Scurrilous Antisemitic Doxxing

 

"The Canadian Jews on this list are quite possibly the most unflappable members of our Jewish community. I don't think we'll be intimidated by it, if that's the intention. I don't think it's an acceptable thing to happen in Canada."

"It's kind of sad that in this day and age, it's such a show of courage to stand up for the Canadian Jewish community. It shouldn't be hard for our leaders in Canada to denounce hatred of Jews."

"I'm not going to hide under a rock. It's who I am. I'm proud of my service and there's no way I'll hide it. But to put us out there, it feels like it is a bit targeted. What's the purpose of that?"

Rebecca Garner, Canadian citizen 

"The soldier is most likely to have grown up in a Greater Toronto Area neighbourhood with a larger-than-average proportion of Jewish residents in what they'd describe as a Zionist household."

"[On average the type of Canadian who becomes an IDF soldier is] a white Jewish man born and raised in Canada who immigrated to Israel in their late teens with the express purpose of joining its military."

"[Readers can send in tips] about other Canadians that have joined the Israeli military [for the ongoing  database project]."

"[This is] an entirely reader-funded publication that puts the working class first."

"There is nothing antisemitic about the website as the individuals were included based on their service in the Israeli military, not their religious identity."

"We did not take the website down, and are working to restore it. We expect it to be restored soon."

Davide Mastracci, author of online list --  Find IDF Soldiers -- published in The Maple 

"I stand in solidarity with [Canada's] Jewish community. When they target one of us, they are targeting all of us."

"The people being targeted are Canadians. It's a Canadian issue when Canadians are doxxed. Additionally, I know some of the people on the list. I have stood with them in Toronto, and I will continue to stand with them and Canada's Jewish community against this blatant campaign."

"I want the community to know that you are not alone and, together, we will fight to restore the city and country that we knew and love."

Member of Parliament Kevin Vuong

 

"I am a public figure. Last year, I was disinvited on March 8 [to an International Women's Day event in Ontario] because I served in the IDF [Israel Defense Forces]."

"I got death threats ... just absolutely ridiculous."

"[I am] not at all [intimidated by the list]."

Leah Goldstein, public speaker

Leah Goldstein, now 56, lived in Israel from age 17 until 32. She was a world champion kickboxer, an experience that qualified her to become head of instruction for Krav Maga, the IDF fighting system for Israeli soldiers. She had been invited as a keynote speaker last March for an International Women's Day event. Her invitation was cancelled when a group cited her service in the Israeli military, claiming her to be tainted by her collaboration with a military that had entered Gaza to destroy the Hamas terrorist group responsible for an epic-magnitude invasion of Israel of sadist savagery leaving 1,200 civilians -- from infants to adults -- slaughtered, and 120 taken hostage.

 

In the atmosphere circulating within Canada sponsored in large part by the Liberal government of Justin Trudeau whose embrace of Critical Race Theory and DEI set the stage for the domination of progressive-left activism, which paved the way for antisemitic rallies led by Palestinian student groups whose hostile actions against Canadian Jews won the support of a significant number of academics and university students, isolation of Jews in Canada along with threats against the Jewish community became normalized and tolerated. For her part, the targeting of Leah Goldstein resulted in the collapse of her once-numerous speaking engagements. 

When Rebecca Garner, 34 years of age, discovered her name placed on a list that formed part of a database titled "Find IDF Soldiers" she was fairly well taken-aback. An article titled "Meet 85 Canadians that have Fought for Israel" was featured in an online publication -- The Maple -- which was linked to the list. Having served from 2011 to 2014 in the IDF, Garner characterized the list and the article as a "pretty clear expression of hatred for Jews". Born and  raised in Canada, she was motivated to join the IDF in tribute to her Holocaust-survivor grandparents.

 

The article in question states its purpose is meant to provide a database, according to its author, of "mini-profiles for as many Canadians that have fought in the Israeli military at any point as I could find (because) there is little existing research in Canada beyond one-off news articles about who these soldiers are and how they came to make the life choices that they did".

"Throughout this time, the Israeli military has been credibly accused by and/or before major international bodies of ethnic cleansing, war crimes, apartheid, and now genocide. Israeli soldiers have also provided the physical force necessary to uphold practices the Canadian government has condemned, such as the occupation of the West Bank and the creation of new settlements. Despite this, the Canadian government has shown no interest in making it illegal for its citizens to join the Israeli military, preventing them from doing so or even keeping track of them."

Davide Mastracci

The author of these provocatively innocent pieces denies they are meant as doxxing articles; merely devices of keeping track of Canadian Jews who distinguish themselves as lending their efforts as Jews to the Jewish state, in its defence. Nothing malicious about that, is there? A running database for the convenience of any readers interested in perhaps making contact with those listed, out of curiosity, certainly nothing more. The Maple website is meant to serve the ordinary person, it states, and quite ordinarily many persons in Canada share an overriding conviction of Jews as 'the hated other'.

