THE STANDING SENATE COMMITTEE ON HUMAN RIGHTS
EVIDENCE
OTTAWA, Monday, June 20, 2022
The Standing Senate Committee on Human Rights met with videoconference this day at 5:02 p.m. [ET] to examine such issues as may arise from time to time relating to human rights generally.
Senator Salma Ataullahjan (Chair) in the chair.
[English]
The Chair: I am Salma Ataullahjan, a senator from Toronto and chair of this committee. Today we are conducting a meeting of the Standing Senate Committee on Human Rights.
Now I would like to introduce the members of the committee who are participating in this meeting. We have Senator Boyer from Ontario; Senator Jaffer from B.C.; Senator Dennis Dawson from Quebec; and Senator Amina Gerba from Quebec. Online we have Senator Omidvar from Ontario, and I think we are expecting Senator Audette from Quebec to join us as well.
Welcome to all our colleagues and those viewing these proceedings on senvu.ca. Today we continue our study on Islamophobia in Canada, including as it relates to online/offline violence against Muslims, its sources, its impact on individuals and possible solutions. It’s our second meeting on this topic under our general order of reference.
I will now introduce our panel of witnesses. We have Jasmin Zine, Professor of Sociology, Religion and Culture, Muslim Studies at Wilfrid Laurier University; Anver Emon, Professor of Law and History at the University of Toronto; Mohammed Hashim, Executive Director, and Amira Elghawaby, Director of Strategic Communications and Campaigns from the Canadian Race Relations Foundation.
I now invite Professor Zine to make her presentation, to be followed by Professor Emon, then Mohammed Hashim and Amira Elghawaby.
Jasmin Zine, Professor of Sociology, Religion and Culture, Muslim Studies Option, Wilfrid Laurier University, as an individual: Thank you for the opportunity to address members of the Senate today to discuss Islamophobia in Canada.
I’m a professor of sociology, religion and culture in Muslim studies at Wilfrid Laurier University, and I’m also co-founder of the International Islamophobia Studies Research Association, or IISRA.
I’ve worked as an expert on Islamophobia internationally for UNESCO, the Council of Europe and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, and I’ve been researching Islamophobia in Canada for more than 20 years. I recently published a book titled Under Siege: Islamophobia and the 9/11 Generation that is the product of a six-year study that involved in-depth interviews with 130 Muslim youth across Canada examining how the war on terror and domestic securities, domestic security policies and heightened Islamophobia have impacted them. Coming of age during the war on terror meant that issues such as racial securitization and being constructed as potential radicals and jihadists were among the concerns that the 9/11 generation of Muslim youth faced.
With the twentieth anniversary of 9/11 just passed last year, it’s an important time to take stock of how Islamophobic backlash during that period has impacted Muslim youth who found themselves subjects of public scrutiny and unwarranted state surveillance. For example, Muslim student associations at Canadian universities have been contacted by the RCMP, CSIS and counterterrorism units simply because they were part of campus-based Muslim groups, and that rendered them suspect. For example, my son was contacted to meet with CSIS after he was elected the president of his university’s Muslim student association a couple of years ago. Canadian security agencies have created the conditions that further marginalize and alienate Muslim youth and Muslim communities at large, and I urge the government to critically examine and re-evaluate these measures.
In my research, I examined how Islamophobic surveillance became internalized by youth and how they reacted by performing the good Muslim to avoid suspicion as the potential bad Muslim. These youth bore the burden of collective guilt for the violent acts of others who shared their faith. In response, young Muslims take on the burden of representation and the role of being the image corrective trying to prove that they are peace‑loving citizens and not potential terrorists.
As racialized youth, the 9/11 generation have faced unique challenges that have impacted their sense of identity, citizenship and belonging within the nation, which has always been a fraught and contingent relationship. Furthermore, anti-Muslim racism is a source of trauma and impacts mental health as well as physical well-being among marginalized communities and must be acknowledged and addressed.
For the past four years, I have been working on another study on what I call the Canadian Islamophobia industry. What makes Islamophobia distinct from other forms of oppression and racism is that there’s an industry behind purveying anti-Muslim hate. Islamophobia is organized. The Islamophobia industry is comprised of far-right media outlets and Islamophobia influencers, White nationalist groups, pro-Israel fringe right groups, Muslim dissidents, think tanks and their designated security experts and the donors who fund their campaigns. These individuals, groups and institutions comprise a network that supports and engages in activities that demonize and marginalize Islam and Muslims in Canada.
Research in the United States has shown how Islamophobic hate is monetized. Funding for Islamophobia networks in the United States circulates in the amount of $1.5 billion to 39 organizations that are dedicated to promoting anti-Muslim propaganda and disinformation campaigns. Some of that funding helps support groups in Canada whose goal it is to orchestrate controversies and promote conspiracy theories about Muslims as a demographic, cultural, security and civilizational threat. My 300-page report on the Canadian Islamophobia industry will be released in the coming months and will reveal the interconnected ecosystem of Islamophobia in Canada. Since Islamophobia is being monetized, I would ask the government to fund anti‑Islamophobia campaigns that counter these movements.
