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NEW YORK – This is a tale of two police forces.

One police force knows how to deal swiftly and effectively with pro-Hamas thugs breaking the law.

The other is a Police Farce.

Here in New York City on the weekend, we witnessed a police force that is competent. Toronto police – whose budget just got a big boost – should watch and learn.

But they won’t.

Every Saturday, New York City’s Washington Square Park is the weekend gathering place for musicians, dog-walkers and produce vendors. This Saturday, the park was filled with what can only be described as a mob.

They called it a “Millions March for Palestine.” There weren’t a million of them, but they certainly started to march. They headed towards Times Square.

Police watched them every step of the way, forcing them onto the sidewalk. By the time they reached Times Square, near 42nd Street and Seventh Avenue they were angry and ugly.

Right around then, my partner and I were a couple blocks away, heading to see a play at the Samuel Friedman Theater called A Prayer for French Republic. Which, ironically enough, is about generations of a Jewish family facing violence and persecution – for being Jews.

Also happening right around then: an Uber driver somehow got close enough to drop off a passenger in Times Square. Who had left a hand grenade in the back seat of the Nissan Ultima.

It wasn’t a real hand grenade, thank God. But it certainly looked real.  The Uber driver called the police. The cops immediately deployed the bomb squad – a unit of the New York Police Department’s Counterterrorism Bureau, located pretty close to Times Square.

The bomb squad couldn’t get to the Uber because the Israel-haters were actually and actively blocking them. Chaos ensued. The mob was chanting and surrounding police cars.

So, New York’s finest did what police are supposed to do: they took action. They promptly shut down access to the area, and they pushed up against the mob to create a perimeter around the Uber. And then – pay attention, Toronto “police” – they started to make arrests.

You know: using their legal authority to take persons into custody. NYPD Deputy Commissioner Kaz Daughtry tweeted what happened next: “Happy Saturday to all! Except the people who thought it was a good idea to block an NYPD ESU vehicle on the way to a bomb threat call. They will be spending their Saturday where they belong – in jail.”

Eleven of the thugs were dropped into a jail cell that night. In the meantime, the hand grenade was found to be “inert,” police said.

Now, Times Square is always a circus, jammed with people and vehicles and noise and lights. That’s certainly what my partner and I observed on Saturday, right near the spot where police were dealing with a real riot and an unreal bomb. We saw and heard the sirens and the cops, but Times Square was never, ever shut down.

But in Toronto, the meeting place of two G7 leaders was. By a similar mob of Israel-haters – and a totally ineffective police force.

On the very same day, right around the same time as the Times Square melee, there was supposed to be a meeting of the Prime Ministers of Italy and Canada at the Art Gallery of Ontario. You know, the elected leaders of two G7 countries.

As in New York, an Israel-hating mob descended on the AGO building. As in New York, they chanted calls for violent revolution and blocked access. As in New York, they screamed and attacked people.

Unlike New York, the Toronto police effectively did nothing. They essentially let the bad guys win.

One of Justin Trudeau’s caucus members, pro-Israel MP Francesco Sorbara, tweeted what happened. Wrote Francesco:

“Last night members of the Italian-Canadian community from across Canada came together in anticipation to greet PM Meloni & PM Trudeau but instead were spat on, physically assaulted, and verbally abused. It was absolutely disgusting and unacceptable.”

Now – full disclosure – Francesco is an old friend of mine. As such, I can tell you that he is a moderate and sensible guy, not given to overstatement. When he says that was what happened, you can rest assured: that is what happened.

So, in a bit of karma or kismet, Toronto was experiencing the same sort of thing the New York was experiencing, on the very same day, at the very same time: Israel-hating mob, violence, intimidation, abuse.

The difference: New York cops dealt with it. Toronto cops didn’t.

The usual dance ensued: the Prime Minister’s Office quietly suggested that the cops were to blame for shutting down the meeting. The Toronto police subtly suggested the PMO was to blame.

