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

 

Samidoun: Offended It is Recognized as a Terrorist Group

"[Between the three politicians [Public Safety Minister Dominic LeBlanc, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre] recklessly and maliciously [accusing Samidoun as a terrorist entity owing a retraction and apology, a lawsuit has gone forward]."

"The suit will force the biggest mouths in government to actually show proof of the allegation of terrorist activity."

"It is very dangerous if we allow a government to decide who gets to enjoy full rights and who doesn't without showing actual proof."

Toronto lawyer Stephen Ellis

 

"The Liberals cannot legislate away our right to free speech."

"If they contend we are terrorists, let them prove it in court."

Charlotte Kates, co founder, Samidoun

 

"Samidoun does not have any material or organizational ties to entities listed on the terrorist lists of the United States, Canada or the European Union."

Samidoun statement

Anti-Israel demonstrators march in Ottawa on March 9, 2024. Samidoun, a group listed in Israel as a terror organization and banned outright in Germany, is one of the main groups organizing pro-Palestinian protests in Canada. Photo by Ashley Fraser / Postmedia

 

Vancouver-based Samidoun established a global network of support branches to which they give direction in the promulgation of 'public relations' announcements and protests in support of Palestinian 'rights' and entitlements in a world where Palestinian terrorism wreaks havoc as it mounts terrorist assaults against Jews universally and within Israel in particular, exacting a penalty of murder as the price it feels Israel must pay for its insistence that it has a right to exist on its own ancestral land. 

Palestinian terrorism is geared toward penalizing Israel and Jews through a never-ending devotion to lethal assaults against their 'oppressor'. Portraying themselves as victims seeking restitution of land they claim as theirs despite that it is historically Judean land, and Jews the original inhabitants native to the land, those identifying themselves as 'Palestinians' are in fact looting from the indigenous Jewish population the heritage that was never theirs.

There is, and never has been, a shortage of militant terrorism among the Arab Palestinian population. Among the earliest and most barbaric has been the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, involved in plane and sea-going vessel hijacking, hostage-taking and murderous assaults. Samidoun is a later, public-relations manifestation of Palestinian terrorism's realization of what can be accomplished when slanderous lies are repeated frequently enough to seem believable to the history-ignorant West.

Samidoun, ostensibly created to speak for the rights of Palestinians in Israeli prisons serving sentences for violent crimes against Israelis -- to agitate for their recognition as 'freedom fighters' eligible for release by virtue of the fact that whatever crimes were committed were in defense of their right to 'struggle against' their colonialist oppressors -- is committed to portraying violent criminals as merely asserting their humanitarian right to free themselves from imperialist colonizers.

 

Protesters from the Samidoun organization gather in front of the Muelheim train station in Cologne, Germany, on April 15, 2023, to commemorate Palestinian Prisoners' Day (Ying Tang / NurPhoto via Getty Images)

 

Those like Charlotte Kates preach to a public in the West for whom antisemitism is not unknown, that there is a connection between colonizers of the past and those of the present, as despised, indigenous-injurious exploiters of original, authentic territorial populations. Not only do they promote chants of 'death to Israel', but also 'death to Canada', tarred with the same colonizing brush as Israel. Samidoun portrays itself as a human-rights group seeking justice for all disentitled people, with a special emphasis on Jews and Israel, its first and foremost agenda.

Its links with the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine are obvious enough, not least since the other of its co-founders, Kates's husband Khaled Barakat, is a prominent leader in the PFLP. Kates has run afoul of Canada's hate-speech prohibitions in law, with Vancouver Police leading an investigation following on her having fulsomely praised the savage Hamas attack in southern Israel on October 7, 2023. Jewish groups in Canada have identified Samidoun for what it is, lobbying government to have it recognized as a hate group and enabler of terrorism; linked in its formation and purpose with an already-listed terror group, the PFLP.

Several weeks back, no longer able to ignore the reality of Samidoun's purpose, linkages and incitements the federal government finally relented and announced its decision to place Samidoun on the country's terror list. With the kind of impudent, defiant arrogance recognizable as a hallmark of Samidoun, it now portrays itself as ill done by, a victim of government over-reach, and should apologies not be forthcoming, a full-scale lawsuit is to be mounted.

The leader of the official opposition in Parliament, Pierre Poilievre, had called on the Liberals to designate Samidoun as a terror entity, emphasizing that the group had "clear and direct ties" to designated terror groups abroad. Mr. Poilievre stated, before the official announcement of its designation, that prime minister Trudeau and the federal New Democratic Party "have allowed terrorist organizations to operate freely across Canada", which qualified him a place alongside Canada's public safety minister and prime minister in the pending lawsuit.

