Paul Champ: A case study in progressive antisemitism

One way to think about bigotry of any kind, antisemitism included, is to imagine it existing on a Richter scale of sorts. Back in 2021, this story from the UK elicited a fair amount of outrage and I believe just about everyone who travels in polite company would characterize this as unequivocal antisemitism. Let's say the Richter scale goes to 10 (it doesn't). This kind of thing registers pretty high. 

Ok, let's take a look at Ottawa lawyer and human rights advocate (judging by his X bio) Paul Champ, who became better known nationally during the COVID trucker convoy. I don't exactly mean to pick on Paul, even as he's elicited many groans from the Jewish community over time, but I genuinely think it's instructive to explore how one can still register on the Richter scale while condemning the 9 out of 10 stuff. And in particular, how progressives who only seem to see antisemitism or call it out when it's coming from the white far-right play an active role in propagating that which they call a "cancer."

Now, I believe Paul would absolutely deny he is antisemitic at all. Look at this post. This sounds good and genuine. This was posted after a bomb threat to the Jewish community was reported. 

Isn't that nice? Let's dive into three of Paul's other posts. Many links/receipts follow but only screengrabs of Paul's posts just in case any are deleted. 

Example 1:

Paul posted this when tens of thousands of Jews (total crowd size estimated at 40,000) rallied for Israel in Toronto. Why is this problematic? 

1. The guy Paul is reposting here, Sulaiman Ahmed, is a full-on "the Jews did 9/11" antisemite. Monica Marks wrote a thread with some of his greatest hits here. Ok, maybe Paul didn't know. Presumably he's horrified to boost someone like this, right?

2. Why is he re-posting a video of a racist Rabbi in the same tweet where's he's criticizing Canadian Jews for marching for Israel? See if you can find any posts of his where he shows video of an antisemitic Imam, like this one for example, to say...I don't know, criticize Canadian Muslims who march in support of Oct 7 and Hamas, which he has referred to as an atrocity and terrorists, respectively. Or holding a funeral prayer for Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar, who Paul would say is a terrorist. Can you imagine Paul doing that? I honestly cannot.

3.  Why can't Paul seemingly imagine that Canadian Jews might be marching for Israel for any good reasons? He knows many of us have family or friends there. Can Jews and in fact other Canadians express their support for hostages being held by Hamas, or families of those brutally murdered on Oct. 7? Can we march in support for the tens of thousands of Israelis who have been displaced from their homes in the north due to Hezbollah rocket attacks that started on Oct. 8? Can we march for the people of Israel, including the literally hundreds of thousands of Israelis who have marched against Netanyahu's government and for a hostage deal? Can we just express our support for Israel's survival as it's been attacked by Hamas, Hezbollah, the Houthis, Iran, and Iranian proxies in Syria and Iraq? As it's very existence as a Jewish state is being attacked by the hoardes of "anti-Zionist" demonstrators who are literally calling for ethnic cleansing? "Go back to Poland." "We don't want no 2 States, we want all of 48." Burning Israeli flags. Etc. No...Jews, must not march for Israel and if we do it means we're supporting crimes against humanity. And here's a video of a racist Rabbi.

Again, there are people marching in the streets of Ottawa saying "long live October 7." What has Paul said?

Example 2: 

I love this one. Paul is boosting a fringe anti-Zionist Jewish group (tokenism!) to downplay incidents of antisemitism on university campuses to condemn a small number of extremist Jews who absolutely deserved the criticism, and in fact mainstream Jewish organizations like CIJA condemned it.  

Now, see if you can find an example of Paul, or Independent Jewish Voices for that matter, condemning any instances of pro-Hamas and antisemitic behaviour on the streets of Canada, including university campuses. That video I linked to earlier calling for ethnic cleansing? How about this? Or this? Or this? Paul is a proponent of free speech. How does he feel about chants of "No Zionists on campus" that have been seen all over North American campuses, including actual physical checkpoints. Look at these heroes.

Paul says Jews deserve to feel safe. Surely he means it. Surely he would condemn this hate mob that rallied directly outside a Jewish long-term home care centre with Holocaust survivors in his own city, right? Or this hate mob outside a Montreal synagogue? 

Example 3:

I'll make this one brief. I happen to think the Kahanist assholes in Israel who tried to block food aid from getting to Gaza are absolute travesties of human beings. It would have been nice if Paul boosted the Jews in Standing Together who intervened to stop this madness. Worth noting Standing Together was disavowed by a chapter of the BDS movement and when the band Bon Iver announced plans to support them, they got shat on by the "Right Side of History." 

In any case, why does this post register on the Richter scale? Because there is no universe where Paul or any progressive would start a sentence this way about Muslims. You know it. I know it. Paul knows it. Never mind the fact that Paul is posting about bad Jews in a backdrop of historic levels of antisemitism. 

It's not "Fuck the Jews and rape their daughters." But it registers. 

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Final personal note: I'm nearly 50 years old (yay!) and never contemplated voting for the Conservatives in my life. I am going to vote for them in the next federal election, for multiple reasons, but a very big reason is because I'm a liberal Zionist who has witnessed a huge chunk of the political Left engage in or whitewash the shit that I just wrote about above. Paul is not some anomaly, and I do feel a bit bad for singling him out. I don't want him chased with pitchforks or anything. I want him to reflect, in good faith.  

As I've vented into the ether on X a few times for the reward of mild catharsis, the NDP (and Paul for that matter) notionally supports Israel's existence, which is what Zionism means, and the "hate has no place here" party hasn't been able to find the absolute minimal amount of courage and decency to condemn the demonization of a vast majority of Jews in the past year that has seen this cancer of antisemitism, to use Paul and Bruce Arthur's phrasing, grow and grow. Can you see how that might be upsetting to me? Don't answer that with "well, there's a genocide in Gaza." Never mind the allegation of "genocide," you can walk and chew gum. You're an adult, and presumably not a moron.

If you're a progressive that happens to read this, I'm fucking begging you to take two minutes, maybe five, out of your life and do some introspection. I only created an X account because: 1) Elon blocked people without accounts from reading; and 2) a progressive neighbour of mine told me last year that it shouldn't be up to me/Jews to speak out against antisemitism in the Left, and then I noticed almost no non-Jews on the Left were saying much at all when they weren't actually stoking the flames. 

If Poilievre wins and you call me and everyone else a racist, know that my two middle fingers will be raised to the sky. Take yourselves down a notch or two, pretty please. 

Thanks for reading.