Fighting back! Police intimidation in Canada

Exclusive: Pamela Geller declares, 'This outrageous double standard has to end'

WND Commentary -- 28 July 2013

Pamela Geller 

Pamela Geller is the publisher of AtlasShrugs.com and the author of the WND Books title "Stop the Islamization of America: A Practical Guide to the Resistance."

When a policeman uses the full force of the state to enforce the Shariah at the cost of our constitutionally protected inalienable rights, the West is in trouble. But that’s what happened last May in Canada, when I was scheduled to speak at the Chabad Flamingo Synagogue in Thornhill, right outside of Toronto’s city limits. Two of York Regional Police’s “finest,” Chief Eric Jolliffe and Inspector Ricky Veerappan of the force’s Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Bureau, threatened Chabad Rabbi Mendel Kaplan into canceling my speech.

Other Canadians wouldn’t stand for this, and my speech went on as scheduled in another venue. And now I have even more good news. The intrepid Canadian freedom fighter Ezra Levant was determined not to let this police intimidation stand. He encouraged me to file a complaint, and now our complaint against Inspector Veerappan has been accepted for investigation. Our complaint against Chief Joliffe has been forwarded to the York Regional Police Services Board for further consideration – since he is chief of police, there are extra procedures to go through.

Veerappan richly deserves to be investigated for his persuasion of Rabbi Kaplan, who serves as a chaplain for the York Regional Police. Back in May, he announced that if Kaplan hosted my speech as planned, “then we’d have to reassess our relation with (Kaplan). Some of the stuff that Ms. Geller speaks about runs contrary to the values of York Regional Police and the work we do in engaging our communities.”

Values? The “stuff” that I speak about includes gender apartheid, creed apartheid, Islamic Jew-hatred and honor killing. That runs contrary to their values? What exactly are their values? Imposing Shariah? Because that’s exactly what they’re doing. My value is life. What’s theirs?

The Ottawa Citizen said in an editorial, “The York Regional Police department should be ashamed. … Whether the job threat was real, and whether anyone agrees or not with Geller’s views, Veerappan’s conduct is appalling. Canadians expect police to respect Charter provisions protecting freedom of speech. They are not supposed to act as censors at the behest of a particular community.”

And the incomparable Mark Steyn wrote: “Thanks to the York Regional Police’s creepy and Orwellian ‘Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Bureau,’ Canada is now a land where cops are sent round to synagogues to threaten rabbis – all in the name of ‘diversity’ and ‘inclusion,’ which must give the old-school fascists a laugh at their Monday-night poker game in hell. Jewish organizations north and south of the border ought to be up in arms about this. According to Brian Sibley, Inspector Ricky Veerappen, the head of the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Bureau, is himself Muslim – which may or may not explain why he’s strutting about like the Ontario branch of Saudi Arabia’s Mutaween.”

Steyn also pointed out the double standard: “Pamela Geller, tireless campaigner against Islamic imperialism (and a lady I had the honor of being introduced by at CPAC a few years back), was scheduled to give a speech at a Toronto synagogue on May 13. Miss Geller is not a convicted terrorist or terrorism-supporter or someone who argues for the execution of all homosexuals. If she were, she could speak at any Canadian venue with impunity.”

It’s true: The superb Canadian blog, Blazing Cat Fur, reported at the time that my talk was canceled that “Imam Abdul Hai Patel, is a chaplain with the York Regional Police. Patel, along with other members of the Canadian Council of Imams in 2012, attended a conference in Saudi Arabia sponsored by the Muslim World League. The Muslim World League, as detailed below, has a long and sordid association with terrorists. Do note well that the Muslim World League operates WAMY – the World Assembly of Muslim Youth. WAMY was stripped of status as a Canadian charity last year after it was discovered to have funded terrorists.”

And the convicted terrorist and airline hijacker Leila Khaled, who is known as the “poster girl of Palestinian militancy,” spoke via Skype in early June at the University of British Columbia. Khaled has been convicted of terrorism for participating in airline hijackings for the Palestinian Front for the Liberation of Palestine, a terrorist group. She spoke at a conference hosted by a group supporting the Palestinian jihad.

This outrageous double standard has to end. It is good that Veerappan is going to be investigated. Free people must not stand idly by while our most basic, fundamental freedoms are silently seized and destroyed.