of violence, antisemitism

or hatred. And yet our politicians insist on claiming that that is the motivation, as

if they have some kind of special knowledge about what people are intending um other than

what they are actually telling them that they're intending. it's consolidating power in the

hands of the people who already have that power. And when we talk about people like Councillor

Pasternak, who has been on this mission for 20 years trying to say that there should never

be protesters in the street with Palestinian flags. And it's also Olivia Chow saying, calling

all of these rallies hateful, which then feeds into this narrative of will we criminalize

hateful things, even though actually we don't, but more and more we are trying to. And then

she's also on a podcast recently talking about how the problem is that the police charges

aren't sticking and that the police and the courts should be working harder to make the

charges stick instead of looking at why they're not sticking. And they're not sticking because

people are being charged for things that are trumped up and that don't actually meet the

thresholds. And so people are being charged and their lives are being ruined and they're

losing their jobs. The mayor of our city thinks that the problem is not that they were charged

to begin with, but that they haven't found a way to make the charges stick. And then we

see all these new pieces of legislation that are being introduced to try to tighten that

rope, right? And say like, okay, well, it hasn't been working so far. So we're just going to

increasingly criminalize things. And eventually some of these charges will stick, which is

very concerning and anti-democratic. is, and it drives me. crazy when folks don't make that

connection. Like they think it's just, isn't that weird how Olivia Chow's calling for something

and Mark Carney has it written up and ready to go? Like the same thing happened in the

UK, right? So the genocide accelerated, people started accelerating their actions and cops

started arresting Palestinian action for destroying Elbit systems, weapons. You know, shout out

to them. But juries were letting them off. They weren't getting the convictions they needed

there at all. um They were actually legally able to use the protection of Palestinians

as a defense and it outweighed the harms which the judge thought or the jury believed that

they were committing, right? It was a defense that was allowed. And so what did they do?

They changed the law. A judge may rule that the globalized the Intifada was not criminal,

but not if you change the criminal code. to say it is. So like every time these bills

come out in my notes is like, why? Everyone always like, why would they do something like

that that seems so dangerous and so bad? And it's like, well, yeah, their motivations were

they, they're getting their ass handed to them in the court, the courtroom, right? So their

goal of actually criminalizing is more in the abstract, right? It's in the punishment of

process. And we've talked about that. It's not like, those people don't go through hell and

back being charged, but they aren't getting convictions. And that's embarrassing. It's

wasting resources and it's not helping to reaffirm their narrative. What do mean they're not criminals?

I told you they were all criminals. I need to prove to you they are criminals. That means

locking them up. I'd like to spend a little bit of time drawing that connection we talked

about at the beginning. Molly hinted at it where, you know, we do focus on the weaponization

of anti-Semitism, but for an imperialist good, right? Good, in scare quotes there. Can we

talk about what you folks think the motivations might be behind this outside of Palestine?

Because Kearney is not fully wholly invested in Palestine as um a single issue, right? He

has other plans that he will need to suppress other people. um And not that we want to appeal

to the right, but that includes you folks if you're listening, they're not. There's no way

they've made it this far, um they do need to realize that these laws will be used to curtail

any dissent that they might have or any challenge they might pose to power Indigenous land

offenders, right? So just maybe talk about, any one of you can pick this up, you know,

the motivations behind legislation like this, um beyond the movement. I had a big one when

Louise was talking and just the connection you just made, I think is so smart about like,

what are the government's broader schemes? And it is a nice, in one way, it's a nice

thing, which is the movements are actually working. These movements have shut down commerce in

such a way have costed people so much money. The Palestinian uh freedom and justice movements

that have taken storm across Canada and United States after October 7th, of course, decades

before, have actually forced like, I believe that governments are saying uh their investment

in the money making of selling weapons, they are mad that they can't do that, unavated.