 

The list happens to include Israel's Special Envoy for Combatting Antisemitism, Michal Cotler-Wunsh, design expert on The Morning Show Shai DeLuca, journalist and author Matti Friedman, and cyclist and public speaker Leah Goldstein. It also included Ben Mizrahi, who made use of his army medic training in an effort to save lives. He was murdered by Hamas terrorists on October 7. 

"[The publication of this list is a] shameful attempt at intimidation."

"There is a long history of Canadians, particularly those with dual citizenship, who have served in the militaries of democratic allies of Canada, whether in countries like Israel, the United States, or the United Kingdom."

"In fact, some of the people in this list served as far back at the 1940s. Others on the list have lived in Israel for decades and have written books about their military service."

Noah Shack, Interim President, Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs

One notable reader comment to the published article: "This article has nothing to do with freedom of speech; it is a clear accomplice and a precursor to something like Kristallnacht. One can try to camouflage the idea of this article and present themselves as an innocent investigator of an interesting issue. However, a wolf in sheep's clothing is betrayed by its large wolf's tail and a huge stack of yellow Jewish stars, ready to be sewn onto the Canadians who served in the IDF."

Canada, Fundraising Haven for Palestinian Terrorism

"It is such an honour to be here in Beirut today, one among a sea of over a million people in collective tribute, mourning, love and commitment to the road of resistance and liberation exemplified by Sayyed Hassan Nasralla and Sayyed Hisham Safieddine."

Charlotte Kates, Canadian citizen, co-founder, Samidoun Terrorist group, Vancouver-based

 

"Today, I attended the funeral of Hassan Nasrallah in Beirut."

"During the ceremony, Israeli warplanes flew low over the stadium on two occasions, provoking a defiant response from tens of thousands of mourners."

Dimitri Lascaris, lawyer 'activist journalist', Canadian citizen 

"Barakat [Khaled Barakat, Samidoun co-founder] has previously publicly acknowledged Samidoun's affiliation with the PFLP [Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine terrorist group outlawed in Canada], despite direction from PFLP leadership to maintain the confidential nature of the relationship."

U.S. Treasury Department statement

Charlotte Kates posted this photo on her X account with the following caption: "It is such an honor to be here in Beirut today, one among a sea of over a million people in collective tribute, mourning, love and commitment to the road of resistance and liberation exemplified by Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah and Sayyed Hisham Safieddine." Photo by Charlotte Kates /X

Charlotte Kates, who styles herself an 'international coordinator' for Samidoun, circulated photographs of herself at the Beirut 'funeral' of Hezbollah's leader Hassan Nasrallah, while holding a Samidoun flag. Apart from her presence at the event, two other Canadians were in attendance to mourn the assassination by Israeli airstrikes of Hassan Nasrallah and Hashem Safieddine, leaders of the Islamist terror group. Representatives of Islamist terrorist groups gathered in their tens of thousands to pay homage to the two acclaimed terrorist leaders, beloved of the Islamic Republic of Iran theocratic leadership and its Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

 

Lebanon's largest sports arena was used as a venue for this public funeral, where mass chants of 'death to Israel, 'death to America' rang out. The current head of Hezbollah, Naim Qassam, gave a keynote address to the crowd -- remotely, in fear he would become the third in succession to be assassinated by the military of the country that remains the sole target of Islam's terrorist contingent. 

It is telling just how deeply Islamist terrorism has infiltrated Canada at all levels of society, from its growing Muslim population, ascending to become stealth-acting members of government at every level. Dimitri Lascaris, one of the three Canadians attending this notorious event was a candidate for the leadership of the far left Green Party of Canada in 2020; a former chair of the board of directors for Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East. Yet another innocuous-sounding title for yet another group whose purpose is to slander Israel, to mount divestment campaigns in BDS and to persuade others that Palestinians are entitled to the Judean ancestral land that present-day Israel sits upon.

 

The Israel Air Force flyby Lascaris referred to in a video he shot of the warplanes buzzing the funeral was confirmed by Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz to include the very types of aircraft used to assassinate both Nasrallah and Safieddine in separate incidents; intended to send a 'message' to the faithful in Hezbollah. "You will specialize in funerals, and we will [specialize] in victories", he had stated. 

Born in the United States, Kates claims Canadian citizenship, living in Vancouver since 2009, founding Samidoun with her husband Khaled Barakat, a high-ranking member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, recognized as a terrorist group in Canada since 2003. Samidoun was also declared a terror entity following Samidoun organizers seen burning a Canadian flag on the steps of the Vancouver Art Gallery, leading chants of "death to Canada", during one of their pro-Hamas demonstrations following the events of October 7, 2023 when Hamas operatives by the thousands that included PFLP members, stormed across the border from Gaza into Israel to perpetrate a savage bloodbath killing 1,200 and taking 120 Israeli children, elderly, women and men along with foreign farm workers into Gaza as hostages.

 

To say that the current Liberal-led Justin Trudeau government is soft on Palestinian terrorism is a bit of an understatement. Despite the fact that these terrorist groups are classed as such in Canada, no level of government has acted to outlaw them and arrest those supporting them in Canada. Their ongoing representations on behalf of Palestinian terrorism, openly supporting the sadistic savagery of October 7, the mutilation and rapes of Israeli girls and women, the torching of Israeli homes with entire families inside, the wholesale slaughter of a high percentage of Israelis living in border kibbutzim (communal farming villages), with no official intervention, much less action on the part of Canadian police forces.