For once, I believe Trudeau’s PMO. I’ve worked for a Prime Minister. When it comes to matters of security, we always listened to what the police say. We did what they told us to do. Period.

Since October 7, for months, the Toronto Police Service has distinguished itself with one thing: total incompetence. In dealing with the Israel hating-thugs that have threatened Jewish neighborhoods, attacked Jews and Jewish businesses, firebombed Jewish delis, they have been an abject failure. They have been a joke.

Jews won’t say that, because they’re scared and don’t want to lose what little police protection they’ve received. But I’m a pro-police Irish Catholic, and that’s what I think: Toronto’s Police Service has become a joke.

Want proof? Take a look at what happened in New York City on Saturday. Then take a look at what happened in the city of Toronto on Saturday.

Here in New York, the cops did and do their job.

In Toronto, they don’t.

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It started on October 8.  Literally, the day after.

Think about that: a slick, global, and professional-looking propaganda campaign – one that would promote violent anti-Semitism, and deny the horrors of October 7 –  was underway the very next day.  October 7: the biggest massacre of Jews since the Holocaust.

October 8: a campaign immediately starts to deny October 7, or justify it.

This writer has been involved in politics in the Americas and the Middle East for a long time.  It is impossible – literally impossible – to develop and deploy a coordinated global propaganda campaign in a single day.  It can’t be done.

But if you have millions of dollars to pay for it, and bot farms in Egypt, Britain and America to push it out – and, most importantly, if you knew October 7 was going to happen before it did – then you could do it.  And thereby reach, and manipulate, millions upon millions of people, in multiple languages.

That, along with other disturbing revelations, comes out of our latest discussion with the brilliant Tal-Or Cohen Montemayor, Executve Director of CyberWell, an Israeli tech nonprofit that targets and combats the spread of anti-Semitism on social media.  Speaking from Amsterdam, Cohen Montemayor shared some startling, and disturbing findings from CyberWell’s latest report.

“We found evidence of October 7 denials – and support and celebration of it – as early as October 8, 10 and 11,” she says. “And we have evidence of accounts on X’s platform with only 3,000 followers tweeting out October 7 denial and misinformation – and getting three million views.  That’s highly suspicious.”

Other disturbing findings: there are specific anti-Semitic messages showing up on each of the major social media platforms.

•Facebook: “Jews control the world – or are dominating the world order.”
•Instagram: “The Rothschild conspiracy theory”  so named after the well-to-do Jewish family that has long been targeted by Jew haters
•TikTok: “Jews are the enemy.”
•X (or Twitter): “Jews are the enemy.”
•YouTube: “Jews are the synagogue of Satan.”

Anyone who has ever worked on a political campaign knows what that is: micro-targeting.  That is, pushing out messages that are targeted to specific demographics, based on age, gender, geography and education.  That just doesn’t happen organically.  It requires money and organization.

Now, more than 150,000 examples of that sort of anti-Semitic propaganda were flagged by CyberWell for removal by the main social media platforms.  And (some good news) the platforms are getting somewhat better at removing hate.

Cohen Montemayor says that the removal rate is now around 32 percent across all the social platforms – an improvement of almost ten per cent from 2022.  And Elon Musk’s X, where some of the worst stuff is found, has finally bowed to pressure, and is hiring 150 new employees at his Texas headquarters to identify and remove online hate.

But the bad stuff is still getting through, turbo-charged by algorithms that make the anti-Semitic content a little bit worse every time someone sees it.  CyberWell took the hateful postings and presented them to the social media bosses.  Their responses were not helpful, she says.

“X threw out the rulebook entirely when it came to content moderation, [when they decided] to no longer remove hate speech,” she says.  Thereby making X one of the worst places for anti-anti-Semitism on Earth.

This past week, the Trudeau Liberals rolled out a massive and controversial legislative package to curb online hate and harm.  But, to experts like Cohen Montemayor, the problem goes far beyond mere words.  Because the harmful words are resulting in violence, she says.