And so they are like, we will stop this through criminalizing dissent. And actually, this is

super helpful because it also criminalizes dissent, like you said, that costs us lots of money

when Indigenous land offenders uh take up their actual charter rights to say, no, you can't

build this pipeline across my land. uh So I think it's like a uh twofold that like the...

support of this particular genocide and any genocide for that matter where we get to sell

weapons. For example, we just shipped uh two armored vehicles produced by Rochelle, which

is this Israeli company in Brampton that uh had been named in uh one of the biggest PYM

reports of shipping weapons to Israel. We sent those armored vehicles into cities in the United

States, which people should be uh enraged by, Canadian taxpayers. should be paying attention

for ICE to use on citizens of the United States. So when we as movements disrupt money, I think

that governments are very clear that that needs to be shut down. And so I think that there

is a big motivation here to ensure that capital continues to flow and deadly capital is not

interrupted at all. And I think that aligns perfectly with, like you said, anti-Indigenous.

uh legislation, but also anti-immigrant. We know that we are gearing up for our own version

of, uh you know, raids on people who don't have their full citizenship, uh you know. So

there's so many more pieces that will come, but I think it's really important to talk about

the capital interests here because uh our governments make money off of these wars and they want

to continue that unabated and they want to make sure that our, I guess, that our charter backs

them up in that, which is just completely bananas. One of the things that um a couple months ago

already after um Donald Trump had declared Antifa a terrorist organization in the States,

we saw Pierre Poliev suggesting that this was something that he would want to do here.

um And so immediately with this legislation, what comes to mind for me is like, let's imagine

a scenario where that happens, right? Let's imagine a scenario where Antifa is designated

a terrorist organization. Anybody? the brain knows, you know, it's, it's, not a uh single

thing. There's not like a consolidated Antifa organization that is centrally coordinated,

you know, but there are symbols, there are symbols and there are, you know, it's a, it's

broadly captures a lot of different kinds of things, right? It's like opposing fascism,

white supremacy, other forms of oppression. If you decide that it is a terrorist entity,

and then you have legislation that says, any symbols connected to that terrorist entity,

then that means that there's a future where this kind of legislation can be used to criminalize

any kind of protest. That's Indigenous land rights, immigrant justice, workers' rights,

climate change, anything can be seen as under the umbrella of Antifa. And it's left up to

the government and the police to decide what that is. And we know that politicians tell

us endlessly that they don't control the police. And yet then they are writing things and going

on TV shows and going on podcasts and making it very clear to the police what their expectations

are for them to be doing to justify their budget increases and inviting them to their galas.

Like all of these, you know, Zionist Jewish organizations who have the police come to their

events and then turn around and say, we don't influence the police. Like, of course you do.

You take them on trips to Israel. Like you're not doing those things. you know, just to

be neighborly. Like you're doing those things because there's something you're going to get

out of it, you know, and what you're going to get out of it is that you have convinced them

that Arabs and Palestinians and Muslims are terrifying and therefore their existence

has to be criminalized and it's the police that are given the power to enforce it. Just

to say also that it feels like there has not been a lot of reaction from organized labor

about this legislation and That also seems like concerning that if, again, if we put this

back in the hands of the people who are being protested against and them deciding that they

are being made to feel fearful about accessing a building, like that is innately what picketing

is doing, right? It's trying to dissuade people from accessing a space. which is a charter

protected right and is so fundamental to like social change. And now this legislation is

saying, no, if you are invoking fear to impede access to a building, you can be in prison

for 10 years. That's the intimidation offense that you're talking about, right? Yeah. And

I don't know where labor is on this. I feel like we haven't seen a lot of pushback. I feel

like they think that they are going to be constitutionally protected. to do their traditional pickets,

as that remains to be seen. But I know non-unionized workers who form picket lines and do try to

intimidate bosses into paying back stolen wages will be cleared if not arrested. So that is

a good question. mean, that question comes around on a lot of issues. Migrant rights, um you

know, there's a few players out there, but. In general, I don't think I've seen a big

enough push from the entire political left on this. And partly because it gets wrapped

up in things like Bondi Beach, right? Where it's, is it worth wading into this discussion?

