By Ottawa Citizen Editorial, Ottawa Citizen, May 3, 2013
The York Regional Police department should be ashamed. YRP Insp. Ricky Veerappan, who heads up the force’s so-called Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Bureau, was apparently disturbed that volunteer department chaplain Rabbi Mendel Kaplan invited the controversial American commentator Pamela Geller to address a local synagogue.
Geller is well known in the United States for her criticism of Islamist ideology and her opposition to building an Islamic centre near the site of the World Trade Center.
According to reports, Veerappan didn’t like the idea of her expressing such views, and, supposedly, told Kaplan his position with the department would be in question if he didn’t cancel the invitation. “If he did (host Geller), then we’d have to reassess our relation with (Kaplan),” Veerappan told a reporter. “Some of the stuff that Ms. Geller speaks about runs contrary to the values of York Regional Police and the work we do in engaging our communities.”
Whether the job threat was real, and whether anyone agrees or not with Geller’s views, Veerappan’s conduct is appalling. Canadians expect police to respect Charter provisions protecting freedom of speech. They are not supposed to act as censors at the behest of a particular community.
Unfortunately, the desire of some to stifle the freedoms of others with whom they disagree has become all too common. Journalists Mark Steyn and Ezra Levant were dragged before human rights tribunals by those who objected to their opinions about Islam. A speaking engagement by right-wing commentator Ann Coulter at the University of Ottawa was shut down by demonstrators. The Canadian government has tried to keep out George Galloway, a left-wing British politician hostile toward Israel. In Geller’s case, members of York Region’s Muslim community — of which Veerappan is a member — reportedly wanted the immigration minister’s office to keep her out of the country.
Interestingly, Veerappan’s conduct offends other Muslims. In a letter to York police chief Eric Jolliffe, Salim Mansur, a University of Western Ontario academic, wrote: “I am appalled that … we continue to hear regularly how the liberal democratic tradition of Canada and the West is being systematically shredded by institutions sworn to protect it.” Some Muslims who’ve made Canada their home, he said, “need to learn the culture … of a society that is open to debates and discussions however painful this might be to someone else’s sensibilities.”
Insp. Veerappan — the entire York Regional Police department? — appears to be among those who need this lesson.
I wondered if he was a muslim. His last name indicates that he is either Indian or Pakistani.
It’s sad that the rabbi didn’t have more guts. It is the DUTY of a good Jew to be a light unto the nations and EXPOSE the truth! Of coarse most rabbis are NOT Canadian citizens – thanks for nothing rabbi – COWARD!!
@ Jerry G:
Imagine how hard it will be for your Jewish children to get into universities and into fields dominated by Muslims who sometimes have faked credentials from overseas diploma mills. It seems that all verification and due diligence goes out the door when it comes to hiring Muslims to high positions in Canada. Look no further than President Shoukri at YorkU (a guy who likes free speech for Islamists but for no one else on campus) and, in a non-Muslim example, the TDSB’s Director of Education who was found to be plagiarist (and only let go after mounting media attention made it impossible to ignore) during his directorship and while he was in the same position in another city and possibly when he wrote his PhD.
Look out, they are stacking the cards against us and for an Islam-friendly country ripe for the picking and open to indoctrination.
So the cat is out of the bag. Veerappan is a Muslim. Another example of the fox guarding the henhouse. We live in a would gone completely insane.
So we have a Muslim nobody given a job that involves a regions moral and ethical sensibilities deciding what Canadians deem as a social positive! Reminds me of the U.N. where various Human Rights, legal and social committees are composed and headed by Islamic states that are in the forefront of violating every aspect of the U.N. charter. Is this world insane or not! Western Judeo-Chrtistian civilization is digging its own grave.
The shoe dropped
apparently Insp. Veerappan abuses state authority using extortion against Jews in their synagogues to further his Muslim agenda: