In their response to a story Jihad Watch covered here, Toronto police deliver coffee to pro-Hamas demonstrators who blocked North America’s busiest highway overpass, the Toronto police continue to justify their actions.

Spokesperson Laurie McCann stated:

“In regards to the coffee post on X, Our officers are managing a dynamic situation.”

“Their top priority is maintaining order in a tense environment on the Avenue Road bridge,” McCann said in an email. “In performing a helpful act yesterday, our officer’s motivation was to help keep tensions low and should not be interpreted as showing support for any cause or group.”

“Our officers continue to work to de-escalate these demonstrations and maintain calm and the public’s safety,” McCann added.

It is certainly true that de-escalating a situation and maintaining order are prudent responses to a crisis. In this case, however, for whom was order maintained? It wasn’t for those commuters who were traveling along the busy route. Nor was there any sense of order and safety for the Jewish community. What the Toronto Police did to “de-escalate” this situation instead escalated the public’s lack of confidence in the Toronto Police’s ability to protect and to serve.

Police showed their willingness to appease pro-Hamas demonstrators, whom they likely feared would become hostile and violent. The duty of the Toronto Police was to disperse the crowd to make room for through traffic on the busy Highway 401, as well as on the major Avenue Road route. That location is near a Jewish neighborhood, which some protesters called “a Zionist infested area.”

There were also no investigations announced about any violations by the pro-Hamas group of Canada’s hate laws, which state:

Public incitement of hatred

• 319 (1) Every one who, by communicating statements in any public place, incites hatred against any identifiable group where such incitement is likely to lead to a breach of the peace is guilty of
  • (a) an indictable offence and is liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years; or
  • (b) an offence punishable on summary conviction.
• Marginal note: Wilful promotion of hatred

(2) Every one who, by communicating statements, other than in private conversation, wilfully promotes hatred against any identifiable group is guilty of

• • (a) an indictable offence and is liable to imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years; or
  • (b) an offence punishable on summary conviction.

Section 423(1) of the Criminal Code also states this about the overall rights of Canadian citizens:

 Every one is guilty of an indictable offence and liable to imprisonment for a term of not more than five years or is guilty of an offence punishable on summary conviction who, wrongfully and without lawful authority, for the purpose of compelling another person to abstain from doing anything that he or she has a lawful right to do, or to do anything that he or she has a lawful right to abstain from doing…..

This includes “(g) blocks or obstructs a highway.”

Journalist Brian Lilley writes in the Toronto Sun:

Chief Myron Demkiw, Deputy Chief Lauren Pogue and the rest of the Toronto Police Service let it happen and will even deliver coffee and donoughts [sic].

Demkiw and Pogue did a glowing job of promoting Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, instead of training their police officers to do their jobs. The coffee and doughnuts moment was a DEI promotional showpiece.

An update: faced with a barrage of criticism and compounded embarrassment — from both the citizenry and the government — Chief Demkiw has apologized and ordered a “thorough review.” Demkiw states:

Questions have been raised regarding one particular interaction between officers and a person on the Avenue Road bridge during an hours-long demonstration….Whatever the intent, the impact has been to cause concern and confusion and for that I am sorry.

We understand the disruption and concern for safety many of these demonstrations have caused and when laws are broken, we will intervene to ensure our city is safe.

Demkiw’s apology falls short. He apologized for the “concern and confusion” that was caused by his staff serving coffee and doughnuts to pro-Hamas protesters, not for the questionable police response and its entire management of the demonstration, topped off by coffee and doughnuts incident. One of the protesters, who was wearing a black jacket and keffiyeh, grinned and stated: “The police are becoming our little messengers.” Demkiw’s ordering of a review is odd, since it is his response and that of Toronto Police that need scrutiny.

Liberal MP Marco Mendicino, the former Minister of Public Safety, tweeted:

Good intentions aside, police serving coffee and food to protestors will just embolden more deliberate obstruction of traffic, undermine public safety, and add to local frustrations. Laws exist to prevent this. They need to be enforced! pic.twitter.com/s7znCf3gt5

— Marco Mendicino (@marcomendicino) January 6, 2024

A key question was asked in the Toronto Sun:

Will it take another arson attack, another firebombing like we saw at a Jewish-owned deli last week for them to act? Do we need to wait for someone to be shot before they apply the laws as they exist, rather than encouraging what has been going on?

There’s a pattern in Canada, of failure to uphold and protect the rule of law and the rights of all citizens. This pattern was apparent in Covid overreach; the abuse of pastor Artur Pawłowski for non-compliance during the Covid lockdowns; the treatment of the peaceful Freedom Convoy that earned Trudeau international scorn; and the freezing of bank accounts of Convoy supporters. Another Calgary pastor, Derek Reimer, was roughed up and charged with hate-motivated crimes for a second time over his protests of drag queens reading stories to young children at a library. Last March, Calgary’s mayor, Jyoti Gondek passed a law to protect drag shows and stop any anti-drag show protests. Recently, Gondek chose not to attend an annual menorah lighting to avoid appearing pro-Israel after the October 7 Hamas massacre.

Mislav Kolakusic, a Croatian lawyer and Member of the European Parliament for Croatia, stated in February 2022:

“Trudeau, in recent months, under your quasi-liberal boot, Canada has become a symbol of civil rights violations. The methods we have witnessed may be liberal to you, but to many citizens around the world, it seemed like a dictatorship of the worst kind.”

It appears as if Canadian leaders are picking and choosing when and how to enforce the law. The freedom to protest against LGBTQ indoctrination of young children is inhibited; the freedom to freely protest the violation of the constitutional rights of Canadians during the Covid crackdowns by the government were inhibited; vandalism and intimidation during the Black Lives Matter riots were permitted; and now pro-Hamas thugs are permitted by police to disrupt the busiest highway in North America and foment hatred against Jews. Then they get served doughnuts and coffee by those same police.

Meanwhile, the Calgary police have figured out a way to crack down on pro-Hamas protests, and to do so with an appearance of “equity”: by comparing Covid protests in response to government violation of Canadian rights to pro-Hamas protests. The pro-Hamas protests are not only disruptive, but spread Jew-hatred and incitement. Calgary police chief Mark Neufeld states that “law enforcement gave protesters too much latitude during COVID-19 demonstrations,” which they certainly didn’t. So now, he’s using this line to crack down on disruptive pro-Hamas demonstrations. Already, a demonstrator is complaining about an “Arabophobic and anti-Palestinian bias.”

Canada is at a crossroads. Its leaders at every level have managed to wriggle out of endless scandals and violations through the years of Trudeau’s tenure as prime minister and Leftist mismanagement. Now, with the safety of the Jewish community at stake, and the rise of disruptive pro-Hamas influences in Canada and elsewhere, a showdown is in the offing.