The Media Accountability Project  

It is beyond dispute that Warmington’s piece is beneath the dignity of any newspaper that aspires to credible journalism and that there is no choice but to retract it, immediately.

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Dear Ottawa Sun editorial board:

• The headline manages to include two glaring inaccuracies. First, the demonstrations were not “anti-Israel” but, rather, pro-human rights and international law. Second, the insinuation that Toronto police generally let such protests proceed unimpeded is false. As early as last July, providers of legal aid to pro-Palestine demonstrators targeted by TPS noted that they were aware of 133 of them being arrested.
• On the basis of nothing whatsoever, Warmington libels all of the demonstrators as “Hamas supporters.”
• Even more absurdly, Warmington claims that Hamas has a “grip of control” on Toronto. Neither he nor could the editor who approved his text could possibly believe this to be true, yet it was published all the same.
• Warmington asserts that the protestors wanted the speakers at the Munk Debates arrested “for Israel’s response” to October 7. This statement is either dishonest or ignorant. Calls for arresting Ehud Olmert and Tzipi Livni are based on their roles as Israel’s Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, respectively, during its 2006 invasion of Lebanon. Warmington can lean more by reading about the 24-page complaint filed with the RCMP and the Crimes Against Humanity and War Crimes Section of the Department of Justice, which seeks to hold Olmert and Livni accountable in accordance with Canadian law.
• Warmington, again without evidence, refers to the demonstrators as “professional protestors.” Apparently, he cannot imagine someone protesting war crimes and war criminals on mere principle, in exchange only for the knowledge of having stood up for what is good and right.
• Mr. Warmington cites a “pro-Palestinian” demonstrator (at last using the correct term) who notes that certain of the speakers “are ‘banned’ from other parts of the world” – putting quotes only around “banned” in a transparent attempt to ridicule the use of the word. It is a matter of record that Ayelet Shaked was prevented from entering Australia in 2024 in the wake of pro-ethnic cleansing and pro-genocide comments, including, “We need all 2 million to leave. That’s the solution in Gaza,” “What’s so horrifying about understanding that the entire Palestinian people is the enemy?”, and the following, worth quoting in full: “Behind every terrorist stand dozens of men and women, without whom he could not engage in terrorism. They are all enemy combatants, and their blood shall be on all their heads. Now this also includes the mothers of the martyrs, who send them to hell with flowers and kisses. They should follow their sons, nothing would be more just. They should go, as should the physical homes in which they raised the snakes. Otherwise, more little snakes will be raised there.” What are Warmington’s thoughts on these sentiments?
• Warmington calls the Munk Debates “famous for offering fiercely independent thinkers to address all issues without interference.” While they are clearly happy to invite speakers with a history of antisemitic statements, such as Steve Bannon and RFK Jr., Palestinians are apparently too “fiercely independent” to be heard: the event’s chair dismissed the idea of inviting them to debate the idea of their own statehood, saying that he would “welcome somebody organizing that debate.”
• Warmington ludicrously suggests that outrage over Israel’s assault on Gaza – widely described as genocide by a broad range of international and Israeli experts – is disingenuous because it was not accompanied by similar outrage Hamas’ recent executions of fellow Palestinians. No one could possibly believe, in good faith, in even a scintilla of equivalence between the deliberate destructions of an entire society, with two years of unimaginable suffering inflicted upon millions, and an outburst of factional violence that has killed dozens. That Warmington is reduced to this sort of pathetic comparison only underscores how pitifully weak his case is.
• Not content merely to slander a demonstrator as a “Hamas supporter,” Warmington also calls him a “thug” for having called for an “intifada revolution” and thereby causing “a Jewish family [to] feel intimidated.” If Warmington does indeed believe that causing such feelings constitutes thuggery then I commend him for his empathy but I cannot find his indictment of those who openly celebrate the annihilation of Gaza and the mass murder of its people. I can assure him that they cause profound feelings of intimidation among both Palestinians and non-Palestinians alike.
• Warmington closes with a tweet from Meir Weinstein, the former national director of Canada’s branch of the Jewish Defence League – an organization that the FBI “deemed a right-wing terrorist group.” Weinstein justified an Israeli-American terrorist’s 1994 massacre of 30 Muslims during prayers in a Hebron mosque, and the banner on his organization’s website features Meir Kahane: a theocrat and convicted terrorist with such horrifically vile anti-Arab views that its racism earned it the distinction of being the first political party ever banned in Israel. Weinstein has stated that he “will always be a loyal disciple of Rabbi Kahane.” Warmington is certainly free to promote a violent, terrorist-loving thug if he wishes, but in doing so he forfeits any remnant of credibility he had as a voice for law and order.