Winnipeg, Canada – Liberal Leader Stéphane Dion has dismissed a Winnipeg candidate who wrote that Israeli companies renting offices at the World Trade Center in 2001 vacated them beforehand because they had advance warning of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Subscribe to our Daily Roundup Email
The firing was an about-face for Mr. Dion who initially resisted calls for the dismissal of Lesley Hughes, the Liberal candidate in the riding of Kildonan-St. Paul.
It came after mounting pressure from Canada’s Jewish community, including the Canadian Jewish Congress, for a stronger response from the Dion campaign.
“The Liberal Party’s commitment to tolerance and multiculturalism is paramount,” Mr. Dion said in a statement Friday released just after 12 p.m. EST.
Liberal Party Leader Stephane Dion greets supporters at a seniors residence during a campaign stop in
“I have reviewed the past comments of Lesley Hughes and it is clear they do not meet this standard.”
The move came about 17 hours after the Liberal Party’s initial response to outrage over the writings, which had been to issue an apology from the Winnipeg candidate herself but offer no comment from Mr. Dion.
In a press release Thursday evening, Ms. Hughes had denied her writing was anti-Jewish but said she was sorry if people had taken it that way.
“I find any interpretation of my journalism as anti-Semitic personally offensive and I heartily apologize for that perception,” she said in the Thursday statement.
On Friday, Ms. Hughes, speaking to CBCNewsworld, described herdismissal by the Liberal party as “incredibly unjust.”
Sheappeared to be shocked when she learned of her dismissal on air from a CBC reporter.
“I have no time for conspiracy theories about the Jewish population whatever,” she said. “The article that I wrote, for anyone who reads it carefully, is very clearly innocent of any kind of anti-Semitic feeling. I’m just absolutely stunned by this.”
Earlier this morning at a Toronto event, Mr. Dion had rejected Ms. Hughes’ writings but declined to go further.
“I am strongly against this theory. The party is against this theory and she is against it too,” Mr. Dion said this morning, adding only that the matter was under discussion with the Canadian Jewish Congress.
But this afternoon when he released his statement dismissing Ms. Hughes, the Liberal Leader acknowledged he had to do more.
“While I appreciate her apology, I cannot condone those sentiments in any way,” he said. “I have therefore asked Ms. Hughes to step down as the Liberal Party candidate in Kildonan-St. Paul.”
Mr. Dion found himself on the defensive earlier this morning when he was resisting calls for Ms. Hughes’ resignation but urging the Conservatives to get rid of Calgary Tory candidate Lee Richardson, who was recently quoted in a newspaper linking refugees and crime.
“This is awful and he should fire this candidate right away,” Mr. Dion said this morning of Mr. Richardson.
The Canadian Jewish Congress (CJC)applauded Ms. Hughes’ removal as the “right thing to do.”
CJC chief executive officer Bernier Farber said his organization had been “horrified” by the Hughes writings – which the Liberals say date back to 2002 – and communicated this to Mr. Dion’s party.
“We …explained to them exactly how vile the 9/11 Jewish conspiracy is,” Mr. Farber said, adding these ideas are unquestionably anti-Semitic.
B’nai Brith Canada also welcomed Ms. Hughes’ resignation.
“We commend Stéphane Dion for signalling that anti-Semitism and bigotry have no place in the multicultural mosaic of Canada,” B’nai Brith Canada executive vice president Frank Dimant said in a statement.
Ms. Hughes had appeared alongside Mr. Dion Wednesday during a significant outreach to the Canadian Jewish community in Winnipeg, where the party pledged that it recognized Israel’s right to live in peace and security.
What a witch!!
Sometimes a party needs to disavow its nominee. An example:
In 1980, Tom Metzger, then a Ku Klux Klan leader, won a low turnout Democratic congressional primary in southern California in a district with almost no Democrats when few knew who he was. Every Democratic politician in the state then endorsed the incumbent, conservative Republican Clair Burgener, who won with 86% of the vote, winning the most votes in any congressional race in American history up to that time.
better late than never, I guess.
Obviously her theory is ridiculous and stupid – hundreds of Jews died in 9/11, the attacks were carried out in the name of Jihad which swears to the destruction of Israel, and would not possibly have been allowed.
The problem is that the way Bnai Brith goes about these types of issues, and simply says “This type of talk cannot be allowed, it’s anti-semitic” causes goyim to say to themselves “why can’t we say it? Why is it simply illegal to talk like that? Is it perhaps true?”.
The bnai brith and cjc have to, in addition to condemning the remarks, they must point out how ridiculous it is, to justify the zero tolerance they will have for it.
Ms. Hughes theory may not be so farfetched. I do believe that President Bush had advanced warning of the attacks, and if President Bush knew it stands to reason the Israelis also knew.
There are too many questions regarding the type of planes that hit the buildings and whether planes actually hit the Pentagon and Shanksville, PA or were they missiles. If you watch the reports on Youtube, you will notice that on all the stations, the reporters all asked the same questions, “Where is the wreckage?” or “There is no plane.”
But in the end it doesn’t matter. Because this was all planned by H’K’B’H. It was a wake up call for the whole world.
To anon 7:02; What an interesting insight. And to think that HKBH also created a Kopshtick like you! Amazing! No wreckage? Wow! Personally, I’m thinking that it was aliens; after they killed Kennedy and then gave us AIDS, they blew up some buildings to test their Ray Gun!
7:02,
Boruch mishana habrios, nuff said. Now on to the next step. Winnipeg, Manitoba has the biggest ethnic Ukrainian population in Canada along with the highest number of Ukranian war criminals, hiding contently for 60+ years. Maybe it’s time to address that matter as well.