It's a little uncomfortable. I don't understand it. It won't affect me right now. And it

absolutely will though, right? It absolutely will. You, Louise, you mentioned Antifa and

I had a chuckle. I shouldn't have laughed because it's kind of like laughing off those silly

statements isn't all that helpful either. Like we try not to let it bother us, but pushing

back against it's important because it leads to all the things that we've just talked about.

in Australia, they're not waiting for, know, Antifa to be declared or the language to be

very specific on who is allowed. Part of the... The change that they made in a state within

Australia was like no, they could ban all public protests for three months following a declaration

of terrorism. And that is not defined, right? On what that declaration is or looks like

or what terrorism is. And that's so broad. So, and they can just blanketly ban for up to three

months. So we can just, we can already see the tools are there for the powerful to suppress

us. um They've just used this kind of, the timing is just awful. You know, that mechanism that

you talked about and then the fact that Bill C-9, where is it now? It's in committee, is

that right? Yes, so the committee has totally devolved um because the conservatives were

so mad that they started filibustering uh the committee. And then they actually, introduced

a motion right after the block and um the Liberals passed the religious exemption removal. the

conservatives came forward with a motion to say that whatever is done should not interfere

with people's uh right to religious expression. So they tried to put an external, like an

asterisk and be like, yeah, you can do all of these things, but only until the point where

it interferes with somebody's religious expression, which of course, if you're doing that, you're

like undermining the whole thing, right? So then they entered into all this debate around

all this and the conservatives brought in all these MPs who are not typically members of

the committee, but they sort of brought them in, I'm assuming because it was suddenly very

important for them to represent their constituencies to say that like, this is anti-Christian now.

So they started talking about all the ways this is anti-Christian. They're debating all the

wrong things, right? Is that... They are absolutely debating all the wrong things. But the committee

meetings were like the last one that I watched, it ended at 11.30 p.m. and then eventually

the... committee chair was just like, okay, we're done. One of the interesting things to

watch has been that the conservatives, because they seem so insistent that they are not going

to support a liberal bill, that they've been taking this stand on it, that it will, you

know, it will silence dissent. It will. They were like, even some of the conservative members

were quoting uh Canadian civil liberties, BC civil liberties, talking about how this is

taking away people's rights and therefore they can't support it. Oh. And then in the next

breath, they're talking about how the Jewish community is being targeted by slogans and

how definitely we shouldn't allow people to do that. So it's like they're trying to have

it both ways. They don't want to support the liberal bill, but they're also saying that

people's speech should be silenced, but just in this one very specific way. I've seen some

of them arguing that the they're upset the hammer and sickle wasn't included. Yes. they someone

introduced emotionally. I would have a problem in my house. Yeah, it's also like Melissa

Lansman. uh You know, we're name dropping all the people. I know, right. um And she went

on a thing in the committee about how she's been hearing from rabbis. She said something

like, you know, like, I've talked to 50 rabbis today, who are concerned about when they

go up to preach from the pulpit. that they now have to worry about what they might say.

And I'm thinking like, if there are that many rabbis who are concerned about what they're

saying in a synagogue setting, like that is actually a concern. Like that is problematic.

If they don't think they can make a sermon without potentially being charged with a hate crime,

like that's a concern, right? And when we think about like, know, Benjamin Netanyahu and how

he used language from scripture, to justify murdering every Palestinian. Like this thing

where he called them Amalek and like, I went to Hebrew school growing up and I was like,

yeah, whatever. Like Amalek, like who takes that seriously anymore? And then I actually

read the quote and the full quote is it's basically justifying that anybody who is from that heritage

is somebody who you are entitled to murder because You don't want to like further that

identity, which is so deeply, deeply messed up. genocidal. And genocidal. And the guy

who actually is running a country, like it's, it's not the same as somebody standing on a

street corner and just like saying shit, right? This is a guy who actually has the authority

and has been proving to the world that he is comfortable murdering children. and babies

and men and like, none of those people deserve it. And, you know, he has all of these things

available to him and then he invokes scripture as a way to justify it. And here we are sitting

and debating about like, which words we should be allowed to say in Canada. It's, it's just,

it's, it's so deeply disturbing. And every political party, what we're seeing is every political

party is taking a piece of this, right? Like, None of them are saying we should defend people's

free expression. They're all just trying to find different variations on what should be

protected and what should be criminalized. And we should all be concerned because we can see

very clearly in the States, like we have such a window into how fascism picks up speed and

is able to do increasingly terrible things if people don't stand up and stop it. Like

we can see it unfolding in real time and there's not enough focus on it happening here. Like,