A screenshot of the Samidoun-led anti-Israel protest outside the Vancouver Art Gallery where Charlotte Kates was arrested, April 26, 2024. Photo by freepalestinetricitiesbc/Instagram

Finally Placing Samidoun on the U.S./Canada Terror List

"His [Khaled Barakat, Samidoun founder] fundraising and recruitment efforts support the PFLP's terrorist activity against Israel."

"[The United States is designating Samidoun a] sham charity that serves as an international fundraiser for the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine [PFLP] terrorist organization."

"The PFLP, which was designated as a Foreign Terrorist Organization and a Specially Designated Global Terrorist by the U.S. Department of State in October 1997 and October 2001, respectively, uses Samidoun to maintain fundraising operations in both Europe and North America."

U.S. State Department press release 

"Organizations like Samidoun masquerade as charitable actors that claim to provide humanitarian support to those in need, yet in reality divert funds for much-needed assistance to support terrorist groups."

Acting Under-Secretary of the Treasury for Terrorism and Financial Intelligence, Bradley T. Smith

Charlotte Kates, in Tehran two weeks ago, accepts the Iranian human right award  Iran International

 

The Vancouver-based anti-Israel organization has finally been listed by Canada, after much campaigning by Canadian Jewish groups, some pro-Israel-supporting Members of Parliament and editorials in a number of Canadian newspapers. What finally forced the Trudeau Liberal government to act was not the terrorist charity's organization of hundreds of rallies and protests decrying Israel's very existence while making life dangerous for Jews in Canada through its incitements of hate, but the over-reach by Samidoun revealing the scope of its program.

When the hate group encouraged and guided its followers to declare themselves fully in support of Hamas and Hezbollah, declaring fealty to the Islamic Republic of Iran, the Houthis, Hamas, Hezbollah and other non-government terrorist militias from Iraq and Syria to Lebanon and Gaza, insisting that 'imperial-colonialist' Canada must be defeated, and burning a Canadian flag to emphasize their point, prime minister Justin Trudeau no longer had any excuse to hide behind failing to recognize them for what they are.

"The listing of Samidoun as a terrorist entity under the Criminal Code sends a strong message that Canada will not tolerate this type of activity, and will do everything in its power to counter the ongoing threat to Canada's national security and all people in Canada", announced Public Safety Minister Dominic LeBlanc. It remains to be seen just how strenuously committed this government will be to 'do everything in its power' to destroy the malevolent effect this terror group has succeeded in producing in Canada, in its goal of destabilization and conquest.

Unbelievably, the group has enjoyed charitable status in Canada for years, long after it was repeatedly brought to the attention of the government that their activities created stark and dangerous divisions within Canadian society with no end in sight to their ambitious agenda of making Canada terror-central to the Palestinian networks of demonizing Israel, calling for its destruction, and hounding Jewish Canadians in public, while inciting to violence against Jewish institutions in Canada.

The US. government went a step further than Canada, in designating Barakat's wife Charlotte Kates, a director of Samidoun, a terrorist, while Khaled Barakat  himself has been identified as a ranking leadership member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine. These Palestinian terrorist stalwarts last week organized a rally on the one-year anniversary of the October 7 terror attacks where attendees chanted "death to Canada", to which Samidoun later announced "we at Samidoun stand by this phrase as the call to action that it is".

Masked protesters set a Canadian flag on fire at the event, while a woman led chants of "We are Hezbollah and we are Hamas"; identifying with Lebanon and Gaza. The PFLP has been listed by Canada as a terrorist organization since 2003. Groups with a terrorist designation are prohibited from receiving financial services, donations of money, or property. 

Kates, who directly following the October 7 southern Israel atrocities perpetrated by Palestinian terrorists led by Hamas, praised the Hamas and Islamic Jihad savages at a rally: "We stand with the Palestinian resistance and their heroic brave action on October 7", she crowed. The Vancouver Police Department launched a hate-speech investigation as a follow-up to that event. It has been over  year that the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs lobbied government for Samidoun to be declared a terrorist organization, launching a petition with B'nai Brith Canada to have Kates and Barakat deported.

 

Screenshot showing the Facebook page of Samidoun Deutschland. November 03, 2023. (credit: SEAN GALLUP/GETTY IMAGES

"This process has not been tested in Canadian courts. A lot of the reason for that is because we are designating, for the most part, foreign entities. This is one of the only cases where I've seen a direct Canadian tie and a direct Canadian leader ... who will be directly affected by a terrorist listing."

"In the case of an organization like Samidoun, or really any listed terrorist entity, the question comes down to what the people are doing to support the organization."

"Just being a member of an organization is not a criminal offence in Canada. However, as soon as you cross the line into conducting any kind of support or sort of advancement activities that are fairly concrete, then  you come very close to facilitation [of a terrorist activity] and some of those activities."

Jessica Davis, counterterrorism expert, Carleton University