But when we want to talk about Islamophobia, we first need to understand the way Islamophobia operates as a system of oppression to develop effective ways to combat it. I have proposed in my work that Islamophobia is best captured as a fear or hatred of Islam and Muslims and those perceived to be Muslims, because we know Islamophobia has affected people who are misidentified as Muslims, but that that fear and hatred is not really what Islamophobia is about. It’s about how it becomes translated into individual actions and ideological and systemic forms of oppression. Put simply, individual actions, like vandalism and other hate crimes, are supported by widespread ideas — like Muslims are terrorists — and these ideologies find expression in systemic practices, such as racial profiling. Picture this as an iceberg where individual actions are what becomes visible above the water, while the ideologies and systemic practices lie below the surface — underpinning, supporting and sustaining the structure. Anti-Muslim racism is a manifestation of Islamophobia that relies on the racialization of religion and the demonization of Islam and Muslims. Challenging Islamophobia requires an approach that addresses each of these three levels. This definition helps us understand the sociology of Islamophobia as a dynamic and pervasive form of oppression that is embedded in structures of power.
At the tip of the iceberg, when we look at individual acts, there have been deadly acts of Islamophobic violence in Canada, as we are all well aware, including two mass murders in the last four years that targeted Canadian Muslims, along with the stabbing of a mosque caretaker in Toronto and, more recently, an attacker brandishing an axe at a mosque in Mississauga. Other individual acts and hate crimes include things like vandalism, where a mosque in Edmonton was branded with a swastika, and other mosques have been ransacked; rises in gendered Islamophobia where Muslim women are differentially impacted by anti‑Muslim racism and have been attacked, including physical assaults, harassment, attacked at knifepoint, death threats, and harassed in public transit and parking lots; and Muslims who are visibly —
The Chair: Professor Zine, I’m sorry; I have to interrupt you. We had given five minutes to each witness. However, you did send us your speaking notes, and we all have them and have read through them. I apologize, but the Senate is sitting and that takes precedence, so we had to cut down our meeting time. We will come back to you with questions. Your testimony is before us and has been given to all the senators.
I will turn to Professor Anver Emon.
Anver Emon, Professor of Law and History, Faculty of Law, University of Toronto, as an individual: Thank you for inviting me to address this committee on systemic Islamophobia in Canada.
As a historian and legal scholar, I find it useful to think of Muslims and Islam not so much as nouns but, rather, as social constructs. In my research, I examine how these two social constructs get construed in sites of bureaucratic rationality in Canada.
Before addressing specific sites of concern, I first want to applaud the Government of Canada for taking Islamophobia seriously — not just through this Senate committee meeting but also in its 2021 summit, in its review of the CRA for systemic bias and in its designation of a special envoy for Islamophobia. I also thank the Government of Canada for its inclusion in Budget 2022 of funding for the Muslims in Canada Archives, which I lead at the Institute of Islamic Studies at the University of Toronto. Thanks to the federal government’s support, we can steward in perpetuity records of Muslim contributions to Canadian Heritage and thereby combat Islamophobia one story at a time.
I will address three examples to show where work still needs to be done.
First, the Ministry of Finance has oversight on the whole‑of‑government approach to combatting terrorist financing. It adheres to standards set by the Financial Action Task Force, or FATF. In anticipation of its 2016 mutual evaluation before the FATF, Finance Canada explained its risk-based assessment model, or RBA, in compliance with FATF standards. The ministry identified 10 groups that pose the greatest threat to terrorism financing in Canada. One is Tamil, one is Sikh and the remaining eight are all Muslim identified. From this, we can infer that the Government of Canada assesses that 100% of the risk of terrorist financing revenue from Canada comes from groups that map onto Canada’s racial and religious minorities. Moreover, 80% of that risk assessment maps directly onto Canada’s Muslim minority communities. As we now see governments around the world officially acknowledge and grapple with White supremacy and extremism in all its forms, this risk-based assessment model seems either behind the times or, quite simply, an express statement of Islamophobia.