 

The United States assigning terror status to Samidoun, stated that the group headquartered in Canada functions as an "international fundraiser" for the PFLP. While in Lebanon, Barakat writes openly about co-ordinating 'resistance' activities with Hezbollah. "This country Lebanon, will fight, and will emerge stronger and unified, trampling the criminal Zionists and imperialists", he stated while praising the Al-Aqsa Flood, so named by Hamas as a titular nomenclature for the massive bloodletting October 7 campaign of 2023. 

Also present for the funeral last Sunday for Nasrallah, Barakat made an on-camera appearance for the English-language propaganda outlet of the Islamic Republic of Iran: "Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah was an exceptional historical leader and we are very lucky that we lived in his time", he stated, lauding the Hezbollah leader whose butchery against Israel gained him fame in the Islamist world of terrorism. Barakat also boasts Canadian citizenship.

 

Despite having been designated by Canada as a terrorist group, Samidoun's website and social media channels continue to function openly with no intervention by any government agency. They continue their solicitation of donations, while continuing to support the BDS movement, and although under suspicion of terrorism activity and subject to court-ordered conditions barring Kates from attending public protests she was still able to travel to Iran where she accepted an Islamic Human Rights Award in recognition of her "anti-Zionist activities". 

Khaled Barakat — the husband of Samidoun leader Charlotte Kates — is seen at a 2015 protest in Brussels in a photo posted on the Samidoun website. Israel’s internal security service alleges that Barakat is a senior figure in the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), a listed terrorist organization in Canada and elsewhere. Photo by samidoun.net

 

Sounds Like an Approach to Regional Conflict...

"There must be a U.S. backstop because a U.S. security guarantee is the only way to effectively deter Russia from attacking Ukraine again."

U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer

 

"Russia is preparing for a long war. They have now three times the manpower and their defence industry is moving quicker than that of Europe."

"Does anybody believe that this is only aimed at Ukraine?"

"What is the use of security guarantees from a weak party? Europe needs to muscle up right now to be actually able to provide security guarantees that will hold."

Lithuanian Defence Minister Dovile Sakaliene

UK PM and French President at 106th anniversary of Armistice Day. Nov2024   AP

In Europe, political and military leaders are busy fleshing out details of a plan for European forces -- on the sidelines of the United States and Russian talks, to which Ukraine has not been invited -- to vigilantly prepare to ensure that Moscow will not attack again. The issue of a united European force is likely to be high on the agenda when U.K. PM Keir Starmer and French President Emmanuel Macron visit Washington for talks with U.S. President Donald Trump, next week.

 

The proposed force would only be workable if the U.S. military could be relied upon for backing, and persuading Donald Trump to that opinion will be a difficult proposition. What Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is really invested in is NATO membership to ensure the security guarantee he is looking for. Yet while NATO's European members are fully invested in backing Ukraine in its NATO ambition, it seems the U.S. has no intention of paving the way for Ukraine in NATO.

 

With NATO membership closed off to  him, Zelenskyy feels that over 100,000 European troops would be required to guarantee the conflict will not flare up once more following a ceasefire. According to Western officials what is under discussion is not an army of peacekeepers to be posted along the 1,000 kilometr front line in Ukraine's east, but rather a "reassurance force". Fewer than 30,000 European  troops on the ground in Ukraine, distant from the front line at key infrastructure sites, backed with western air and sea power is what the UK and France envision.

 

The front line would, under the plan, be monitored remotely. Based outside Ukraine, air power would be in reserve for the purpose of deterring breaches and to reopen Ukrainian airspace to commercial flights. Presumably U.S. air power could be included, in the opinion of the U.K.'s Starmer. However, U.S. Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth informed European allies "there will not be U.S. troops deployed to Ukraine", without completely ruling out U.S. support like air transport or logistics.

 

French President Macron speaks with Ukrainian soldiers at military camp in France, Oct2024  AP

"Different people in the administration are sending different signals ... Who do you believe, is an issue", commented former senior NATO official Jamie Shea. The closest NATO countries in proximity to Russia, the U.K., France, the Nordic and Baltic states, are likely to be assigned the major roles in any such force as is being proposed. Poland, a key logistics base for support to Ukraine since Russia's invasion does not intend to send  troops into Ukraine, according to Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk.

 

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz commented that discussion of a Europe-led security force is "premature", and he was "a little irritated" that peacekeeping forces were being discussed "at the wrong time", insisting NATO, and not an independent European force, must remain the foundation of Ukrainian security. Russia has a fighting force of some 600,000  troops in Ukraine; according to analysts any ceasefire leaving the bulk of that force in place would be a guarantee of renewed conflict.

 

The French military is comprised of just over 200,000 personnel, the U.K.'s fewer than 150,000; Europe would struggle to mount a force of even tens of thousands, according to Matthew Savill, director of military sciences, Royal United Services Institute. 

