The Media Accountability Project  

CJPME’s advocacy efforts resulted in the publication of Media Analyst Anthony Issa’s letter to the editor in The Hamilton Spectator, addressing Elle Canada’s decision to remove MPP Sarah Jama from its list of trailblazing women due to her pro-Palestinian stance. 

Issa’s letter condemned the removal as an act of censorship and anti-Palestinian racism, drawing on the Arab Canadian Lawyers Association’s definition, which highlights the exclusion of Palestinian voices as a form of erasure.

The letter called for Elle Canada to reinstate Jama’s recognition and issue a public apology, warning that their actions set a dangerous precedent for Canadian media by disqualifying women who support Palestinian rights. Issa emphasized that this undermines journalistic integrity, especially at a time when Palestinians in Gaza are facing genocide.

This publication serves as a significant step in CJPME's ongoing campaign to push for accountability in Canadian media and to ensure that voices advocating for Palestinian rights are not silenced.

"This information hopefully makes clear why the presence of these groups serves not to bring safety to Jewish people but to intimidate and threaten advocates for Palestinian human rights. They should be identified instead as extremist vigilante organizations with far-right, anti-Palestinian ideologies."

As journalists, we should be ashamed. Scrubbing an article because of Ms. Jama’s pro-Palestine stance because of backlash is the equivalent of unpublishing and censoring a story. This is a serious violation of journalistic standards and also an act of anti-Palestinian erasure. Excluding Palestinian perspectives and those of their allies is an explicit form of anti-Palestinian racism, according to the Arab Canadian Lawyers Association.

A Twitter thread shows a small sample of such examples, including pro-Israel students chanting anti-Semitic phrases, which were widely misreported as being a protest chant. While you do frame the claim as an allegation, it is unfortunate that an allegation without evidence is the lead into an article about a protest against genocide.

Unlike other articles regarding this topic, you denounce the conflation of antisemitism and anti-Zionism and plainly state that Dahab’s advocacy for Palestine is pro-Palestinian and anti-genocide, not antisemitic. Thank you for writing this article defending Dahab and her Palestinian advocacy. Please continue to do so!

"Contrasted with the photo of an indoor interfaith meeting from Rabbi Wise himself, the photo seems intended to project xenophobia and fanaticism. This is highly inappropriate and deliberately misleading on the part of the Spec."

"I applaud students today who are engaging in contemporary issues, protesting atrocities even worse in some ways than what concerned us. I don not recall any state violence where 135 children a day are being killed by the aggressor as is the case with Israel’s bombardment of Gaza."

Please help us challenge the points mentioned by Daniel Kollek in his opinion piece. The author makes several unfounded claims. Even opinions must be grounded in fact. Join us in challenging these gross misrepresentations, which have no place in a fair and balanced media landscape.

"Any mention whatsoever of Israel’s “Operation Break the Wave” continues to evade AP’s reporting. I could find no evidence that AP has even once mentioned the Operation. By failing to name that Israel’s “near daily raids” are part of a deliberate, documented military strategy obscures the reality that these attacks on Palestinians are not mere reactions, but part of a planned military operation that is largely offensive by design."

"You describe Hamas as ‘the militant group that rules the Gaza strip”. This is rather reductive and lazy journalism. Palestinians have suffered dispossession, occupation and apartheid under Israel for decades, so it is not surprising that many Palestinian groups take up arms against Israel."