“We’ve seen this with the 9/11 bombers.  We’ve seen it with January 6 insurrection. YouTube was the number one platform cited by January 6 insurrection participants as their source of information. These very smart algorithms are meant to grab your attention, and get you addicted…the content is meant to stir emotions, to make people upset, to isolate them socially,” says Cohen Montemayor.

“Mainstream social media platforms are being used to radicalize people, leading to very violent results. October 7 was the largest-ever hijacking of social media platforms by terrorist groups.  It should’ve indicated to every Western democracy that these platforms will be exploited by terrorist groups.”

In conclusion, Cohen Montemayor makes one point several times – which is that the problem goes far beyond words. It’s an issue of national security, too.

And not just Jews will be the victims, Cohen Montemayor says, adding:  “After the October 7 massacre by Hamas, the following weekend, 800 Christians were massacred in Sudan. That massacre was uploaded directly, and streamed directly, onto Facebook.  Why? They’re learning.  These terrorist groups are learning from each other.”

It’s a chilling report, and one that all civilized nations should heed.

Because the haters are getting better at what they do.  And they’re winning the propaganda war.

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The biggest achievements in politics – the only achievements, really – are the ones involving risk.

As in, taking a risk. Making a decision, making a statement, making a law that entails risk to you and your career.

Brian Mulroney took risks.

I didn’t work for him. In fact, I worked for Jean Chretien, his Liberal Party opponent. And part of my job was to make the Mulroney government miserable.

Despite that – and when behind closed doors – Martin Brian Mulroney, PC, CC, GOQ, was a bit of a marvel to us. Because he took risks. Because he had guts.

Case in point: South Africa.

In the Eighties, when Mulroney was Prime Minister – and presiding over two successive super-majorities – South Africa still practiced apartheid. Apartheid was institutionalized racism, essentially. It was racial segregation and discrimination that had been forced on the black majority in South Africa by a white minority.

Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher were Brian Mulroney’s closest allies internationally. They professed to oppose apartheid – but they vociferously opposed international sanctions to bring it to an end. Thatcher called them “counterproductive.”

Brian Mulroney stood up to Reagan and Thatcher – and many within his own Conservative Party. In September 1986, Mulroney imposed tough sanctions on the apartheid regime, and encouraged other nations to do likewise. Said he: “I viewed apartheid with the same degree of disgust that I attached to the Nazis — the authors of the most odious offence in modern history.”

Nelson Mandela thanked him for that, saying that Mulroney, and Canada, would be forever remembered for their support.

Mulroney’s other great and courageous achievement: free trade.

And, yes, we Liberals initially opposed it – or, at least, the John Turner-era Grits did (Chretien, as the country would soon see, not so much). But Brian Mulroney saw where the world was heading – with technology ushering in an era of lightning-fast global commerce, dominated by companies all too willing to move to where they could do more business for less.

Mulroney’s free trade stance was targeted by Turner during the 1988 federal election – and, for a while, it very nearly turned the tide against the Tory leader. He could have blinked, then, and backed away. He could have reversed himself. He didn’t. Mulroney persisted – and won another huge majority, and signed a comprehensive free trade deal with the United States.

There were other, less notable, parts to the man. On the Hill, in the pre-Twitter days – when things were more civilized – all of us heard stories about Brian Mulroney’s human side. A gift of ties to Brian Tobin, his Liberal tormentor, when the MP’s son was born.

A call to Chretien during a health scare. Quiet wishes whenever a Liberal was going through personal hardship. Not for publication, ever. But never forgotten by the recipients.

Brian Mulroney was not a great politician and Prime Minister because he won two big elections. He was one of the great ones because he took risks – because he took risks with things that mattered, the things that will be remembered by history.

My deepest condolences to his family, some of whom I now know and consider good friends.

Your Dad was a great one. He will be missed.

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It’s the next front in the war.