British PM Keir Starmer speaks to British soldiers at base in Cyprus, Dec.2024   AP

 

First The Saturday People, Then The Sunday People -- The Writing on The Wall Ignored

"Our hearts -- the hearts of an entire nation -- lie in tatters."

"On behalf of the State of Israel, I bow my head and ask for forgiveness."

"Forgiveness for not protecting you on that terrible day." 

"Forgiveness for not bringing you home safely."

Israeli President Isaac Herzog

 

"Their bodies were handed over to the Red Cross today after Hamas paraded them in Gaza in a shocking display of cruelty and propaganda."

"Hamas's treatment of these victims in death is as abhorrent as their treatment in life. The terror group labelled each casket with 'Date of arrest: October 7' -- a blatant distortion of the truth."

"These innocent civilians were not arrested; they were violently kidnapped from their homes during Hamas's brutal attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, and murdered in captivity."

World Jewish Congress 

Hamas releases four  dead hostages to Israel; still from video CNN

 

A handful of Israeli citizens, and even fewer female soldiers released from captivity by a terrorist group that had no compunction over taking infants and their mothers, the feeble elderly, teens, and foreign farm workers as pawns in a scheme to eventually exchange them for the release of thousands of Palestinians held prisoner in Israeli jails. Those prisoners were incarcerated for presenting a direct violent threat to Israelis. Others were convicted of committing or taking part in deadly raids on Israeli citizens and armed personnel as acts of personal violence, to gain favour with the Palestinian Authority and Hamas after years of indoctrination into a cult of murder incorporated and the fetish of martyrdom.

 

A simmering tinderbox of acid-tempered relations between a state re-established on its ancestral territory and a people that had migrated to take advantage of better living opportunities, leaving their original homes in Syria, Egypt, Jordan and Lebanon to arrive in an historical-era geographic land mass of ancient Judeans, the authentic indigenous people of the region. A group of people of Arab origins whose leaders have convinced generations that the presence of Jews is displeasing to Islam and they must be violently dealt with, that their obligation to Islam calls for the obliteration of the Jewish state.

 

Pre-dating and post-dating the rebirth of Israel in its indigenous territory, Arab leaders allowed diaspora Jews to live among them since the Roman era of occupation as lesser beings, paying a tax for their presence to be tolerated. The Jews that were Arabized living among Arabs for millennia were suddenly exiled, their properties confiscated, when Israel re-materialized in 1948. The Arabs calling themselves Palestinians, a designation reserved for Jews on historically Jewish land during the Roman era, signed a covenant among themselves, supported by the wider geographic Arab populations to destroy the Jewish State.

A relative of Ariel and Kfir Bibas holds their photos in Tel Aviv in January 2024.

Jordan Pettitt/PA/AP

That condition of challenge, conflict and conquest led to wars, none of which dislodged Israel. When state-led armed conflict failed, unaligned, spontaneous terrorist groups took the place of state-led wars against Jews. Terror groups out of Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Iran all pledged the destruction of Israel, by various Sunni and Shi'ite tribal proxies. At the present time, Hamas in Gaza has been the most persistent attacker of the Jewish state, followed by Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, Fatah and Yemen's Houthis. What they all have in common is a morbidly sinister ethos of death and martyrdom, refined to a fine art with the addition of sadistic savagery in which Hamas excels. 

Palestinian terrorist groups have become as addicted to threatening, tormenting, and exacting death through both organized and casual attacks as they are to portraying themselves as victims of conniving, territorial-hungry Jews. Their propaganda campaigns in the West aided and abetted by the migration of Islamist agitators infiltrating society at every level have succeeded in drawing out the slumbering menace of the world's oldest and deadliest menace against Jews through antisemitic smears and accusations, succeeding in polluting public opinion and actions against any Jewish presence anywhere.

 

Pro-Palestinian, anti-Israel protesters wave Palestinian flags and chant slogans during a demonstration in central London on January 6, 2024, calling for a ceasefire in the war in Gaza. (Henry Nicholls/AFP)

No crime against humanity is too severe in its horrendous outcome to be perpetrated against Jews. The Medieval-era brutalities of the savage attacks by Palestinian terrorists in southern Israel of October 7, 2023, appealed to the inner antisemitism of a global public at large which bent to their lifelong obsession in a belief of Jewish schemes to control the world through devious means, led by the Christian Church through the ages depicting Jews as the killer of the originator of Christianity, none other than a Jew.

 

Throughout the worldwide Jewish community there is confusion and disbelief that the world seems once again to have turned against them. The influential Muslim Brotherhood which has infiltrated one country after another, from the Middle East to Europe, North America and Africa with its long tentacles and conspiracies, helping to give birth to countless Islamist terrorist groups which become the living scourge of whichever country they settle in, attacking minority ethnic groups, clans and tribes, killing not only non-Muslims but insufficiently-pious Muslims as well.

