A party that officially supports BDS, led by Canada’s most famous former student activist, condemned a call to defend students’ right to oppose Israel’s holocaust in Gaza. For Québec Solidaire (QS) Islamophobic Quebec nationalism trumps internationalism.
Recently the National Assembly of Quebec unanimously supported a resolution condemning a letter sent by Canada’s Special Representative on Combatting Islamophobia to university presidents across the country. On August 30 Amira Elghawaby posted a letter defending students’ right to oppose Israeli crimes. On X she wrote, “it has become abundantly clear that far too many Canadian Muslim, Arab and Palestinian post-secondary students, faculty, and staff have faced negative consequences for their advocacy on Palestinian human rights, along with allies. Today, I sent a letter to University and College Presidents with the following recommendations in anticipation of the coming school year.”
Over the next two weeks English speaking leftist, Muslim and Palestinian organizations and commentators praised the letter. On August 30 prominent left NDP candidate Avi Lewis quoted tweeted Elghawaby noting, “This is a superb letter: rigorous, thoughtful, practical recommendations. CIJA, Housefather and Lyons favour exaggeration, hyperbole and bombast. They pressure and bully. Amira Elghawaby models responsible leadership. University presidents: this is what an A+ looks like.”
As Lewis notes, ultra-Jewish supremacist Liberal MP Anthony Housefather, who was recently made Trudeau’s Special Advisor on Jewish Community Relations and Antisemitism, and Deborah Lyons, Trudeau’s Special Envoy on Preserving Holocaust Remembrance and Combating Antisemitism, have been pressing university administrations to clamp down on student democracy. In December Housefather and four other MPs sent a letter to 27 Canadian universities presidents calling on them “to protect Jewish students”. A few months later they mimicked the US Republican right’s effort to intimidate university presidents by organizing a parliamentary committee to grill them on “antisemitism”. More recently, Housefather met the leadership at Concordia and McGill and threatened (with Lyons’ backing) the University of Windsor administration for conceding to some of the demands of its student encampment.
Elghawaby’s letter was an important rejoinder to the Zionist assault on academic freedom. It cites the Centre for Free Expression’s call for “university presidents to uphold the principles of freedom of expression and to resist calls to ‘police legal expression on campus’ which would ‘destroy the foundation on which academic communities are built.” It echoes the UN Special Rapporteur on the rights to freedom of assembly and association, Gina Romero, who recently called on universities to “respect peaceful activism and revise repressive policies targeting pro-Palestine solidarity movement.”
Since Elghawaby’s letter defends students’ rights to defend Palestinians it was ignored by the English language media. But, two weeks after the letter was posted on X, Le Journal de Québec “first reported” it under the headline “Manifestations propalestiniennes sur les campus: Amira Elghawaby veut plus de profs musulmans” (Pro-Palestinian demonstrations on campus: Amira Elghawaby wants more Muslim teachers). Later that day, September 13, Le Journal de Québec followed that up with an article focused on Islamophobic higher education minister Pascale Déry’s criticism, titled “Plus de professeurs musulmans dans les universités: Québec réclame la démission d’Amira Elghawaby” (More Muslim professors in universities: Québec demands the resignation of Amira Elghawaby).
Instead of a letter defending students’ rights to oppose a holocaust, the Québec political and media establishment made the story a segment of one out of the five proposals in the letter. Point 4 of the letter notes, “Justice MacDonald recommends institutions use ‘available mechanisms to increase the diversity of full-time faculty’ to better reflect the student body, including increased representation of Muslim, Palestinian and Arab faculty members.’”
Basically, Islamophobic Quebec nationalists promoted the idea that the letter was about a Muslim envoy demanding universities hire people based on their Muslim faith.
At a climate march last week, I raised the matter with QS leader Gabriel Nadeau-Dubois, who rose to prominence as the spokesperson for the coalition that launched the 2012 Quebec student strike. He was dismissive. The leader of the leftist party justified backing the motion by citing university independence. When I asked why he hadn’t criticized Housefather and Lyons for their repeated attacks against university independence Nadeau-Dubois claimed ignorance.
In truth, QS conceded to Quebec nationalists gripped by anti-Muslim sentiment and angry that Elghawaby previously criticized Quebec’s ‘secularism’ and empowered sense of victimhood. In a sign of the psychosis, a TVA/Journal de Montreal commentator did a clip headlined “Affaire Elghawaby: ‘Combien de fois va-t-on permettre à cette personne de cracher sur les Québécois?’” (“Elghawaby affair: ‘How many times will we allow this person to spit on Quebecers?’”). Defending students’ rights to oppose Israel’s holocaust was turned into spitting on Quebecers!
QS has embarrassed themselves. Amidst a holocaust in Gaza and Israel rampaging across the region, the leftist party has sided against students trying to end the horrors. Québec Solidaire should rescind their support for the National Assembly motion, apologize to campus activists and grovel for forgiveness from Palestinians.
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