There’s been no ceasefire reached yet. Fighting is still going on, in and around Southern Gaza. Rockets and bullets are still being fired into Northern Israel by Hamas and Hezbollah.

Slowly but surely, however, Israel is winning the war.

As of last week, more than 12,000 Hamas terrorists have reportedly been killed. Three-quarters of Hamas’ 24 battalions – each containing more than 1,000 men – have been wiped out. Missile attacks on Israel have dropped off dramatically.

And, like Adolf Hitler in his final days, Hamas’ leadership is in hiding in subterranean bunkers, moving from one hideout to another, more preoccupied with survival than directing the fight against the IDF – who, incredibly, have lost only 300 troops since the war began in earnest on October 27.

So, Israel is winning. After the military “mop-up” is done, Israel will relinquish governance of Gaza to someone else – possibly some amalgam of the Palestinian Authority, humanitarian agencies and peacekeepers.

One thing is clear: as in the past, public opinion in Israel overwhelmingly opposes governing Gaza. They want Hamas defeated, and the remaining hostages back, but no role in governing the ungovernable.

The Middle East, however, is just one front in the war that broke out after the horrors of October 7. There is another battle raging, and it is not centred in Gaza and the West Bank.

It is the war against Jews taking place around the world.

Not even the “pro-Palestinian” protestors – some of whom are being paid to protest, as this newspaper has documented – dispute the reality anymore: they don’t just oppose Israel’s government (which isn’t anti-Semitic to do). They oppose Jews (which is).

Their Jew hatred has manifested itself, in Canada, in firebombing and shootings and acts of vandalism from coast to coast – at synagogues, Jewish schools, businesses, and even the private homes of Jews. The same sort of anti-Semitism is happening around the planet, too, every single day. It is, as noted, the next front in the war that commenced on October 7, 2023.

This writer has authored ten books, most of them about anti-Semitism, racism and their variants. Regularly, I get asked by exasperated and frightened readers: where does this anti-Semitism come from? In the year 2024, why have we not killed it off, once and for all?

It’s no longer true to say that anti-Semitism is caused by Christians. While the Holocaust was indeed conducted in European Christian nations, no one seems as preoccupied, anymore, by the notion that “Jews killed Christ.” (They didn’t: the Romans did.). And polling shows that the vast majority of Christians in the West strongly support Israel’s right to defend itself, within safe and secure borders.

No, the genesis of modern anti-Semitism is a lot harder to pin down. A lengthy essay in the new Time magazine by Noah Feldman, a professor (ironically) at Harvard’s law school, is now making the rounds. In his “New anti-Semitism” piece, Feldman writes: “Anti-Semitism is actually a shape-shifting, protean, creative force. Anti-Semitism has managed to reinvent itself multiple times throughout history, each time keeping some of the old tropes around, while simultaneously creating new ones adapted to present circumstances.” Jews, he continues, are the targets of whatever hatred is fashionable at the moment.

And Feldman is right. Whenever there is a global calamity, people cast about for a scapegoat, and Jews are always the best candidates. So, 9/11 was caused by Jews, because no Jew was killed that day. The 2008-2009 global financial crisis was caused by Jews, who disproportionally benefitted from the economic chaos. Covid was a Jewish invention, because they own the pharma companies.

Even wildfires has been the fault of Jews: in his amusing (but disturbing) new book, Jewish Space Lasers, Mike Rothschild – who ironically, bears the surname of a centuries-old anti-Semitic conspiracy theory – tells the story of MAGA Trump fanatic, congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene. She promoted the notion that Jews were “beaming the sun’s energy back to Earth” with non-existent “space-based solar generators,” and missing non-existent “receiving stations.” And thereby causing wildfires in California.

Anti-Semitism, then, is indeed a shape-shifter, never dying, never completely going away. It adapts, like cockroaches adapt. It is unkillable.

So, since October 7, anti-Semitism is back with a vengeance, globally. It is the new front in the next war.