Pope Francis stops to pray in front of a Nativity scene from Bethlehem in the Vatican audience hall Dec. 7, 2024. The baby Jesus is lying on a white and black kaffiyeh, a Palestinian headdress. Around the star, written in Arabic and Latin, are the words of the angels: "Glory to God in the highest and on earth peace to people of good will." (CNS photo/Vatican Media)

Of the two extremes of jihad, the jihad practised by terrorist groups through violence, threats and bloodlust in eliminating those whom Islam identifies as kuffars, Crusaders, infidels and Jews, there is a general alertness and concern, enough to make target governments -- not only those of the West, but those in the Middle East and elsewhere that fundamentalist Islamists loathe for not sufficiently adhering to strict Islamic Sharia -- dimly aware. The legal immigration and stealth migration of Muslims into Western society has succeeded not only in having Islam accepted into traditionally Christian-majority populations, but in numbers leading to the slow and steady rape of indigenous Western heritage, culture, societal mores and laws.

Kyiv to Washington: Explain Your Game Plan!

"If anyone wants to replace me right now, then it just isn't going to happen."

"I wish Trump's team had more truth. Because none of this is having a positive effect on Ukraine."

"[Claims from Trump that ratings stood at four percent is disinformation] coming from Russia."

"Since we are talking about 4 percent, we have seen this disinformation, we understand that it is coming from Russia. We understand this, and we have evidence that these numbers are being discussed between America and Russia."

"President Trump, with great respect for him as a leader of the people (...) unfortunately, lives in this disinformation space."

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy

Zelenskyy says Trump 'living in disinformation space' created by Russia

 

"Well, we have a situation where we haven’t had elections in Ukraine; where we have martial law, essentially martial law, in Ukraine; where the leader in Ukraine, I mean, I hate to say it, but he’s down at 4% percent approval rating."

"He [Zelensky] refuses to have Elections, is very low in Ukrainian Polls, and the only thing he was good at was playing Biden 'like a fiddle'. A Dictator without Elections, Zelenskyy better move fast or he is not going to have a Country left...I love Ukraine, but Zelenskyy has done a terrible job, his Country is shattered, and MILLIONS have unnecessarily died."  

U.S. President Donald J. Trump

President Donald Trump speaks during the signing of executive orders at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida, on Tuesday.   Roberto Schmidt/AFP/Getty Images

The verbal jousting between Donald Trump and Volodymyr Zelenskyy has resonated deeply in Ukraine. Ukrainians who have been chafing at the ongoing conflict that Russia imposed on it, finding fault with their president's positions have now been unified with those of their compatriots who find the president doing all that can possibly be done in defence of their country amid the conflict, and his unstinting efforts in the international diplomatic field to bring together staunch supporters and allies, imploring them to aid Ukraine in its existential struggle against the territorial ambitions of Russian President Vladimir Putin.

 

Assertions by Donald Trump of the Ukrainian President's failures in the field of popularity among Ukrainians, faulting him for the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine that has displaced millions of Ukrainian citizens, levelled huge swaths of Ukrainian infrastructure, killed or wounded hundreds of thousands have not been well received by the Ukrainian population at large. Nor has most of Europe been impressed by the statesmanship of the leader of the most powerful country in the world, who has suddenly once again turned against America's traditional allies and found common ground with Vladimir Putin's Russia.

"Today I heard, 'Oh, we weren't invited'."

"Well, you've been there for three years. You should have ended it."

"You should have never started it."

"You could have made a deal."

Trump taunting Zelenskyy 

Ukraine, held President Trump, must hold elections. The Kyiv International Institute of Sociology, Ukraine's premier polling organization, published a survey concluding that 57 percent of Ukrainians place their trust in Zelenskyy. Trump's election call for Ukraine and erroneous claims of  low approval ratings echo Vladimir Putin's attacks on the legitimacy of the Ukrainian leader whose Churchillian performance has been outstanding, has become a matter of confused conjecture over Mr. Trump's logic and comprehension of the Russian invasion leading to its occupation of a sixth of Ukraine.

 

Transposing Russia's own flawed election results and the manipulation of Vladimir Putin's changes engineered to alter the Russian constitution in 2021, to enable Putin to remain power up to 2036, appears to have escaped the American President's notice in his tirade against a democratically elected president in Ukraine with a high trust rating among his electorate.  Moreover, charging Ukraine with 'starting' the war is a direct quote from Vladimir Putin that Russia had 'no choice' but to attack Ukraine as a matter of self-defence.

 

"It sounds like there was a handout prepared by Lavrov given to Rubio, and now they're just reading it", remarked former Lithuanian foreign minister Gabrielius Landsbergis. A situation alerting Europe that the alliances the West has been dependent on for mutual security since World War II appear to be unraveling. "Diverse, varied and often incomprehensible", is how French government spokeswoman Sophie Primas characterized Trump's remarks. "We do not understand the American logic very well."

"I would love to meet with Donald. It's been a long time since we've seen each other. I would love to meet with him now as well. I think he will, too", chortled President Putin, praising the meetings between the U.S. and Russian diplomats in Riyadh as 'friendly', describing how different the U.S. representatives were from their Biden predecessors.

