Sunday – Honouring our Communities: March Against Racism
The Deets:
Sunday November 4, 2012
4:00 pm
Rally at David Pecaut Square (King & John) March to Fairmont Royal York Hotel (100 Front)
Honouring our Communities: March Against Racism
Toronto, ON
The Call Out:
NO HONOUR IN DEPORTATIONS | NO HONOUR IN APARTHEID | NO HONOUR IN CORPORATE
PROFIT
Jason Kenney is being awarded an ‘honorary’ degree by Israel’s Haifa University at a fundraiser supported by Stephen Harper, Ezra Levant, Peter Munk, Stockwell Day and others. This event is a celebration of war, racism, corporate profit, displacement, apartheid and anti-migrant xenophobia – all intensified by the Conservative Party of Canada’s agenda. There is nothing honorable about this gathering.
We call on our communities to gather in/to honour of our strength and resilience, in opposition to this award and gathering, and against the dishonorable acts of Kenney, Harper and their allies
Join us on November 4th !
#confrontkenney #nohonour
BACKGROUND
Why is a major Israeli academic institution honouring Canada’s most infamous and despised Minister, Jason Kenney? And why are people like Stephen Harper, Peter Munk and Ezra Levant supporting this?
It is well-known across Canada that Jason Kenney – Minister of Censorship and Deportation – is a key player in advancing the Harper government’s austerity and policing agenda. Their agenda is transparent and their racist, xenophobic, neoliberal policy agenda is clear. It includes:
–Giving unhindered access to corporations while cutting public services, attacking workers, and forcing communities into deeper poverty and greater precarity
–Unquestioned support for wars and colonization in Turtle Island, and globally from Palestine to Iraq to Afghanistan
–Unequivocal support for the Israeli apartheid state and its internationally condemned war crimes and human rights violations against Palestinians and all refugees in Israel
–Expanding an already exclusionary and racist immigration system by increasing temporary work programs, citizenship rejections, detentions and deportations while cutting off refugee status, migrant sex workers, family reunification and access to full services for many, particularly undocumented residents.
–Defunding, criminalizing and censoring dissent and organizing for queer rights, gender justice, Palestinian liberation, migrant justice and beyond
This fundraiser is also meant to establish the “Jason Kenney Holocaust Education Fund”. At the same time that Kenny receives this ‘honour’, the Roma community in Canada is facing intensified discrimination as a direct result of Kenney’s brutal immigration policies.
This is a horrifying insult to the memory of the Roma people who were also targets of Nazi genocide.
Indeed, Kenney has shown great disregard for the atrocities committed during the Holocaust. At a 2009 event, Kenney praised WWII-era fascist collaborator Cardinal Alozije Stepinac, who was convicted for his role in collaborating with the fascist Ustasha regime in Croatia. This regime was responsible for the deaths of between 250,000 to 750,000 Jews, Roma, Serbs, and anti-fascist Croats. And yet, in Kenney’s words: “[Stepinac] was a kind of martyr for Croatia and the faith, and he for me is one of the great heroes of the 20th century”.
This is the agenda that Kenney represents, and these are just some reasons why he and Harper should not be honoured. Join us on November 4th to honour our communities, and to oppose this agenda.
Organized by: Afghans for Peace, Barrio Nuevo, Caregiver’s Action Centre, Centre for Social Justice, Coalition Against Israeli Apartheid (CAIA), Common Cause Toronto, Educators for Peace and Justice, Faculty for Palestine (F4P), Health for All, Independent Jewish Voices – Canada, Independent Jewish Voices – Toronto Chapter, Indigenous Sovereignty and Solidarity Network, International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network (IJAN) Canada, International Socialists, Justice for Mahjoub Network, Justice for Migrant Workers, Law Union of Ontario, Maggie’s: The Toronto Sex Workers Action Project, M1M, Mining Injustice Solidarity Network, Movement Defence Committee, Munk OUT of UofT, New Socialist Group (NSG), No One Is Illegal – Toronto, Not In Our Name (NION): Jews Opposing Zionism, Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP), OPIRG York, OPIRG UofT, Protest Barrick, The Public Health Social Justice Collective, The Women’s Coordinating Committee for a Free Wallmapu, Queers Against Israeli Apartheid (QuAIA), Queers for Social Justice (QFSJ), Social Justice Committee of the United Jewish People’s Order (SJC-UJPO), Socialist Project, Students Against Israeli Apartheid York & UofT, University of Toronto Students Union, Toronto Haiti Action Committee, Toronto Immigration Legal Committee, Toronto Rape Crisis Centre, Women in Solidarity with Palestine
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