And, as in every war, the frontlines will grow. Other targets will be added.

Because what starts with Jews never ends with Jews.

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“Free speech,” says Salman Rushdie, “is the whole thing, the whole ball game.”

“Free speech,” he says, “is life itself.”

That feels like a bit of an overstatement. But in Rushdie’s case, it’s probably heartfelt. The British-American author has faced several death threats and assassination attempts since the publication of his book The Satanic Verses in 1988 – including one death threat from Iran’s supreme leader, no less.

Hezbollah, al-Qaeda and several Islamic terror groups have also promised to kill him. In 2022, one Islamic terrorist came close to doing so, stabbing Rushdie repeatedly before a speech in New York. Rushdie lost sight in one eye, and the use of one hand.

There’s no way to know, of course, what Rushdie thinks – if anything – about the Trudeau government’s latest attempt to reign in harmful speech online. But it’s reasonable to assume that Rushdie would be unimpressed.

Rushdie might disagree, but it is not ever unreasonable to have some limitations placed on hate speech, terrorist content, incitement to violence, the sharing of non-consensual images, and child exploitation. For example, the toxic wave of anti-Semitism seen everywhere these days is clearly corroding our social fabric, and causing actual terror in the Jewish community.

So, what would Trudeau’s sweeping package of legislative reforms, announced Monday, do to combat anti-Semitism? Not much.

For starters, Trudeau’s bill is predicated on a falsehood – the notion that it is possible for one country to control what is on the Internet. How, exactly, does one do that? The Internet truly is, as its name implies, a World Wide Web. If the owners of a web site promoting hate or terrorism dislike governmental control over what they have to say, they can just move it to another jurisdiction that is less bothered by it.

The proposed Trudeau law anticipates this, and says it will target social media platforms and Internet Service Providers (ISPs) operating in Canada, and essentially deputize them to police content.

But the social media mavens and ISPs – many of which are headquartered in the United States, where the First Amendment frowns on virtually any restraint on speech – have said they have no interest in acting as Internet hall monitors. They will (and have) simply pull the plug. Which doesn’t just limit free speech. It ends it.

Another problem: who decides?

The proposed federal overseer – an ombudsman-type official – will be vested with extraordinary powers to decide what is, and what isn’t, acceptable. The problem with such an approach is obvious: what is one person’s medicine is another person’s poison. It is wildly subjective, always.

The post-October 7 era has offered us plenty of awful examples of why this is problematic. Anti-Israel types are being permitted by the authorities to regularly promote hate – while pro-Israel voices are being suppressed or cancelled with impunity. A Toronto Star former ombudsman and current columnist, to cite just one example, last week opined that Hamas was “provoked” into attacking Israel – and that Hamas is a mere “system of government” composed of “civilians working for a living.” So, what if the proposed online speech ombudsman possesses similarly vile views? Where does a Canadian Jew go to complain, then?

Now, it may be that the online harms bill is simply a ruse – a political head fake. Trudeau’s Liberals can proclaim that they have taken action against online hateful conduct, without ever actually planning to pass it into law. The real objective, perhaps, is to trap the Conservatives into opposing the bill, which will permit Liberals to say that Tories don’t care about hate and child exploitation.

Which would be cynical and duplicitous. And classic Trudeau-style sophistry.

If the bill’s objective is stamp out online harm, it goes about it in the wrong way. It presently gives too much power to an unelected official to decide what is acceptable – and it underestimates the willingness of social media platforms and ISPs to simply ignore the new rules.

The road to Hell, someone once said, is paved with good intentions. Trudeau’s new bill is full of good intentions.

But it’s still a Hellish mess.

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Was it the tiny Star of David?

Does Maple Leaf Sports and Entertainment now plan to bar anyone from Scotiabank Arena if they are wearing Stars of David around their necks?

If it wasn’t that, was it the words: “Free Our Hostages”? Was it that?