Second, since 9/11, the Ministry of Public Safety deploys certain tools that embed systemic Islamophobia and that effectively under-protect Muslim Canadians. Let me explain. Although I said that Finance Canada maps 80% of such risk on Muslims with regard to terrorist financing, the fact is that it’s actually higher because included among the risk factors is the eleventh category of foreign fighter, but the foreign fighter, for national security purposes, does not include someone who trains with an Allied state’s military. As an example, a Canadian who makes aliyah to Israel, fights for the Israel Defence Forces in Gaza and comes back to Canada is not a foreign fighter for purposes of national security, but a Canadian who travels to Gaza, fights for Hamas and then returns to Canada is a foreign fighter for purposes of national security. In both cases, the individuals are militarily trained in and by foreign entities, and both have potentialities to cause harm to others in Canada, but only one is deemed a national security threat. The systemic Islamophobia in this example requires us to ask the next question: To whom might they be a national security threat? In answering this last question, we cannot help but see that the foreign fighter designation creates a hierarchy of Canadians and their respective entitlements to basic security. Unless Canada opens up the foreign fighter category to anyone who fights for a foreign military entity — whether state or non-state, ally or enemy — the current status quo effectively over-polices the Muslimist terrorist and under-protects the Canadian Muslim.
Third is the Ministry of Justice and the Criminal Code. My third example concerns the very definition of terrorism in the Criminal Code in section 83.01(1)(b), which defines terrorism, in relevant part, as
“an act or omission … that is committed in whole or in part for a political, religious or ideological purpose, objective or cause …”
The Toronto 18 trials offered the first instance of a jury trial on terrorism. In that jury trial, Mr. Asad Ansari was found guilty and convicted. In our published article on the trial, my co-author and I show, from a close reading of the trial transcripts, that there is little doubt that what was litigated in that case was not simply an act or omission but, rather, an Orientalist construction of Islam. This litigation reality stemmed nearly entirely from this provision of the Criminal Code. Due to time constraints, I cannot go into the details here, but the article is openly accessible and I provide a link to it in my written submissions.
In conclusion, there are, of course, other examples we could address. My current research is in the Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) and Terrorist Financing Act and the global phenomenon now known popularly as #Banking while Muslim. Moreover, I’m currently editing a book featuring over 20 essays by colleagues identifying different sites of systemic Islamophobia in immigration, policing, education policy and terrorism financing. That book won’t be out until early 2023, but I can discuss with the publisher sharing page proofs with the committee if you so wish.
Thank you for having me, and I look forward to your questions.
The Chair: Thank you very much.
We turn to Mohammed Hashim and Amira Elghawaby, sharing your time. The floor is yours, to be followed by questions from senators.
Mohammed Hashim, Executive Director, Canadian Race Relations Foundation: Thank you, Madam Chair and honourable senators.
I want to acknowledge that I’m speaking to you from the traditional territories of the Mississaugas of the Credit in Mississauga, Ontario, also covered under Treaty 13.
The CRRF was born out of an apology to Japanese Canadians who were wrongfully imprisoned in internment camps during World War II. Part of the redress agreement was the creation in 1996 of the CRRF as an independent federal Crown corporation that reports to Parliament and to the Department of Canadian Heritage. Our organization conducts research, convenes community groups, hosts policy discussions, provides funding and is currently supporting federal efforts to create a renewed Canada’s anti-racism strategy and combatting hate national action plan.
When we think about Islamophobia, our minds go to painful tragedies that have taken place in our country. As the chair noted in the opening session, in the past five years there have been more killings of Muslims in Canada than in any other G7 country. This is heartbreaking and difficult for all of us, and difficult to explain to our kids.
At the CRRF, we are working on a variety of related issues. We have partnered with institutions such as the YWCA to highlight the impact of hate and Islamophobia on racialized women, we have worked with the Public Policy Forum to examine issues to address online hate, and we are working locally with the Federation of Canadian Municipalities to assist municipalities to address all forms of racism locally. We also have a National Anti-Racism Fund, where we are providing $3.8 million to support community projects, events and youth projects, including those addressing Islamophobia. However, we will focus on two key areas of concern that we believe will help us to address some of the damaging impacts of Islamophobia and other forms of hate.
Let me first paint the picture. Over 233,000 people in this country say they were victims of hate in 2019 alone, according to Statistics Canada. Only 1% of those numbers are captured in the police-reported hate crime stats. Charges are laid in only a fraction of those, and convictions are even fewer. Communities have felt let down and unprotected.
All of this is why in this past March at our hate crimes summit with The Globe and Mail, we launched a national task force to work with the Chiefs of Police National Roundtable on hate crimes. This committee is co-chaired by the CRRF and the RCMP. This task force had our first meeting last week and includes representatives from across the country who will look to, one, create national police standards for hate crimes investigations; two, improve reporting intake practices within police forces; three, create a national network of hate crimes investigators; and four, create a central hub of information for community members to better understand hate crimes and hate incidents.
I’ll now turn it over to my colleague Amira to explain the secondary focus for the purposes of today’s presentation.
Amira Elghawaby, Director of Strategic Communications and Campaigns, Canadian Race Relations Foundation: Honourable senators, I am here in Ottawa on the unceded Algonquin and Anishinabe territory.
