No matter how many Palestinians, Lebanese or Iranians Israel kills some lefties will work with genocidal Jewish supremacist lobby organizations.
On September 22 University of Manitoba Professor Sean Carleton and Niigaan Sinclair are scheduled to speak on their new book Truth Before Reconciliation: Confronting Residential School Denialism in a virtual forum organized by the Montreal Holocaust Museum. MHM openly backs genocide in Gaza and its main benefactor is the sponsor of the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA).
Israeli flags hang at MHM events and last month the museum put out a statement claiming it was “antisemitic” for CF Montreal football fans to have chanted “Death to Israel” at a former Israeli soldier and national team player Dor Turgeman after he scored and taunted the crowd.
MHM actively promoted Bill C9, which reinforces the terror list in service of Zionism by criminalizing the display of listed “terror” groups’ symbols in certain contexts. In 2020 MHM complained that the Mayor of Montreal refused to support the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s (IHRA) definition of antisemitism. The IHRA is designed to undermine free speech and criminalize labelling Israel a racist state.
After over 10,000 Palestinians had been killed in the latest round of Israeli barbarism directed at the besieged coastal strip, MHM released their position “on the continuing conflict in Israel”. The November 15, 2023 statement noted: “The past few weeks have been excruciatingly painful for our Museum community. We have seen the worst terrorist attack committed against the Jewish people since the Holocaust, an escalating war in a place that many of us call a second home, images of extreme violence, the proliferation of hate propaganda, and the terrorizing of Jews around the world. We share the pain of the Israeli and Palestinian families, equally victimized by the cruelty of Hamas. We are heartbroken thinking of the innocent hostages being held by these ISIS emulators, and we pray for their immediate release back to the loving arms of their Israeli families.
Worse than its official statements, the head of MHM has used the Nazis’ decimation of European Jewry to justify Israel’s holocaust in Gaza. Over the past three years MHM president Jacques Saada has repeatedly used Holocaust commemoration events to promote Israel’s genocide. In April 2025 Saada compared Palestinians to Nazis, claiming “on Oct. 7, 2023, it was the Holocaust all over again.” In a speech to the Montreal Mayor’s Holocaust Remembrance Ceremony Saada declared: “We live in an upside down world…. A world where women sing the praises of Hamas, while it wants to enslave them. A world where members of the LGBTQ communities sing the praises of Hamas, while in Gaza it sentences them to death. … All this is also happening in the streets and on the campuses of Montreal. A world where university professors treat their Jewish students as prostitutes.”
Saada opposed a ceasefire in Gaza and attended Israel rallies and events. When South Africa brought a case against Israel’s genocide to the International Court of Justice, Saada signed a message on behalf of the MHM labeling the legal effort a “revolting accusation” akin to “the Protocols of the Elders of Zion.” Saada claimed, “The current war is the result of a pogrom deliberately carried out by Hamas against Israeli civilians. This pogrom directly meets the definition of genocide. Hamas makes no secret of its intent, its genocidal goals, even in its charter.”
MHM even argues that not wanting to work with a pro-genocide museum is “antisemitism”. Complaining about groups backing away from partnerships with it amidst Israel’s horrors, last year MHM communications director Sarah Fogg wrote in the Montreal Gazette, “Holocaust museums do not have to pass a litmus test on the Middle East to do their crucial work…If a Holocaust museum’s commemoration inspires individuals to publicly question where its Gaza exhibit is, this demonstration of solidarity with Palestinian civilians is clouded by an antisemitic trope. For the record, it is valid and perfectly reasonable for Canadian Jews to care about Israel, worry about the hostages and to define as Zionists, meaning they support the Jewish people’s right to self-determination in their ancestral land.”
The lead private donor of MHM is the Azrieli Foundation. Worth more than $3 billion prior to his death, David Azrieli served in the paramilitary Haganah group during the ethnic cleansing of Palestine in 1948. His unit was responsible for the Battle of Jerusalem, including forcibly displacing 10,000 Palestinians. A Montrealer who also owned property in Israel, Azrieli paid for an amphitheatre to be built in the occupied Golan Heights to commemorate his Haganah brigade and donated to Im Tirtzu, which an Israeli court deemed a “fascist” group.
MHM has many ties to Montreal’s main apartheid and genocide lobby organizations. The museum lists Montreal’s Federation Combined Jewish Appeal (CJA) as its “Beneficiary” and has co-sponsored initiatives with B’nai Brith, CIJA and other anti-Palestinian groups. CIJA is the official advocacy agent of CJA Montreal and the other Jewish federations.
When I learned about the September 22 webinar I reached out to Sean Carleton with information about MHM and asked him to withdraw from an event put on a by an institution that seeks to criminalize criticism of genocide through the IHRA and Combating Hate Act. He acknowledged receipt of my message but didn’t respond to my request.
Sean Carleton and Niigaan Sinclair should withdraw from an event legitimating the genocidal Jewish supremacist Montreal Holocaust Museum.
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