Because, as a general principle, freeing hostages – any hostages, anywhere – isn’t really controversial, is it? The dictionaries define “hostages” as human beings who are illegally seized, and held for ransom. Everyone is against that, aren’t they? It’s illegal, after all.

Looking at the hoodie worn by Toronto defence lawyer Gary Grill at a Raptors game this week, those are the only things one can imagine MLSE’s head of security, Chad Bowman, could object to. The Star of David, or the three words about hostages. White letters, not big. There was nothing else on the hoodie.

Who can be against freeing hostages, besides Hamas? Who can be against the public display of a Star of David?

Oh, wait. We actually know who is against the Star of David being shown in public, don’t we?

In Canada, they’re the same people who have been shooting up Jewish schools and homes, and firebombing synagogues and Jewish delis, and attacking anything that is even remotely associated with someone who is Jewish.

How did it all happen? Lawyer Gary Grill was wearing the hoodie at the game, alongside his best friend, lawyer Leora Shemesh. Says Shemesh: “We got up to get a drink and a security guard approached us and said someone would come to talk to us. She claimed that our sweatshirt was too political. We were also wearing dog tags and I was wearing a Jewish star with an Israeli map.”

She continues: “A manager came and said take it off or cover up or we would be forced to leave.”

Says Gary: “When they asked me to take it off or leave, the assistant head of event security said MLSE doesn’t want to take sides. Really? Remember Kiana Lede, the ‘river to the sea’ anthem singer [at the NHL All-Star game, played at Scotiabank Arena]? It seems what MLSE doesn’t want to do is side against Hamas who believe taking, keeping, and raping hostages is just fine…This isn’t political speech because there aren’t two competing ethical sides to this issue.”

Exactly.

Gary and Leora tried to figure out the MLSE’s policies. The rules didn’t seem to apply to Black Lives Matter, or LGBTQ, or similar causes – the arena, and the Raptors and the NBA, had actively promoted those. The NBA has held LGBTQ nights. And, the Raptors even have a Black Lives Matter clothing line. So what gives?

Chad Bowman isn’t talking, per corporate policy. We emailed him, and he hasn’t responded. So we looked at the “policies” MLSE has promulgated about Scotiabank Arena.

“Conduct” that is “prohibited” includes “displaying signs, symbols, images, flags, clothing, banners that may be considered vulgar, discriminatory, disrespectful.”

That doesn’t seem to fit. A Star of David isn’t vulgar, discriminatory or disrespectful. It’s actually about the loving relationship between humankind and God. And freeing hostages, as noted, is pretty respectful, isn’t it?

There’s only one other “policy” that may apply. It says “displaying signs, symbols or images for commercial or political purposes” is verboten – that’s German for “forbidden,” by the by, which seems apt in relating this story – at Scotiabank Arena.

Again: is it “political” to wear a Star of David? Is it political to say illegally-held hostages should, as a general principle, be released?

Because MLSE isn’t really saying much that is useful about their decision to remove Jews with a threat of force, what are we left with? Are they afraid of the anti-Israel types showing up to a game, and calling for a violent revolution – an intifada – at halftime?

Well, MLSE isn’t saying that. Before Christmas, however, a couple pro-Palestinian types were told by MLSE to remove their kafiyyehs – those traditional black and white scarves you see everywhere – before they would be let in to a Mariah Carey concert.

They shouldn’t have been. Kafiyyehs are ubiquitous in Toronto, and it’s not an incitement to murder anyone. Holding up a sign saying: “Kill The Jews”? A banner reading: “Kill Gazans”? Of course.

But a tiny Star of David, and a plea to release hostages? No.

Situations like these require judgment. MLSE and their security folks didn’t use their judgment. They panicked, it seems. They opted for the easiest course of action – which was to kick out the Jews. To deny them a small indication of their faith. To erase them.

Which, you know, has familiar ring to it.

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Holocaust denier David Irving is reportedly dead.

Some were surprised to hear that he was dead. Because, really, David Irving had been dead inside for a long time.