Just about two weeks ago, I was in London, Ontario, to participate in activities to mark the tragic killing of the Afzaal family. It was, of course, an extremely painful time. To their immense credit, friends of the late Yumna and other young people and elders came together to form the Youth Coalition Confronting Islamophobia, to organize the march and vigil in honour of the family. However, the day after the anniversary of this tragedy is when the deep pain and trauma of what happened set in all over again. As one mother shared with me, her young teen was so distressed she couldn’t even go to school and was struggling immensely, as were other young people. What was reinforced through that conversation is that the support available to victims of hate and the communities that are targeted is simply lacking. While the charity had managed to raise funds to provide counselling services through a local faith-based centre, without that initiative, access to such resources would have been limited.
The CRRF is currently examining the state of support for victims of hate across Canada. What we believe we’re going to see is a limited, patchwork level of services to not only the direct victims of hate but also to wider communities that are impacted by such crimes. As you know, hate crimes are message crimes. That means the trauma of these incidents is not only deeply felt by the person or group directly targeted but by the wider community as well, according to various studies. This is one of the myriad ways we believe support is required for victims of hate and victims of Islamophobia.
Thank you so much.
The Chair: Thank you for all your presentations. We will now proceed to questions from the senators.
As was our previous practice, I would like to remind each senator that you have three minutes for your questions, and that includes the answer.
Senator Jaffer: Senator Boyer has very kindly given me her time. Thank you very much.
Welcome to all four of you for being here. It’s a real honour to welcome you to the Senate of Canada. All your work is very well known. In the few minutes I have, it’s really difficult to ask in‑depth questions. Obviously, we’ll have to get together on an individual basis to get a better understanding.
I want to start with Ms. Zine. You have been working on this for a very long time, and I salute you. Working with youth can be a wonderful experience. I’ve done it for many, many years. But it is very difficult to explain to a young person who was born here or who has come here at a very young age why they cannot be identified as a Canadian. I would like you to answer why this struggle of a young person who is continuously seen as different, the other. How do we deal with this? What recommendations do you have for the committee?
Ms. Zine: Thank you very much, senator, for the question.
I agree with you. I think it’s a perennial problem that racialized youth face in terms of always being situated as sort of the other in the sense of being a folk devil. This is how Muslims have been purveyed and what it’s been like for Muslim youth to be socialized within a heightened climate of Islamophobia where they are always questioned. Their identity and their loyalties are always in question, and they constantly have to prove that they are the good Muslim. They often also internalize some of that negativity, and it impacts how they navigate the world and how they also see themselves.
As far as how we look at solutions, first of all, it’s really beginning to address Islamophobia, as I was trying to say, on many levels — on the individual, ideological and systemic levels. If we only address one, the others still gather strength and are still operational. Understanding Islamophobia as a dynamic and looking at the different areas where we have to intervene is very important. I think a lot of youth, particularly, are feeling that they are under surveillance, they internalize that and become self-surveilling, and that is not a positive climate for youth to develop their sense of identity, their sense of citizenship or belonging. Some of the measures, particularly systemic forms of Islamophobia, need to be addressed because they do have an impact on the ground.
Senator Jaffer: Thank you. I would love to follow up, because I have so many questions.
I will go to Mr. Hashim with, first, a request. You’re working with the police. For me, that’s not enough. If they are seriously going to have hate crimes investigated and charges laid, we also have to include the prosecutors. May I respectfully ask that you look at including prosecutors? One of my biggest disappointments is that in the Bissonnette case there was not a terrorism charge laid, and I think it was from just not having enough understanding by prosecutors. May I ask that you also look at working with prosecutors in your organization?
I am fighting with CBSA officials, and they say that — in my understanding — race relations and diversity is sort of included as diversity training. For me, race relations training is very different from diversity training. Can you please expand on that? Is diversity training the same as race relations training?
Mr. Hashim: Thank you for the question.
We are actually looking at the journey of hate from the moment it happens to reporting and interacting with community organizations to policing, and then the prosecution, sentencing and then post-prosecution, and support to victims of hate. Right now, we are currently working right across the entire spectrum. So yes, we are working with policing, but we are definitely looking very keenly to work with Crown prosecutors as well. I fully agree with you that it is a big glaring hole.
To be frank, in many places where hate crimes are being done well, and I say that with a bit of a caveat, within different police services, or better than other places, in those places, the relationships between police investigators and prosecution offices are stronger, and therefore, there is a shared understanding and training that happens. It helps with better knowledge sharing amongst the two in order to make sure that hate crimes are being designated as hate crimes and the hate motivations are noted as part of motivating factors. I’ve seen that work well, and I totally agree with you that the fluidity of that relationship is key for the success of prosecution of hate crimes in Canada.
There’s a variety, a myriad, of trainings that is available to organizations. Some of them are around diversity, some around anti-racism. Honestly, without knowing exactly the contents of what their training looks like, it’s hard for me to say the effectiveness of one versus the other. They all label them very differently.
