B'най Брит Канада: История, деятельность и противоречия

Canadian Jewish advocacy organization

In 1875, Lodge No. 246, located in Toronto, was the first lodge founded in Canada, followed soon after by another in Montreal. Many community leaders were associated with these lodges. Over time, a team of dedicated volunteers and professional staff emerged. was appointed CEO of B'nai Brith Canada, succeeding Frank Dimant upon his retirement after 36 years with the organization.

During the 2007 by election in Outremount the group accused Jocelyn Coulon of being anti American and anti Israel because of his views on the Hamas Israel Lebanon conflict. The Quebec Israel Committee however, stated that B'Nai Brith's statements were exaggerated and that Coulon had every right to be the Liberal candidate. These issues were thought to be important because the Jewish community in Outremont made up 10% of the riding population.

In January 2004, Shahina Siddiqui, executive director of the Islamic Social Services Association, filed a formal complaint against B'nai Brith Canada under the "discriminatory signs and statements" section of the Manitoba Human Rights Code. After speaking with several people who attended a Winnipeg conference on terrorism hosted by B'nai Brith Canada in October 2003, she wrote that the event was biased against Muslims and would encourage the response teams in attendance to engage in racial profiling. The Manitoba Human Rights Commission (MHRC) accepted the complaint and began an investigation that would last five years. In 2009, the MHRC issued a report that dismissed the complaint due to a lack of evidence. MHRC vice chairwoman Yvonne Peters subsequently wrote that "the full investigation of the complaint that took place was warranted" and that "the decision was based solely on the insufficiency of the evidence with respect to this particular section of the Human Rights Code." In 2008, David Matas, B'nai Brith's senior counsel, sharply criticized the MHRC for its conduct during the investigation, stating that: "The [Manitoba] Human Rights Commission itself is supposed to be promoting human rights, but in our view in this process it's violating some pretty basic rights: a secret proceeding, a faceless accuser, failure to disclose documents. These are basic procedural rights that are being violated." denouncing Carleton University for hiring Hassan Diab, who was alleged by French authorities to have been responsible for the 1980 Paris synagogue bombing. Diab was living under virtual house arrest at the time (he had been granted bail but under very strict conditions) due to an extradition request from France. Within a few hours of the B'nai Brith Canada complaint, Carleton University announced that it would "immediately replace the current instructor, Hassan Diab" in order to provide students "with a stable, productive academic environment that is conducive to learning." B'nai Brith executive vice president Frank Dimant later stated that "the university did the right thing." In November 2014, Hassan was extradited from Canada to France where he was imprisoned for 3 years and two months while the investigation continued. Since then, four French anti terrorism judges have uncovered testimony from several individuals stating that Diab was in Lebanon at the time of the bombing as well as university records which show he wrote and passed exams in Beirut then and couldn't have been in Paris. In January 2018, French authorities dropped all charges against Hassan Diab, citing lack of evidence.

In 2008, the Liberal Party of Canada dropped as a candidate and revoked the membership of Winnipeg Centre candidate Lesley Hughes after she was accused on antisemitism by the group, the Canadian Jewish Congress and Conservative MP Peter Kent over a 2002 article about the 9/11 attacks. Hughes later filed a lawsuit for defamation against B'nai Brith, the Canadian Jewish Congress and Peter Kent. In 2013 the aforementioned parties issued a public statement stating that Hughes is not an antisemite, stating that Hughes “does not condone the use of anti Semitic conspiracy theories by racist groups to support antisemitism of any nature". The suit was settled out of court for an undisclosed settlement amount.

In 2019, B'nai Brith unearthed a series of controversial comments and social media posts made by Hassan Guillet, a parliamentary candidate for the Liberal Party in that year's Canadian federal election. When B'nai Brith went public with its findings, the Liberal Party dropped Guillet as a candidate.

B'nai Brith lobbied against the non binding parliament bill M103, together with some extreme right groups. Bill M103 denounces Islamophobia and other type of hates. The bill was introduced after the killing of 6 Muslims at a Quebec mosque by an extreme right sympathizer.

Continuing on with the free speech advocacy, B'nai Brith organized a free speech conference with free speech advocacy and alt right groups. The conference was scheduled to be hosted at a synagogue, but some Jewish groups asked the synagogue to cancel the events after concerns about alt right and Islamophobic groups taking part.

