I’m honoured to have the opportunity to stand in the Legislature today and to speak in support of Israel’s absolute right to unequivocally defend itself and its citizens.

I was devastated by the unimaginably appalling news coming out of Israel on Saturday, October 7. Innocent civilians, men, women, children, even babies and elderly—some of who themselves were Holocaust survivors—were kidnapped, raped, murdered, burned and mutilated.

Hamas terrorists gleefully paraded their war crimes on social media, showing a total absence of respect for the value of human life. By treating these innocent victims as though they were less than human, by dehumanizing these innocent Israelis, these terrorists displayed their own inhumanity for all the world to see. And all the world saw it for what it was: pure evil, the purist display or manifestation of moral evil in recent history.

Every bit of news of the atrocities committed by Hamas hits us viscerally, delivering a punch in the gut, leaving us gutted, as the descriptions from survivors echo the history of pogroms and the Holocaust.

As of Monday, at least 1,400 Israelis had been killed, including the 260 who were massacred at the Supernova Sukkot gathering. This weekend-long outdoor event was scheduled to coincide with Simchat Torah, a joyous day in the Jewish calendar, and billed as a celebration of friends, love and infinite freedom. The symbolism of Hamas’s decision to attack the event is unmistakable. These terrorists clearly stand against the values of freedom, tolerance and peace which Israel and our province will always defend.

Attendees at this event began fleeing in panic as Hamas terrorists arrived and began shooting indiscriminately. The few who managed to reach their vehicles were met with gunfire and blocked roads. Those that hid were hunted down, raped and then were taken hostage or murdered. This attack and all of the other acts perpetrated by Hamas deserve nothing less than our unequivocal condemnation.

This is why the government of Ontario, under the leadership of Premier Ford, has called for moral clarity. We must condemn this evil unequivocally. Israel has an absolute right to defend itself and its citizens against such heinous acts of violence.

Two days after the terrorist attack by Hamas on Israel, I joined Premier Ford and several members of our caucus at the UJA Federation of Greater Toronto’s Emergency Rally for the People of Israel. I continue to receive emails daily from my constituents thanking the Premier, myself and our colleagues for recognizing Israel’s right to defend itself.

Some constituents have noted that the ideology and aims of Hamas have been advanced through a culture of anti-Semitism and Jew hatred disseminated by the school system in Gaza. This system is supported and funded by the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, UNRWA, which has a long and well-documented history of providing classrooms with materials teaching Palestinian students to hate Jews and Israel and encouraging students to commit violent acts, which are glorified by these UNRWA-provided textbooks as acts of martyrdom and which advocate pursuing the elimination of Israel and any Jew who stands in the way. Under the strong moral leadership of former Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Canada cut off funding in 2010 to UNRWA in its entirety, citing it as an unchecked avenue for terror indoctrination. However, the federal Liberals reinstated the funding in 2016 and increased it just five months ago. This is despite numerous reports demonstrating that these textbooks promote hate and terrorism, including an extensive 2021 report funded by the EU which itself is now reviewing all of its aid to Palestine. The only way that conflict in the Middle East will end is when Palestinians are not indoctrinated from birth with hate and terrorist ideas because, as Golda Meir said, if Palestinians laid down their arms today, there would be two states in the Middle East. But if Israelis did, there would be no Israel.

Sadly, over the last several days, we have been reminded that even here in Ontario, we have much work to do to stamp out anti-Semitism and hate in all its forms. There have been reprehensible, disgusting hate rallies here and in other cities around the world, glorifying this indiscriminate violence and terrorism against innocents. These rallies demonstrate that the insidious hatred for Jews and terror taught in the UNRWA schools has infected and spread like a cancer.

My Jewish neighbours are living in fear, with children asking whether they will be attacked in their sleep and fathers sleeping by the front door, wearing their boots, here in Toronto. There cannot be any justification for what has happened to the victims of these atrocities, including the six known Canadians who were killed by Hamas: Netta Epstein, Shir Georgy, Adi Vital-Kaploun, Ben Mizrachi and Alexandre Look as well as Tiferet Lapidot. All of them were in their early twenties except for Alexandre and Adi who were 33. May their memories be a blessing.

Anyone who cares about humanity and human rights should condemn unequivocally the unspeakable atrocities committed by Hamas terrorists and join the call for them to face justice. As a concerned citizen, Dan Levy of Toronto wrote with great insight in a letter to the editor published in the Post a week after the attack: “Here are some truths for those Canadians, media members, academic institutions and members of government who constantly claim the moral high ground in the ever-present culture wars and yet now voice pro-Hamas sentiment and justification.

“You cannot truly claim that every child matters then stay silent when terrorists kidnap and murder children and decapitate babies.