Senator Jaffer: No, no, it’s not about the effectiveness. Sorry to cut you off. I don’t mean to, but I am. Is diversity training the same as race relations training?
Mr. Hashim: Well, I haven’t heard of race relations training. I’ve heard of anti-racism training. I’ve heard of diversity training. I find those are completely different things. I’m not exactly sure what would be entailed in race relations training and what that would actually entail.
Senator Jaffer: I will send you what CBSA officials sent to me.
Professor, I’m always intrigued by what you write and say. Thank you for your presentation and taking the time to meet with us. I know you — not personally but because of your writings — so I want to take issue with you. You say the government is doing a good job. Seriously? If they were, we wouldn’t have an increase in Islamophobia. It’s great. You can have summits galore, but you need results on the ground. May I respectfully ask if you could provide us a draft of the book you’re writing? I want you to really take me seriously on my statement. From where I sit, when my brothers and sisters are being hurt, as a part of the Parliament, I don’t think we’re doing a good job, but maybe you can correct me. Thank you.
Mr. Emon: Thank you for the question.
I don’t disagree with you. However, I think we are further along than we were 10 or 15 years ago or even sooner. I do think we have to at least acknowledge that three, four or five years ago, we wouldn’t have had a summit on Islamophobia. Four or five years ago, I’m not sure we would have been able to think about an archive on Muslims in Canada. We’re beginning to have these conversations now. It might be that these conversations are happening.
As far as the government is concerned, yes, there is a lot that it could do. I gave you three examples, and I could have continued to list more. Embedded within our system of governance are aspects of Islamophobia. We can point to them. We can show them in operation. Whether it’s judicial decisions or decisions on motions, we have them aplenty, so I don’t disagree with you.
I do think it’s worth acknowledging that some steps have been made. Those are positive steps, and at least in terms of their symbolic value, they speak volumes to those who would otherwise insist on a hateful narrative.
Senator Jaffer: Thank you.
[Translation]
Senator Gerba: Thank you to all the witnesses for all the information you provide. We appreciate it.
A study published in 2022 by the Canadian Arab Institute indicates that Arab and West Asian women are the most affected by Islamophobia and face higher rates of unemployment compared to other countries. In particular, 62% of women wearing a head covering are said to have difficulty finding a job, compared to 12.5% of those who do not wear one.
You said it, Ms. Zine: We need government funding. You suggested that the government should fund the fight against Islamophobia much better. It’s impressive to hear you say that Islamophobia is an industry right here in our country. So you’re calling on the government to tackle that industry.
Do you have any examples of countries that have tackled this industry, that have been successful and that we can learn from in terms of best practices in this area?
[English]
Ms. Zine: Thank you very much for the question.
I wish I could say that there were good examples from other nations. So far, the Islamophobia industry has really only been examined in depth in the United States. My study is the first in Canada. It took four years, and it produced a 300-page report. While we have outlined the contours of Islamophobia in Canada through these integrated networks that are fomenting anti‑Muslim racism in an organized fashion, how to tackle and deal with them is a conversation that really hasn’t happened in any national context. These networks are actually transnational and work within nations, so this is a very new kind of examination into organized Islamophobia and these particular kinds of networks. To my knowledge, there have been no efforts in any national context to combat this. Maybe Canada will be the first and will be able to set a standard for how to address this. That, certainly, would be my hope.
[Translation]
Senator Gerba: We know that this is a very organized industry and that it is a systemic problem. Even the government is not blameless, as they themselves keep lists of people who have been involved in events that are considered terrorist. People are on these government lists. How can the government tackle a system that it itself maintains?
[English]
Ms. Zine: That is an excellent assessment of the situation. On the one hand, we have these networks. A lot of them operate within the far right. They have their own echo chambers and networks. However, there is also a connection to what I call “liberal Islamophobia” in the sense that we have a country that endorses multiculturalism and celebrates differences but, at the same time, engages in anti-Muslim policies and practices. We have to address how even the rhetoric of politicians dog whistles to a number of these groups and legitimates their beliefs, actions and campaigns. There is a complicity that must be recognized. It is not something that we can completely separate from the mainstream. We need to look at how these industries are supported through government policies and practices that are actually creating the climate and conditions to foment anti‑Muslim animus that they are able to capitalize on and build their propaganda and their disinformation campaigns on. Thank you very much for acknowledging that. I’m glad to hear that analysis is present within the Senate.
Senator Gerba: Thank you.
Senator Omidvar: Thank you to all our witnesses for helping us in this important study.
