Canadians ‘must not be complacent’ as antisemitism, hatred rise: Trudeau – National | 24CA News
Canadians can’t be complacent as antisemitism and hatred develop throughout the nation, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says.
Speaking at a Holocaust Remembrance Day memorial in Ottawa on Friday, the prime minister warned that in occasions of peace, individuals “look back at this atrocity, bewildered at how it could ever have been permitted to happen.”
“We wonder what could ever have driven people to such cruelty. But hate never overtakes us all at once. It creeps up inch by inch,” Trudeau stated.
Lately, he added, “we have seen hateful and anti-Semitic rhetoric coming from dark corners of our society.”
“Canadians were horrified to see Nazi flags brought to Ottawa last year. It had a chilling effect,” he stated, referencing the Nazi flag flown in the course of the so-called “Freedom Convoy” protests in February.
“Hate is being amplified online and on other platforms. And so we cannot and must not be complacent. All Canadians, especially those of us here who are leaders, need to stand up and call it out plainly and loudly.”
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According to Statistics Canada, hate crimes focusing on the Jewish group have been on the rise. In 2021, there was a 47 per cent improve in police-reported hate crimes in opposition to Jewish individuals. Of the 884 religion-based hate crimes reported to police that 12 months, 487 of them focused the Jewish group.
On prime of that, there have been high-profile incidents of antisemitism in in style tradition within the final 12 months. Rapper Kanye West publicly praised Adolf Hitler in a spate of antisemitic posts on-line that spurred a fierce wave of condemnation.
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre additionally spoke on the ceremony, and referred to as on Canadians to combat the “evil” that led to the Holocaust “every day.”
“We must, every time we hear these utterances of hatred and antisemitism, speak out strongly and unequivocally against them,” he stated. “When we do that, and only then will we live up to the privilege and the honour it is for us to live here as Canadians.”
A examine commissioned by Canadian charity Liberation75 final 12 months discovered that one in three college students of the three,000 surveyed believed the Holocaust was fabricated or not reported precisely.
Earlier this month, Ottawa police charged two highschool college students with public incitement of hatred, legal harassment, and mischief following an incident during which they had been accused of displaying a hate image and utilizing antisemitic language.
“It was hellish,” stated B’nai Brith Canada in an announcement on Friday marking Holocaust Remembrance Day.
“Yet, today, the type of hatred and antisemitism that inspired the Holocaust is surfacing at an alarming rate worldwide, including in Canada. History often repeats but it is our mission to make sure this ugliness does not return. Never again.”
— with information from Global News’ Caryn Lieberman
© 2023 Global News, a division of Corus Entertainment Inc.