I feel like there just has not been enough discussion about this legislation in, you

know, general mainstream kind of conversations and media. And it's, it's really like, this

is the beginning of something really, well, it's not, it's a continuation of something

really scary, but it's taking it to much more severe places. We're far more slick. Right?

Like Trump does it with executive orders and blanket statements and like illegal moves.

But the Canadian government is just lining up the very same legislation um for migrant

removals and denying indigenous sovereignty and, you know, muscling through projects and

all of these things, but through respectable forms of legislation with debates and committees.

And so it feels um a lot more wholesome than an angry man standing up there and just declaring

it so. Right. But the end result will be the same. Canadians do that a lot, right? To deflect

from our own awfulness. We just find someone more awful or with poor PR, right? Like

the United States gets a bad rap, because we're just as bad sometimes in our imperialist adventures.

We've had a few episodes like that. uh Anybody want to have any last words before we sign

off? m Maybe even Gurr, if you could give us an idea of how we could best talk about this,

you know, without being dismissive of that fear, but also not feeding into the narratives

that are being weaponized against us. I wish I had the answer. I'm not, I'm not the right

person for that question. I think Molly is probably much better suited for that question

because. I am so angry. I mean, I'm so angry, right? I'm just so angry about what's been

done with those terms and how that's been flung in people's faces, how it's truly been weaponized

every which possible way without the slightest bit of care for people's lives and livelihoods.

And it's, yeah. I've given up on that term, basically. But Molly, please. There's only

one answer and it's always the same, which is safety through solidarity. So if the left

genuinely cares about anti-Semitism, then it works because then you can fight the way it

is weaponized. And so that means having a very sharp analysis about what anti-Semitism is,

just the same way that you should have one. We should all have one about what anti-Black

racism looks like. what anti-Indigenous uh specific racism looks like, the way that the right

tries to pit every oppressed group against each other in order to have us fight each other.

And for us, we have to say, no, we will fight all of these isms together. And that if we

can do that, then when it is weaponized, we are more able to say as a non-Jewish left,

actually, you can't weaponize that in order to silence protests. for Palestine and that

you, you, we all will develop sharper analyses of all the ways that these oppressions are

linked and that really the people who benefit are always the same people, the Christians,

uh the Christian hegemonic power structures. You know, it's so funny that Louisa's C9 example

says that they're like, actually, we need to maintain our ability to be discriminatory.

The Christians are like outraged. But that's a really obvious answer. It points to the,

it points to the ultimate power holders, especially in Canada, who are often uh the same ones that

they always have been. They always seem to benefit from genocide. Yeah, exactly. Weird. That's

how we all got to this country. yeah. You know, you folks not only helped unpack this weaponization

that we're talking about, but helped to understand why the Canadian state acts the way that it

does. Because that does perplex some people who have this image that Canadians are good,

our government in the most part acts in our best interest. You know, those people still

exist en masse. They might not be listening to this show, but you know, it's it is often.

Why do they act this way? Why would they bother? Even if it's just hot potato, right? Why would

you sit on such a hot topic right now and and support a genocide? um But it's all starts

to make sense, right? When when you look at the big picture and have uh articulate people

to help explain it. So I do appreciate your time here in the studio and uh doing the

slog out there. I know it's hard work and I hope you're taking care of one another. Thanks,

Jessa. Yeah, thanks for having us. Thanks, Jessa. Thank you so much, Jessa. That is

a wrap on another episode of Blueprints of Disruption. Thank you for joining us. You can follow us

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