"The article is about a workshop organized by the Ontario Secondary School Teacher’s Federation (OSSTF) entitled “Anti-Palestinian racism: Nakba denial.” Unfortunately, the article fails to provide a Palestinian perspective nor to explain what the Nakba represents, leaving the reader with a single perspective. Below, I will outline two areas in this article that urgently require an update.
First, your article fails to include a Palestinian perspective, even though the workshop in question is about anti-Palestinian racism. While you mention that the session presenters did not respond to requests for comment, more efforts should have been made to provide a Palestinian point of view on the importance of this workshop and the concepts under discussion. Following the Canadian Association of Journalist’s (CAJ) ethics guidelines on diversity, news organizations and journalists should seek to “include views from all segments of the population.”"
February 20, 2023
To:
Liz Braun, Journalist, Toronto Sun, [email protected]
Adrienne Batra, Editor in Chief, Toronto Sun, [email protected]
Kevin Hann, Deputy Editor, Toronto Sun, [email protected]
Dear Ms. Braun, Ms. Batra and Mr. Hann,
I’m writing to you on behalf of Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East (CJPME, https://www.cjpme.org) to express our concerns regarding your news article titled “Canadian Antisemitism Education Foundation objects to OSSTF event,” which was published by Toronto Sun on February 19, 2023.
The article is about a workshop organized by the Ontario Secondary School Teacher’s Federation (OSSTF) entitled “Anti-Palestinian racism: Nakba denial.” Unfortunately, the article fails to provide a Palestinian perspective nor to explain what the Nakba represents, leaving the reader with a single perspective. Below, I will outline two areas in this article that urgently require an update.
First, your article fails to include a Palestinian perspective, even though the workshop in question is about anti-Palestinian racism. While you mention that the session presenters did not respond to requests for comment, more efforts should have been made to provide a Palestinian point of view on the importance of this workshop and the concepts under discussion. Following the Canadian Association of Journalist’s (CAJ) ethics guidelines on diversity, news organizations and journalists should seek to “include views from all segments of the population.”[i]
I insist that you update the article to include paragraphs which provide a Palestinian perspective.
Second, your article lacks any discussion or explanation of the meaning of the term, “Nakba,” or what it means for Palestinians; nor does it include a definition of anti-Palestinian racism, a key concept in this article. Instead, the article quotes two representatives from the Canadian Antisemitism Education Foundation (CAEF) who claim that a workshop on anti-Palestinian racism will lead to a “skewed view of history” in regard to the “Israeli war of independence.” This is an organization which has previously called the Nakba a “fraud.”[ii] It is not appropriate for your only perspective in an article about Palestinian history and narratives to be from an organization which is overtly hostile to them.
The Nakba, literally translated to “the catastrophe” in Arabic, is used to describe the mass forced displacement and exodus of over 750,000 Palestinians from their lands and the destruction of over 530 Palestinian villages before, during and after the creation of the state of Israel in 1947-49.[iii] Further, “denying the Nakba” has been identified by the Arab Canadians Lawyers Association (ACLA) as a manifestation of anti-Palestinian racism, which they describe as a form of anti-Arab racism that “silences, excludes, erases, stereotypes, defames, or dehumanizes Palestinians or their narratives.”[iv]
I insist that you add an update to your article which includes definitions of both the Nakba and anti-Palestinian racism.
Thank you for making these changes. Should you wish, you can contact me at 438-380-5410 for more information.
Sincerely,
Reem Majid
Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East
[i] Canadian Association of Journalists, “Ethics Guidelines,” June 2011, https://caj.ca/wp-content/uploads/ethics_guidelines.pdf
[ii] CAEF letter to the Board and CEO Canadian Museum of Human Rights, April 16, 2021, https://www.caef.ca/post/caef-letter-to-the-board-and-ceo-canadian-museum-of-human-rights
[iii] Institute for Middle East Understanding (IMEU), “The Nakba and Palestine Refugees,” May 2022, https://imeu.org/article/the-nakba-and-palestine-refugees-imeu-questions-and-answers
[iv] Arab Canadian Lawyers Association, “Anti-Palestinian Racism: Naming, Framing and Manifestations,” March 2022, https://static1.squarespace.com/static/61db30d12e169a5c45950345/t/627dcf83fa17ad41ff217964/1652412292220/Anti-Palestinian+Racism-+Naming%2C+Framing+and+Manifestations.pdf