Is it simply cowardice? Or do many agree with the vile anti-Semitic thinking the government was glad to throw money at?
Sometimes, it’s useful to consider how people would react to the same set of words if they were spoken by a different person.
Consider Laith Marouf, the Lebanon-based individual who the government gave our tax dollars to, even as he had a long-documented history of saying vile anti-Semitic things.
Take a moment and ask yourself how the Trudeau government would be reacting if Marouf was someone who fit the ‘rural conservative’ stereotype.
Would he have gotten any money at all?
Would there be any Liberal MPs failing to denounce him?
Of course not.
The Liberals would be all over it.
The exact same anti-Semitic words could have been spoken, but the response from many Liberal MPs would be completely different.
That’s ‘identity politics’ at work.
After all, Liberal MPs had no trouble vociferously denouncing a man who yelled at Chrystia Freeland. I denounced that as well, as has Pierre Poilievre and many politicians across the political spectrum. Yet, the Liberals seem to be hoping that they could use that as a distraction from their funding of Laith Marouf, wanting it to all just go away.
The man who yelled at Freeland fits the ‘look’ that Liberals are comfortable denouncing, while Marouf does not.
Many Liberal MPs continue to be ‘profiles in cowardice’ as they refuse to speak out about Marouf, and their refusal discredits everything else they say and claim to believe.
Funding the most hateful attitudes of the past
Canadians really must understand the seriousness of this. The Trudeau government was in effect funding the same hateful attitudes that led to so much death and suffering in the 20th century.
A political party deeply steeped in anti-Semitism led to the most destructive war in human history, and those attitudes still remain. Just because some who hold those attitudes don’t look the same as those who held those attitudes in the 1930’s-1940’s, doesn’t make the underlying thinking any less dangerous.
And, in a sad echo of history, the Trudeau government is largely leaving many of their Jewish MPs to denounce this situation almost alone.
Here’s what Michael Geist said about it, as he notes that most of the denunciation of the government for hiring Marouf has come from Liberal MPs Anthony Housefather and Ya’ara Saks:
“Indeed, that short list terrifies me. If we are honest about it, we know that on many comparable issues, the Prime Minister, cabinet ministers, and MPs would be rightly rushing to add their voices to the public concern. I’m happy that leaders are willing to speak out against racism or wrongful conduct as their voices have power. But it leaves me dismayed that somehow a case of government funding an anti-semite did not spark the same reaction. If it falls predominantly to the Jewish MPs to speak out, the message in the silence from Justin Trudeau, Pablo Rodriguez, and many other cabinet ministers is that anti-semitism is a Jewish problem, not a broader societal concern. The failure to take responsibility by speaking out in this case by providing assurances that the government will investigate itself to ensure this does not happen again should not be ignored or soon be forgotten.”
The Liberals are sending a message, and it’s not a good one.
While Housefather and Ya’ara Saks deserve credit for their willingness to put Canadian values and the good of the country ahead of partisanship, the fact that so few other Liberal MPs have done so is deeply disturbing.
Many Canadians will understandably wonder if there are many government MPs who agree with the horrendous anti-Semitism the government was throwing money at.
And many will also wonder if the Trudeau government is repeating the same mistakes of the past by refusing to confront hateful attitudes before it is too late.
And so, when you watch Liberal MPs trying to use other issues to distract from their government funding Laith Marouf, it is important to bring attention back to the actions of this government and push for accountability.
We cannot, and we must not allow our government to use our tax dollars to return us to the same hate and violence we thought we already defeated many decades ago.
Spencer Fernando