 

The resulting firestorm of support for Zelenskyy in Ukraine, where under Ukrainian law, an election cannot be called under a state of martial law and the country steeped deep in conflict, with millions of its citizens abroad, making voting a strategic nightmare, the call for elections has been viewed as an underhanded attempt to sow chaos and divide the country at a time of its vexing existential dilemma. 

 

A prominent documentary director and commentator in Ukraine, a critic of Mr. Zelenskyy, wrote: "After Trump's verbal diarrhea, by tomorrow, Zelensksyy's approval rating will be back above 90 percent -- just like it was on February 24, three years ago", with the invasion of Ukraine by Moscow. 

 

U.S. President Donald Trump delivers remarks after signing an executive order on reciprocal tariffs in the Oval Office at the White House on February 13, 2025 in Washington, DC. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky arrives to meet with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz at the 61st Munich Security Conference on February 15, 2025 in Munich, Germany.   Getty Images

 

                                                                                                                         

National Security ... Uncertain Times

"This is what happens when  you exclude Canadian companies: You find yourself potentially being held hostage."

"We don't control the [combat management] system; the Americans do."

"Who knows what they are going to demand from us?"

Alan Williams, former procurement chief, Department of National Defence 

"The primary thing is during the life of a warship there is the need to modify certain tactics or add certain sensors and the navy didn't want to be restricted to having to ask permission [from the U.S.] for that."

Don McClure, past president, business development, Lockheed Martin Canada

Artist drawing of the Canadian Surface Combatant warship (Source: Canada.ca)

American President Donald Trump's rumblings about forcing Canada through pressure he believes he can apply to Canada's economic well-being, to assent to becoming part of the United States, as the American 51st state, his executive orders that threaten a 25% tariff on Canadian exports to the U.S. focusing primarily on steel and aluminum, his musings about annexing Canada's far North and threats to increase tariffs even further should Canada decide to impose its own counter-tariffs on American exports to Canada, have made for some very tense times. Not that Canada is alone in this; Mexico too has been put on notice, as have Panama and Greenland.

 

Mr. Trump has not endeared himself to his allies since re-assuming the American presidency. His strident demands and threats are beyond reasonable, threatening to upturn the global economy, after putting Europe on notice that they're next. Tariffs he has threatened on Chinese imports are strangely minimal at 10%, in comparison to what America's closest neighbours and trading partners are facing. As for America's traditional role as peacekeeper in Europe and elsewhere as the most powerful country on Earth, one that has supervised the global order, in adherence to the inviolability of sovereign borders, that too has changed.

 

Suddenly NATO and the G7 have been put on notice that their greatest sponsor and originator may withdraw. And Russia suddenly has a new partner in the new world order. President Trump is moving to make good on his election promise that he intended to end the conflict in Ukraine. Whereas the United States, over the past three years, has been as supportive of Kyiv's defiance of Moscow's expansionism as Europe has been, suddenly that is no longer the case. The U.S.  seems prepared to usher peace into this conflict, but it will cost Ukraine a significant portion of its territory while leaving Europe on edge over Russia's territorial ambitions.

A very nervous Canada, a country that could write a best-seller about what it's like to sleep next to a restless elephant, is now considering its options. And re-assessing its former relaxed attitude about its reliance on a mattress, deep and soft enough to prevent serious injury when the restless elephant capriciously turns and tosses, Canada is beginning to assess its various vulnerabilities. Among them is its own defence capabilities, one too long overlooked, yet reawakened as a result of this new posturing from Canada's largest trading partner, the one Canada shares the longest undefended border in the world with.

 

Reawakening to the reality that the United States now has control of many key systems onboard Canada's new warships; the U.S. is potentially capable of holding Canada 'hostage' over future military upgrades, even the provision of spare parts, according to warnings emanating from defence industry officials. The new fleet of Canadian Surface Combatant vessels under construction at Irving Shipbuilding have at their heart the command management system controlling weapons, radars and other intelligent-gathering equipment, produced in the United States. 

The high tech system was originally  meant to be Canadian-made, under full control of the government of Canada. That was changed, however, for made-in-the-U.S. technology named Aegis which allows full control and oversight over the supply of parts, modifications or future upgrades to the Americans, confirmed by industry officials. As it is, the U.S. government currently controls much of the technology in use by the Canadian military, not formerly recognized as an issue, as long as the Americans were considered close allies.

 

Canada is facing an entirely altered situation, one that arrived as out of nowhere, with the ascension of  Donald Trump back to the White House. Canada is awaiting, with  bated breath, the outcome of President Trump's vow to punish Canada economically with heavy tariffs. His threats to annex Canada, to transform it into America's 51st state, was first taken as a joke in bad taste, and then the realization sank in as Trump persevered and returned time and again to musing how it would benefit both countries should Canada fold itself willingly into the arms of the U.S., accepting its manifest destiny.

 

 

Five years earlier, Canadian industry officials had warned the Department of National Defence and Public Service and Procurement Canada bureaucrats of potential dangers inherent in US.controlled technology and the total absence of Canadian on-board content on the new warships. Fifteen years earlier when their current Halifax-class frigates were being modernized, DND insisted on the installation of newly developed Command Management System 330. Financing by Canada gave it total control over the technology. At that time, government stipulated other key systems on the Halifax-class ships originate from companies in Canada, Sweden, Israel, Germany and the Netherlands.