According to an article in The Forward, B'nai Brith Canada had 4,000 full dues paying members in 2007. Membership is restricted to those of the Jewish faith.

In 2007, a group calling itself Concerned Members of B'nai Brith Canada charged that a new constitution had been passed despite a majority of members having voted against it at a general meeting. Henry Gimpel, a former Toronto lodge president, told The Forward that "[t]here's too much of [B'nai Brith Canada] being run by one person." On July 8, 2015, the Toronto Star reported that Dimant has demanded an annual retirement payout of $175,000, representing 75% of his former salary, which the B'nai Brith believes is too lucrative and will require the struggling charity to direct fundraising dollars to pay for Dimant's pension. Dimant has stated that the payout was approved by the organization's board, however, the Star cites an unnamed source as stating that the deal was arranged with little oversight while Dimant was still in charge. In the year following Dimant's retirement, B'nai Brith Canada put its "state of the art" care facility for Alzheimer's patients under insolvency protection while also trying to sell it. The project, initiated and led by Dimant, is a $16 million facility opened in 2013 but that been unable to attract enough patients, due to high fees for patients of $7,500 a month and the fact that it was not designed to be wheelchair accessible; the facility is losing $50,000 a month and owes $11 million to creditors. The Toronto Star article also claimed that other issues left by Dimant's former management of B'nai Brith are a lack of records and record keeping and failure to always issue charitable tax receipts and poor corporate governance with approximately 50 people who had believed they were on various boards of B'nai Brith organizations learning that this is not the case, as Dimant's management had failed to file the correct paperwork with government agencies. They then sold their headquarters, located at 15 Hove Street, in Toronto, that carried two mortgages totalling nearly $4 million, though the building itself was assessed at slightly over $3 million. The newspaper claimed a circulation of over 62,000 copies a week which would make it the largest Jewish publication in Canada. Publication was suspended in early 2015.

On November 29, 2002, B'nai Brith Canada sued the Canadian government for "failing to crack down on the fundraising efforts of Hezbollah", by not adding Hezbollah's charity wing to the list of banned terrorist organizations; the paramilitary wing of Hezbollah, the Jihad Council, was already listed, but not its political wing. About a week later, the Canadian government made the decision to designate all of Hezbollah as a terrorist organization.

B'nai Brith Canada operates a 24 hour a day, seven day a week 'Anti Hate Hotline'. The hotline receives calls from those who feel they have suffered from antisemitism or discrimination and is one of the sources of the organisation's statistics for its Annual Audit of Antisemitic Incidents.

On November 9, 2009, B'nai Brith Canada ran a full page ad in the National Post comparing radical Islam with Nazism. Frank Dimant, CEO of B'nai Brith, said "overall, feedback from the ad has been very positive." At the same time, the ad drew the ire of the group Canadian Jewish Holocaust Survivors and the Canadian Association of Jews and Muslims, and has also led to accusations of racism and Islamophobia against the organization.

In February 2016, the organization revealed that the Windsor, Ontario newspaper 'al Forqan' called for terrorist attacks against Israeli civilians as "sacred duty of jihad". In July 2016, B'nai Brith Canada, organization with the London Police Services, investigated 'al Saraha,' a London, Ontario newspaper for Holocaust denial.

Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper was awarded B'nai B'rith International's Presidential Gold Medal after being nominated by B'nai Brith Canada to honor what it described as his commitment to the Jewish people and the State of Israel. Canadian film producer Robert Lantos has been a long time supporter of B'nai Brith Canada and in 2008 was awarded the organization's Award of Merit. Among other notable Canadians to have received the Award of Merit are Lindsay Gordon, Blake Goldring, Frank Stronach, Tony Comper, Al Waxman, Wallace McCain, Lloyd Axworthy, Gordon F. Henderson, Mayor Jean Drapeau, George Cohon, Leo Kolber, former Liberal Prime Minister of Canada Paul Martin, hockey legend Jean Béliveau, Paul Tellier, former Ontario Premier Bill Davis, Ambassador Allan Gotlieb, Monty Hall, Izzy Asper, Guy Charbonneau, former Manitoba Premier Gary Filmon, former Liberal Deputy Prime Minister of Canada Herb Gray, former Alberta Premier Peter Lougheed, Edward Samuel "Ted" Rogers, former Alberta Premier Ernest Manning, and Calin Rovinescu.