My question is for Professor Emon. Thank you for pinpointing the structural examples of Islamophobia within the government, particularly in the Department of Finance, Public Safety, and the Department of Justice. On that note, I would like you to comment on the government’s proposals in the last Parliament on online hate. As we have heard from the witnesses, online hate is part of the construct of Islamophobia or part of the foundation of Islamophobia. It’s the industry that Ms. Zine talked about. I want to know whether the old version of Bill C-36, which will be retabled at some point, goes far enough, in your view, in addressing online Islamophobia and hate speech.
Mr. Emon: Thank you very much for the question, Senator Omidvar. I’m a bit of a fan of yours. I appreciated the report your committee did on the charitable sector, so it’s a real pleasure to meet you here.
I struggle with online hate. I struggle with it because of its nefariousness and its evanescent qualities. What I struggle with is an inability or unwillingness to go after the platforms, but a willingness to go after the individual accounts. Let’s take, for instance, the terrorist hoax provision. We know in the case of The New York Times podcast Caliphate, there was a gentleman here in Canada who lied about his associations with ISIS. He was prosecuted for a terrorist hoax. I remember speaking to defence counsel about this particular issue. Why was he prosecuted? Here is one guy who put something up on Instagram or Facebook or whatever social platform. Why is the individual being prosecuted? I understand that his particular posting might contribute to a White supremacist post and contribute to an echo chamber. I’m not entirely certain that we have the tools or the willingness to go after the actual platforms, so I can’t comment effectively on what you have asked for.
What I can tell you and what I do worry about even more, if I may shift the question, is that even in standard government practices, we often talk about open access when we do research. Whether it’s the CRA or the Ministry of Finance, we talk about having open access research, which speaks to our democratic commitments. However, a lot of the Islamophobic stuff is out there on open access platforms.
Part of the challenge that I’m having as an academic looking at government practices — and again, that’s my focus. I’m not a social media analyst. One of the concerns I have is we don’t actually train epistemically to be able to distinguish good information from bad information. We take what we see on a blog as fact. I see it over and over again. In the context of the CRA, it consistently appears in the footnotes to the appendices of an administrative fairness letter. My job has been to be a footnote tracker. Effectively, I’m a glorified footnote tracker. In doing that, we see that we, as bureaucrats, have internalized a rationality that normalizes Islamophobia as effective policy making. Until we are able to challenge that, even in the online open access research that we go after, I’m not entirely certain that the online platforms are the only thing that we need to deal with. We need to have better end users. We need to have better readers. That’s something that I can speak to, and I apologize if I can’t speak to the specifics of your question and the bill.
Senator Omidvar: Not at all. You have helped me gain some nuance. Thank you, Professor Emon. What you say is actually quite disturbing. If, in fact, our ministries, our systems, our laws, our processes and protocols are so deeply steeped in a way of thinking that lends itself, one way or another, to Islamophobic results, where should we start in cleaning house? Can you give us some reasonable, constructive suggestions here?
Mr. Emon: I’m currently embarking on a study of the Proceeds of Crime (Money Laundering) and Terrorist Financing Act. I find it fascinating. How is it that we, as a government, have conscripted the financial sector into the war on terror? One of the things that I have noticed is that we don’t have strong consumer protections when it comes to banking. The European Union, for instance, has created guarantees of banking access on the grounds that having access to financial services is important and we can’t actually do business without it, whereas we see individuals losing their banking possibilities and their banking facilities with RBC and HSBC and other banks that do business here. We have a statutory framework that penalizes them and creates moral hazard problems on banks to make sure that they focus on reporting suspicious transactions. Now, when FINTRAC receives these suspicious transaction reports under the PCMLTFA, it may not do anything with them. But a bank might. Nothing prevents a bank from taking the suspicious transaction and suggesting maybe they want to de-risk in this particular context relative to this particular consumer. If you go to the Bank Act and to the Consumer Financial Protection Agency, there are little forms of redress relative to how banks utilize their national security mandate in this context.
I know that under federal Budget 2022, there is a desire to rethink financial crimes. We need to recognize that we have enlisted the private sector in the war on terror. There is no accountability publicly. I am a client of CIBC. I don’t know what their metrics are for measuring suspicious transactions. However, we do know academically that these algorithms used in the world of computer sciences are often embedded with highly racialized algorithms that will flag certain transactions over others. If you can imagine what kinds of algorithmic flagging must happen in a way that is also cost effective, are we ever really going to get to white supremacy and the funding of white supremacy when we’re looking at a target-rich environment, you might say, with respect to a majority white society? Are the algorithms themselves flagging Somalia and Iran in certain specific ways that overdetermine certain customers as potentially risky and, therefore, requiring them to be de-risked? Should we include in FINTRAC a mandate on equity? When it also does its periodic reviews of banks and their methods of analysis, is equity egalitarianism? Non-discrimination? Those are not mandates that FINTRAC currently has. Lastly, what kind of access and democratic accountability should banks be held to with respect to disclosures around their metrics of assessment for suspicious transaction? As a consumer, what kinds of protections can I expect from my government with respect to a bank that de‑risks me?