 

When Lockheed Martin Canada, a subsidiary of the U.S. defence company, indicated its proposal included the CMS-330, pointing out maximum focus for Canadian content -- once the contract was won, Lockheed Martin abandoned the CMS-330 to substitute Aegis in its place. The design team on the new warships, led by Lockheed Martin Canada, pointed out the Aegis system was being used on the surface combatants combined with a tactical interface derived from the CMS-330. 

"[The move is a] real and serious risk."

"Even if everything was rosy and there was no risk, we’ve given up any down-stream autonomy in pursuit of a less capable system. Someone needs to answer for this."

"Of all of my laments about this, the shift away from Canadian IP [CMS 330] to AEGIS CCS bothers me the most…"

Retired Vice-Admiral Mark Norman

(Top) BAE Systems rendering from 2018. (Bottom) the much-refined design – RCN rendering, June 2024.

Ending the Russia-Ukraine Conflict Trump's Way

"There is not any leader in the world who can really make a deal with [Russian President Vladimir] Putin without us, about us."

"He's a liar. He doesn't want any peace."

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy

 

"We'll be having meetings at the direction of the president [Donald Trump], and hopefully we'll make some really good progress with regard to Russia-Ukraine."

"I think Ukraine is part of the talks. I don't think this is about excluding anybody."

U.S. Middle East envoy Steve Witkoff 

"[Putin] wants to stop fighting. We each talked about the strengths of our respective nations, and the great benefit that we will someday have in working together."

"I'd love to have them back [in the G8]. I think it was a mistake to throw them out. They should be sitting at the table. I think Putin would love to be back."

"I think he wants to end it and they want to end it fast."

"Zelenskyy wants to end it, too."

U.S. President Donald J. Trump 

President Donald Trump leaves after speaking during the signing of executive orders at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida, on Tuesday.  Roberto Schmidt/AFP/Getty Images

 

American officials and their Russian counterparts arranged to meet in Saudi Arabia for direct negotiations to begin, over ending the Russia-Ukraine war. Kyiv and its allies throughout Europe were left to swiftly arrive at a strategy for their own security. Which led France to call an emergency meeting of European leaders in Paris. Their first encounter with the Trump team at the Munich Security Conference over the weekend left them reeling in disbelief and confusion when senior U.S. officials including Vice-President J.D. Vance gave up mixed signals on support for Kyiv and relieved them of the expectation that Kyiv and Europe would be present for negotiations on Ukraine's future.

 

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was somewhat less than pleased, responding that Kyiv would never view a deal arrived at without his presence as acceptable, and rejected an American proposal to access Ukraine's rare earth minerals which offered in return no security guarantees. In Abu Dhabi on the weekend, President Zelenskyy signed a trade deal with the UAE, meeting Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan to "maximally liberalize access to the UAE market for almost all Ukrainian goods".

 

Sheikh Mohammed spoke of "the UAE's keenness to support everything that would lead to a peaceful settlement of the Ukrainian crisis and continue working to mitigate its humanitarian repercussions." Contrast that with the White House expressing its interest in backing President Zelenskyy's bid to take possession of the US$300 billion in frozen Russian assets held in European banks, as long as Ukraine spends the money on U.S. military hardware.

 

To place matters in further perspective, contrary to Mr. Trump's claims, the U.S. has not been the primary financial contributor to Ukraine's pushback against Moscow. Over the past three years, Europe has contributed 132.3 billion euros ($197 billion,) pledging an open-ended commitment to continue for as long as it may take. As for the U.S. contribution, it totalled $114.2 euros with most of that funding remaining in the United States, representing purchases from U.S. arms manufacturers. 

 

US, Russia agree to try to end war without Ukraine at the table High-level delegations from the U.S. and Russia held talks in Saudi Arabia on Tuesday over the fate of Ukraine, the negotiations taking place without Kyiv's participation.    Evelyn Hockstein/Pool via AP

 

President Trump concurred with the Kremlin that Ukrainians should not have been encouraged to approach NATO for membership, that the resulting conflict was entirely Ukraine's fault, along with that of Joe Biden's offence to Russia's anti-NATO 'red line' sensitivities regarding Ukraine, which has never been a proper country with a history and culture of its very own, claimed by Vladimir Putin. And of course, the one-sixth of Ukrainian territory annexed by Russia will remain with Russia...

 

Leaving Ukrainians in an agony of anxiety over what else Trump might conceivably defer to Putin on, to Ukraine's detriment, in his quest to win accolades for ending the war, as he proposed during his presidential election campaign. And nor does he apparently feel that Russia should be responsible for war reparations after levelling Ukrainian cities, causing the death of up to 57,000 Ukrainian soldiers and civilians, with over 250,000 having been injured. 