He claimed to be a historian, but he wasn’t one. He had no training as a historian. Early in his career he wrote books about historical events, and enjoyed some success at that.

But, about 30 years ago, Irving started to pilot alone through some dark waters. And in particular, he started to deny the Holocaust.

He said there was no proof.

Despite the fact that the Holocaust was – and is – the most well-documented mass murder in human history, Irving became a denier. He wanted proof.

He said that those who survived the Holocaust were “liars.” He said there was no “Reich policy to kill the Jews.” He said “there is only one salvation for Germany, and that is Hitler.”

One evening in March 1989, while I was a reporter at the Ottawa Citizen, I learned that Irving – who called himself “a moderate fascist” – was scheduled to give a speech at Canada’s most storied hotel, the Château Laurier. I contacted I the hotel’s management, to ask if they were aware that Irving was a Holocaust denier and a promoter of Nazism – and would they cancel his event, as they occasionally cancelled other controversial events.

The hotel’s management said they wouldn’t. In fact, they gave every impression that they didn’t care.

So, on that night, “moderate fascist” David Irving came to Ottawa. There he stood, beaming, beneath the glittering chandeliers at the posh old local hotel. Talking about the need for “proof” of the death of six million Jews.

He was dressed in a tailored suit and protected by about a dozen neo-Nazi skinheads.  Irving stood before his audience and said there was no proof, and declared himself a “hardcore disbeliever” in the gas chambers used to exterminate Jews at Auschwitz.

On that night in March 1989, more than 300 people were in the Chateau Laurier’s ballroom. They weren’t worried about being spotted there. In fact, Irving’s event was sold out. Dozens were turned away.

Hia audience was mainly comprised of older white men and women from the Ottawa area. Many stood and applauded his hateful words about the gas chambers, and virtually every bigoted word he uttered along the way. They wanted proof, too.

The neo-Nazi skinheads slouched at the ballroom’s doors, and handed out copies of a self-published magazine. It called for “death to race mixers,” contained tributes to Adolf Hitler, and called for “race revolution.”

It was an astonishing scene: hundreds of  people paying to listen to a notorious Holocaust denier – and knowing in advance that the media would be there to document their presence. They don’t care. They came anyway.

And they weren’t nobodies.

There was an Ottawa school trustee, a former ranking diplomat, a Department of Justice lawyer, dozens of public servants, and plenty of school teachers. All of them were there, notwithstanding the risk of media exposure, to hear their St. George, the one whose best-selling books would slay the twin-headed dragon of International Jewry and Communism.

They gave him ovation after ovation. Irving beamed.

Seven months following that wildly successful visit to Ottawa, David Irving flew to Austria and spoke to some banned neo-Nazi groups. In Vienna and Leoben, Irving stated that “the gas chambers in Auschwitz never existed.”

Later on, when not sharing stages with former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke or one-time American Nazi Party leader William Pierce, Irving would call survivors of the Auschwitz death camp “assholes,” and claim that “more women were killed in the back seat of Edward Kennedy’s car in Chappaquiddick than in the gas chambers at Auschwitz.”

Then, he made a big mistake. When renowned Holocaust scholar Deborah Lipstadt accurateky characterized some of Irving’s views in her writing, he sued for libel. This writer – full disclosure – was a witness for Lipstadt. But in the end, she didn’t need me. She destroyed David Irving in court, and his reputation and career never recovered.

And now, he’s said to be dead. Now, the “moderate fascist” David Irving is gone, and Hell is a little bit more crowded as a result.

So, really, there’s only one thing left to be said about the reported death of this Holocaust denier.

We want proof.

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Belleville, Ontario, is the Friendly City.  That’s Belleville’s official motto.

Belleville has about 55,000 citizens.  It’s got a Kellogg’s plant, and a Proctor and Gamble plant.  It’s got some beautiful views on the Bay of Quinte, on the Northern shore of Lake Ontario.  It’s got a few Starbucks. It’s got a mall where a Sephora just opened.  It’s got some nice old buildings downtown.