These are all questions that are central to my concern, not because it’s only Muslims that are getting targeted. What I do think is that in this context, Muslims are interesting to think with because thinking about the Muslim at the centre of banking offers us a way to think about how robust is our democracy. Where are the limitations on our democracy and where have we oversecuritized our environment? It’s not just Muslims getting de-banked. It will be others, but Muslims offer us a wonderful test case and a case scenario. I say that as an academic knowing that it’s actually quite horrific to be de-banked in an environment where we rely on electronic transfers all the time. I hope that gives you one example and a useful starting point.
Senator Omidvar: It does. Thank you very much. I’m sure we will be back to you on further understanding your ideas.
The Chair: We have under 15 minutes left. I have a couple of questions, and then we’ll go to a second round.
Professor Zine, as an educational consultant, you have developed award-winning curriculum materials that address Islamophobia and anti-Muslim hate. As we know, education is important in reducing anti-Muslim hate. Have you been invited to share this curriculum with the government? Has the government ever approached you?
Ms. Zine: Thank you for that question.
That particular curriculum was in a post 9/11 context when I worked with mentors, the Muslim Educational Network. We were looking at resources for teachers who didn’t have a language to talk about what kind of discrimination they were seeing and what Muslims were facing. We developed curriculum for secondary and elementary schools. Since then, I have done curriculum with the Canadian Council of Muslim Women and curriculum for secondary schools about Muslim women and girls. No, I have been never been approached by government to share that particular curriculum or any expertise in Canada, although I have worked in Europe on educational policy, with UNESCO, the Council of Europe and the OSCE, but not with the Canadian government.
As I mentioned, I do have other reports that I’m working on and a book that I can make available to the Senate, if that’s of interest, that looks at the experiences on the ground of Muslim youth in particular and around these industries. This isn’t so much about curriculum, but it is about providing broader information to the government, which I have been able to offer in other contexts but not in Canada.
I am happy to see that other organizations have received funding. In the aftermath of the London terror attack, some money was made available. I know some Muslim organizations are now also doing anti-Islamophobia education, so that is a positive development. But these cannot be Band-Aid solutions that only happen when there are mass killings. This needs to be also systemically introduced. Anti-Islamophobia must be systemically embedded into our institutions, governments, schools, civil society, law and so on. We need to embed those kinds of practices, policies, procedures and curriculum to be able to counter the very formidable challenges that we have.
The Chair: Thank you.
My next question is to you, Amira. We have heard that the experiences of Muslim women have been some of the most difficult. We have seen Muslim women being targeted, their hijabs pulled and knives pulled on them. How do we address this? Just the fact that they cover their head makes Muslim women easy targets. How do we combat this? In your opinion, has anyone really addressed this issue?
Ms. Elghawaby: Thank you so much for the question, senator. It’s an important one.
I want to highlight that not only are we dealing with the gendered aspect of Islamophobia but also the intersectional lens to look at race. We know out west, in Edmonton and Calgary, there was a spate of attacks on Black Muslim women there. That was creating a lot of anxiety and fear rippling right through these communities — women as well as that intersection of race. People are aware of this. The statistics demonstrate this. I heard earlier from one of the senators who referenced that, so thank you so much for that. To highlight, Statistics Canada as well has pointed out that, between 2010 and 2019, 47% of violent hate crimes committed against Muslims were women. They were women that were being targeted in those attacks.
In terms of how we address that, women themselves are taking it upon themselves to get their own training on how to have self‑defence. I just saw another story out of Edmonton where Sisters’ Dialogue has organized a walk safe in Edmonton to help support Muslim women who are walking in the streets. We have heard about recommendations, for instance at the summit, where there was a call on municipalities to have stricter by-laws that would hold perpetrators accountable for street harassment, for instance. There have been some recommendations made to try to ensure that everyone remains safe, specifically women.
Certainly, with Bill 21 in Quebec, I think it’s really important that we highlight that this fixation on religious minorities in that province, and specifically that disproportionate impact on visibly Muslim women, creates the idea that there is something wrong with women like myself who wear the head scarf, and therefore there is almost a justification when we are being attacked and discriminated against, whether it is through harassment, attacks and such.
Of course, that discrimination piece in labour and employment is also being felt, as was pointed out earlier. The gender aspect and the racial aspect, all of this has to be taken into account. I have not seen a real whole-of-government approach to addressing this particular aspect, though some organizations, of course, have been calling for that, including the Canadian Council of Muslim Women, which is doing incredible work on this.
The Chair: Senator Jaffer and Senator Omidvar, if you can ask your questions quickly, then we can get an answer in 30‑40 seconds, because we’ll need five minutes to deal with other business before we end the meeting.
