I’d like to welcome the mentorship candidate I mentioned earlier, Olivia Batte, and her mom, Fiona, from Waterloo.

I hear the member from Waterloo now say, “Absolutely not.” So stand in your place and say it.

Interjection.

So I challenge the members across the way: Instead of whispering and heckling and chirping here in this Legislature now during such a crucial time for the world, well then, stand, have your microphone be lit and let the world hear you.

Speaker, I stand with my colleagues here today to condemn Hamas. I stand with my colleagues here today to say we stand with those affected by this tragedy. I stand with the Jewish community, who is suffering greatly through this. I want to remind this Legislature that at Mel Lastman Square, in the heart of North York, on Thanksgiving Monday, we saw thousands gathered to condemn that very terrorism—15,000 people from all backgrounds. Elected officials were there from all levels and from almost all parties. Noticeably absent, Speaker: the New Democrats—noticeably absent. I looked. I didn’t see a single NDP member standing at that vigil.

So Speaker, I have hope that the day is not over. We have a little under an hour to go in debate. My hope, my sincere hope, is that one member on the opposition benches will stand; maybe stand to condemn the terrorism, maybe to stand and be the one to take a stand—because the official Leader of the Opposition will not—against the member from Hamilton Centre’s statements, her hateful statements, which are still pinned on X right now. No apology, no retraction. In other words, the NDP stands by the Hamilton Centre member’s statement now. Shame on them, Speaker.

I have a message to my friends in the Jewish community, and I will conclude with this quote from John F. Kennedy: “Israel was not created in order to disappear—Israel will endure and flourish. It is a child of hope and the home of the brave. It can neither be broken by adversity nor demoralized by success. It carries the shield of democracy and it honours the sword of freedom.”

We stand with the Jewish community. We condemn the hateful acts by Hamas. We think the NDP should as well.

Speaker, I have never stood in this Legislature more passionate, more angry. I have never stood in this Legislature unsure of what I was going to say. Buts Speaker, in my time now, a little over five years, this is the most unbelievable thing I have seen from the opposition. I call on the Leader of the Opposition to take a stand against the member from Hamilton Centre, to clarify her party’s position on what they actually believe, because I’ll say it, and I’ll conclude with this, once again: Martin Luther King, “Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter.” And Speaker, this matters. To quote again, “There comes a time when silence is betrayal.”

They have betrayed the people of this province.

Report continues in volume B.