And, lately, it’s got a reputation for having one of the very worst drug problems in Canada.

Yes, yes: every city in Canada, big and small, has a drug problem these days.  But a few days ago, in a 24-hour period on that Tuesday, two dozen people overdosed on a street that is within the shadow of Belleville’s City Hall.  Nine of them needed hospitalization.

The situation was so bad, every available ambulance in the surrounding area was needed.  Dozens of cops, paramedics and even firefighters were called in.  And, mid-afternoon on that grim day, police issued an extraordinary warning, the kind you see the federal government issuing about travel to war-torn countries: stay away.

“The Belleville Police Service is advising the public to exercise caution and avoid unnecessary travel to the downtown core area following reports of a significant number of overdoses on Tuesday afternoon,” the statement read. “[There is a] need for increased vigilance and awareness in the affected areas.”

And, with that, the Friendly City became the scary city, right across Canada.  It made headlines everywhere. Things got worse, too: on Thursday, with overdoses continuing to happen on and along Bridge Street, Belleville declared an actual state of emergency.

A state of emergency is what you do when things have gotten very, very bad.  The province of Ontario says a state of emergency should be declared to “prevent, reduce or mitigate a danger of major proportions that could result in serious harm to persons.”

Serious harm to people: that’s what Belleville was facing. Serious harm to its citizens, who live right beside the United Church where the overdoses happened – and serious harm to the addicted and homeless people who gather there every morning for a continental breakfast and, on Sundays, a dinner.  “Serious harm.”

The harm comes from not having a roof over your head, of course.  The harm comes from huddling on col sidewalks with nowhere to go.  The harm comes from the drugs.

Addicts in Belleville will gather together to share in a batch someone’s scored.  They’ll keep some naloxone nearby, in case the opioid – always fentanyl, these days – is off.  But, lately, other stuff is being added to the mix: gamma-Hydroxybutyrate, GHB, a “date rape” drug.  And xylazine – tranq, or trans dope – has been showing up, too.  And naloxone doesn’t really work on tranq or GHB.  So, people overdose.  Badly.

Neil Ellis is the smart and plain-spoken mayor of Belleville.  He’s been around: a couple terms as an MP in Ottawa, and he was a junior minister for a while.  And he’s fed up.

After the state of emergency was declared, Ellis got a call from the Prime Minister.  He got calls with some provincial ministers.  But action? Help? Not much of that.

On Tuesday afternoon, Ellis was back in front of a posse of microphones to give a bit of a State of the Union address.  He wasn’t happy.  And with good reason.

Ellis had asked Ottawa and Queen’s Park on help getting two things: a detox facility, and a hub where people can go and be safe.  That’s it.  A lot smaller price tag than an ArriveCan app that doesn’t work.

Said Ellis: “Very little progress has been made in moving forward on the crisis we are facing.  There was no support for either [the detox facility or the hub].  I was told we need to formulate a mental health and addiction strategy.”

Ellis was looking pretty mad, now.  “I’m not in any way disrespecting the efforts of our provincial partners…but it would be dishonest to say we were satisfied or in agreement.” The province was essentially offering a fraction of the amount needed – and not for a detox facility or a hub.

The cabinet minister who represents the area is Todd Smith, the minister of energy.  He’s regarded as a good guy.  Effective.

Smith has “finally shown an interest” and “may be able to move the dial,” Ellis said. Then the mayor wrapped up with this: “Our city, our unhoused, our residents and businesses have endured a terrible set of circumstances.  It has thrust us into national headlines.”

“It’s time for the province to step up,” he said, but now he wasn’t just talking about Belleville, the Friendly City. “Take responsibility, and act, on the crisis that is in front of every community.”

Will Ottawa and the province, and frankly all of the provinces, do so?

Belleville – like most other cities in Canada – can’t wait much longer.

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