Senator Jaffer: Amira, is race relations doing any work around gender and issues faced by women who wear hijabs or niqabs? Is there any education planned in the schools or for politicians to respect the right of a woman to choose? Many feminists are quick in saying a woman has a right to choose, but then she doesn’t have a right to choose her clothing. That really bothers me. Are you doing any education around that?
The Chair: Before you answer, I will let Senator Omidvar ask her question and then we can get the answers at the same time.
Senator Omidvar: My question is a quick one, likely to the Canadian Race Relations Foundation, about what they think the federal government can do to improve the relationship between Muslim communities and national security agencies.
Ms. Elghawaby: I’ll take Senator Jaffer’s question first. Thank you so much, Senator Jaffer, for that question.
In terms of education, certainly at the Canadian Race Relations Foundation, we have a number of different types of programming, for instance around the Day of Remembrance and Action on Islamophobia to remember the mosque attack.
We actually held special programming in which we invited Muslim artists to talk about the way that Muslims have been dehumanized in our media, and that includes the gendered aspect of the dehumanization of Muslim women as victims, as requiring saving, et cetera, and how important it is to take that back. That was a partnership with the National Film Board as well as Telefilm Canada, for instance.
We also held a dialogue last fall with Sisters’ Dialogue, amongst other community organizations out west, with MacEwan University, and Irfan Chaudhry out there, who is doing phenomenal work, in which we discussed ways in which communities can address the very concerning rate of hate that is growing not only for Muslim communities but other communities as well, including the spike in Asian-Canadian hate that we have seen as well.
We take on a variety of programming to address these types of issues. As you point out, Senator Jaffer, there is a lot more required to do, and we are certainly looking for opportunities to partner and support organizations that are committed to this work.
Mr. Hashim: Maybe I can answer the question around national security agencies.
We also have a campaign that we do with YWCA Canada called Block Hate in order to raise awareness about the impact of hate on women, and particularly the racialized women. It has been one of our key partnerships within the organization.
In terms of national security, honestly, you’re absolutely right. Many Muslim communities have lost faith in national security organizations to both protect them but also treat them with fairness. I think that everything our two professors have said earlier has been a lived reality for many. I think that the first thing it needs to do is to stop the practices that have been racist towards Canadian Muslims. National security organizations have perpetuated these things.
When we talk about the CBSA, I used to get stopped every single time I went to an airport and sent to secondary screening. It was only when I got a NEXUS card that I was able to by-pass that; until then, every single time I went to an airport I would have heart palpitations sitting in the secondary screening room thinking about if I would be let go to go on an airplane. That trust is lost, to be frank. That trust definitely needs to be regained. I was out west and I met with Muslim organizations. I asked them how many of them report hate crimes to the police.
The Chair: I’m sorry. I have to apologize.
Mr. Hashim: No problem.
The Chair: We have to go to the Senate and we have one other thing to discuss.
I want to remind the witnesses that you can all make a written presentation. We have just started this study. We are hoping to travel over the summer. There is nothing to stop us from calling you back. I want to thank all of you for your presentation this evening. What you have told us and what you have said to us will greatly assist us in our study as we move forward. We are masters of our own fate. The Senate decided to do this study, not the government. We can call you back. I thank each of you.
This concludes our meeting today dedicated to our study on Islamophobia in Canada. Our next meeting on this important issue will be scheduled in the fall.
Senators, we have one more item to discuss: The consideration of a budget for our report on forced and coerced sterilization. I will turn to Senator Boyer to explain this to you.
Senator Boyer: I want to note that, on June 13, this committee met. We considered the draft report and the communications plan for the release of the report. At this meeting, it was agreed that a survivor should join the senators at the press conference when the report is released. It was also agreed, because I had been working with the survivors for a number of years, that I would ask the one that I believed would make a good impact to attend this conference. This survivor would be answering questions from the media from a lived experience perspective. I had promptly asked a survivor right away. When this information was relayed back to Senate Communications, it was discovered that there was actually no budget to bring a witness in. I had already asked her. Because of the trauma and general distrust that survivors have experienced, as we all heard during this testimony, it is an exceptional request that we’re asking now for financial assistance to bring this witness in, for her and for a trauma support person to attend this press conference. The total cost would be approximately $3,700, and it would involve one night hotel and two airfares from Calgary to Ottawa.
The Chair: Senators, is it agreed that the committee submit a budget for two people to travel from Calgary to Ottawa?
Senator Omidvar: Agreed.
The Chair: Thank you.
The following budget application was agreed upon: For two people to travel from Calgary to Ottawa to participate in a press conference in person, for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2023, be approved for submission to the Standing Senate Committee on Internal Economy, Budgets and Administration. The transportation, accommodation and living expenses would be $3,700.
Thank you, senators. If there is no further business, this meeting is now adjourned.
(The committee adjourned.)