According to President Trump, European troops should be prepared to police U.S. "security guarantees" in Ukraine, at Ukraine's expense. He proposed making it simpler for Ukraine to earn the required funding for that initiative with "the equivalent of like $500 billion worth of rare earths". Vice-President Vance did his part in destabilizing/astonishing European leaders over their harbouring of misguided fears relating to Russia and China. "What I worry about is the threat from within -- the retreat of Europe from some of its most fundamental values, values shared with the United States of America."

 

Beyond astonishing... 

Trump falsely claims Ukraine started war with Russia CNN still from video

Pioneers in 'Safer Supply' British Columbia Benefits the Opioid Black Market

"Significant [quantities of] safer supply [opioids are being diverted to the black market with assistance of organized gangs and some unscrupulous health-care providers]."

"Taxpayer-funded 'safe supply' drugs are flooding the streets, enriching organized crime, in some cases with diversion fraudulently facilitated by pharmacies and medical professionals."

"A significant portion [of safer supply opioids are being diverted to the black market, where they are being trafficked] provincially, nationally and internationally."

Power Point presentation produced by British Columbia's Ministry of Health 

A memorial wall for people who died as a result of using drugs is featured inside the offices of the Vancouver Area Network of Drug Users, a nonprofit group. The New York Times

"The last six months of 2020 they dispensed 577,000 opioid pills. In the two years between 2022 and 2024, it was over 22 million. It's humiliating. How many people are living in British Columbia, for goodness sake?"

"We've got to stop calling things harm reduction. It's not proven."

"Is giving people giant buckets full of hydromorphone to dump into the community harm reduction? No. It's not proven to reduce harm. It's not evidence-based. It's an experiment."

"Of course we need to deal with kickbacks from pharmacies. Even if every pharmacy is on the straight and narrow, it would still be a problem. A huge problem."

"We're not talking about safe injection sites at all. You're giving dope to people who are addicted and they're not taking it. They're using it as a currency to buy street drugs and still put themselves at risk."

B.C. MLA Elenore Sturko

Hydromorphone, a type of opioid, is pictured at a managed opioid program in 2019. The drug is among those whose prescriptions have dramatically increased in recent years. The province is investigating the diversion of a 'significant portion' of opioids. (Ashley Burke/CBC)

Part of a confidential report produced by British Columbia's Ministry of Health summarizing findings of a special investigative unit looking into the fallout of the province's initiative to react to the growing phenomenon of fentanyl overdoses leading to death that has swept Canada, and manifested hugely in British Columbia, has been leaked. Its findings discovered that the freely distributed hydromorphone that has been handed out to people addicted to opioids has flooded the streets, the result of that free hydromorphone being bartered for more potent fentanyl craved by drug addicts.

 

The cheaper and more freely available handout drugs on the streets have made their way into the hands of teenagers which has resulted in a growing use of drugs with occasionally fatal consequences for young people. Government agencies have denied that the 'safer supply' they have invested so heavily in relating to their open-minded search for a solution to the fentanyl black market, could be ending up on the streets in a black market bonanza. Yet reports from hospital personnel, police, and community investigators have all held the government to fault for a situation that really is imperilling a greater swath of the population, despite government denials.

 

Now, years after the accusations of government ineptness and malcompetence made the news, a leaked document -- that investigators have produced verifying the accusations -- has surfaced. Even before that, however, the government of B.C. came to a decision to curtail their experiment in 'harm reduction' through 'safer supply'. No longer able to deny that throughout this experiment, accidental deaths due to overdoses have increased, not diminished, and a wider net has been cast in the process, capturing a younger cohort in the drug spiral.

 

Within the presentation photos of diverted safe supply prescriptions still in their original packaging were included; evidently having been confiscated during vehicle searches by police. At least 60 British Columbia pharmacies were identified by the investigative unit as having provided prohibited paid "incentives" to clients, doctors and assisted living residences for the purpose of increasing their operating profits. 

 

Hydromorphone pills are prescribed for patients to alleviate withdrawal symptoms. Photo by Luke Hendry 

 

A dispensing fee is charged for each prescription filled; in this instance billed to the provincial government. Up to three prescriptions a day can be dispensed for a single safer supply patient. Dispensing fees are around $10 each, so the potential for pharmacies to earn up to $11,000 annually for each safer supply patient served is a compelling temptation. Normal customers are worth around $120 in dispensing fees yearly. The obvious conclusion is that a single safer supply patient can result in more revenue than 90 others not related to safer supply combined, would produce.

 

According to the leaked presentation, some 'incentivized' patients may procure only one of their three daily prescriptions while diverting their extra opioids to the black market. Alternately, the pharmacy involved could fraudulently bill the province while failing to dispense the drugs, so that patients don't receive some or all of their prescriptions. Either way, extra opioids end up on the black market fueling organized crime and leading to an increase in drug use in the population. 

According to the presentation, between 2022 and 2024, some 20-million milligrams of hydromorphone (an opioid as potent as heroin) and 232,000 fentanyl patches were dispensed through safer supply, equal to 19 percent of all the hydromorphone and 13 percent of all the fentanyl patches dispensed during this period in the province.

 

Some pharmacies are paying cash kickbacks to vulnerable patients in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside to attract more business — years after crackdowns related to the practice.    CBC News