“You do not care about the safety of women when you turn a blind eye to terrorists raping and torturing them.

“You do not truly fight for LGBTQ+ rights when you stand with fundamentally oppressive regimes.

“If the attacks by terrorists at the music festival in Israel did not horrify you, then neither did the Las Vegas and Orlando attacks.

“If you can’t use proper terms like ‘terrorists’ or ‘terrorism,’ the news industry is not for you.

“You cannot be anti-racist and be complicit in anti-Semitism.

“It is time to call out the hypocrisy of those who mask their self interest as supporting human rights.”

That’s the end of Dan Levy’s great letter. And I agree with Dan Levy: There is something wrong with us and our cultural institutions if we do not share his moral clarity on this. There is no room for hate in Canada and in Ontario. As Canadians and Ontarians, we are proud of the multiculturalism and inclusive society we have built together where all peoples of all faiths and all backgrounds are welcomed and respected. However, these ideals can never be confused with or justify anti-Semitism, racism or hatred towards any group.

This isn’t a matter of political ideology—it is a matter of our shared humanity. If you do not respect the fundamental dignity and right to life of every human being—because they are a human being—how can you claim that respect for yourself? We must call out hate directed at any group or individual every time we see it. We must enforce the laws on the books against hate, and if the laws on the books cannot be used to combat the hate we see, then we need to put better laws on the books and we need to enforce them. If we do not do so, then our cherished multicultural, multi-ethnic and multi-faith society will be torn apart.

Hamas—these terrorists—neither represent the Islamic faith, nor the Palestinians in Gaza, nor elsewhere. Indeed, Hamas has demonstrated that it prioritizes genocide over the lives of its own Gazan people. Gazans are being prevented from leaving the danger zone and are being held hostage as Hamas uses them to protect their weapons rather than using weapons, as Israel does, to protect its people.

Let me quote my friend, former Canadian finance minister, the former member of Parliament for my riding, MP Joe Oliver, from an article published this week:

“It is long past the time to get rid of delusions, myths and ethical relativism harboured by some Westerners who are variously naive or wilfully blind to reality and indifferent or hostile to a homeland for the Jewish people....

“There can be no moral equivalence between a terrorist organization that commits crimes against humanity and a democratic country it wishes to destroy by violent means.”

Hamas’s “strategic goal is to delegitimize Israel.... That explains why it filmed its atrocities, in spite of the revulsion it generated around the world. The purpose was to outrage the Israeli population to make an invasion of Gaza inevitable, since return to the status quo is strategically intolerable....

“Israel is defending its sovereignty and population against depraved terrorists who massacred its citizens. That means eliminating Hamas as a military and governance menace, which cannot be achieved peacefully. Israel merits Canada’s unwavering support during the very difficult time ahead.”

Let me just close by saying words matter. A number of media organizations have editorial guidelines, for example, directing them not to use the term “terrorist” in their reporting of the conflict between Israel and Hamas and these guidelines may be borne out of well-intentioned aspirations to appear accurate and impartial, but there is a point at which a failure to use the term “terrorist” is itself a failure of accuracy and impartiality. The depth of the terror that Hamas has inflicted upon innocent people across Israel in recent days is not in doubt. The murder of babies where they sleep is not an act of a freedom fighter. The performative desecration of dead bodies for the benefit of social media, the rape of women and the beheading of civilians in their homes are not acts of militants.

The true motives of Hamas could not be clearer: It seeks the murder of Jews and the annihilation of the Jewish state. Their charter says as much. Hamas is no different to ISIS—at least the Nazis were embarrassed by their crimes and tried to hide them, but these guys aren’t. It should be painfully obvious that there is no moral equivalence between those whose motive is to deliberately target innocent civilians in cold blood and those whose motive is to remove the threat of such murderers. The fact that this discussion is necessary at all is a clear sign that we are losing our moral compass and of the warped nature of the depths to which discourse on Israel has sunk.

I call upon everyone with me to reiterate the demand for the immediate release of the 200 people still being held hostage: mothers, daughters, sons, husbands, aunts, uncles, grandparents—from five months old to 95 years old. I join with all of those praying for their safe and swift return.

As we mourn the victims and stand with the citizens of Israel, we come together to remind the world that “never again” is now. As Sheryl Saperia in my riding wrote in an article in the Toronto Sun, if you have ever wondered what you would have done in the Holocaust, if you would have stood up against the inhumanity of terror, now is the time to show what you are made of, to stand like the righteous among the nations, to stand up for the victims of Hamas’s terror attacks and for Israel’s right to defend itself against further attacks.

Today and always, we stand with Israel and with the Jews here and around the world in the face of these acts of war.