Councillor Pasternak Condemns Israeli Apartheid Week at the Toronto City Council Meeting on March 8, 2011
Posted on March 8th, 2011

The following remarks were made by Councillor Pasternak at the Toronto City Council meeting on March 8, 2011.

 

 

Thank you Madame Speaker,

our responsibility as a civil society is to be respectful, tolerant and bring people together. It is what makes Toronto great. It is why people from all over the world want to come here. It is what we must teach future generations.

The so-called Israeli Apartheid Week which runs this week does not meet this threshold. It is an offensive and repugnant event that uses the suffering under the old apartheid regime in South Africa to demonize the state of Israel and its supporters.

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Those who organize and participate in this event are advancing a preposterous analogy of the Israel-Palestinian question, the history of the old apartheid regime in South Africa and the nature of Israeli society. This event and the rhetoric of its organizers are undermining the peace process.

This shameful discourse – born out of ignorance and fuelled by intolerance – has caused great pain in many communities and has tarnished Toronto’s reputation. It has also compromised the academic leadership of the Toronto-based post secondary institutions which host this event.

These anti-Israel groups – in a clear violation of Toronto District School Board policy – tried to recruit teenagers into its twisted ideology. Our reaction was swift:  in 2010, Canada’s largest school board showed principled leadership by condemning Israeli Apartheid Week and banning it from its property.

We expect better from these same post secondary institutions as they welcome all countries from North and South America for the Pan Am games in 2015. It is essential that they live up to the ideals of the games as worthy hosts. Hosting Israeli Apartheid Week is conduct unbecoming of hosting the Pan Am Games.

I urge all of you to use the power of your office and the reach of social media to make your revulsion for this event clear: that we must root out intolerance and the dangers of demonization and by doing so we affirm our commitment to a proud city we call Toronto.

Thank you.