SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
canada
'National Security Threat'? 95-Year-Old Human Rights Scholar Richard Falk Interrogated for Hours by Canada
"Clearly, the international repression of the Palestinian cause knows no bounds."
Nov 15, 2025
Ninety-five-year-old Richard Falk—world renowned scholar of international law and former UN special rapporteur focused on Palestinian rights—was detained and interrogated for several hours along with his wife, legal scholar Hilal Elver, as the pair entered Canada for a conference focused on that nation's complicity with Israel's genocide in Gaza.
"A security person came and said, ‘We’ve detained you both because we’re concerned that you pose a national security threat to Canada,'” Falk explained to Al-Jazeera in a Saturday interview from Ottawa in the wake of the incident that happened at the international airport in Toronto ahead of the scheduled event.
“It was my first experience of this sort–ever–in my life,” said Falk, professor emeritus of international law at Princeton University, author or editor of more than 20 books, and formerly the UN special rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories.
Falk, who is American, has been an outspoken critic of the foreign policy of Canada, the United States, and other Western nations on the subject of Israel-Palestine as well as other issues. He told media outlets that he and his wife, also an American, were held for over four hours after their arrival in Toronto. They were in the country to speak and participate at the Palestine Tribunal on Canadian Responsibility, an event scheduled for Friday and Saturday in Ottawa, the nation's capital.
The event, according to the program notes on the website, was designed to "document the multiple ways that Canadian entities – including government bodies, corporations, universities, charities, media, and other cultural institutions–have enabled and continue to enable the settler colonization and genocide of Palestinians, and to articulate what justice and reparations would require."
In his comments to Al-Jazeera, Falk said he believes the interrogation by the Canadian authorities—which he described as "nothing particularly aggressive" but "random" and "disorganized" in its execution—is part of a global effort by powerful nations complicit with human rights abuses and violations of international law to “punish those who endeavour to tell the truth about what is happening” in the world, including in Gaza.
Martin Shaw, a British sociologist and author of The New Age of Genocide, said the treatment of Falk and Elver should be seen as an "extraordinary development" for Canada, and not in a good way. For a nation that likes to think of itself as a "supporter of international justice," said Shaw, "to arrest the veteran scholar and former UN rapporteur Richard Falk while he is attending a Gaza tribunal. Clearly, the international repression of the Palestinian cause knows no bounds."
Canadian Senator Yuen Pau Woo, a supporter of the Palestine Tribunal, told Al-Jazeera he was “appalled” by the interrogation.
“We know they were here to attend the Palestine Tribunal. We know they have been outspoken in documenting and publicizing the horrors inflicted on Gaza by Israel, and advocating for justice,” Woo said. “If those are the factums for their detention, then it suggests that the Canadian government considers these acts of seeking justice for Palestine to be national security threats–and I’d like to know why.”
Keep ReadingShow Less
Trump to Hike US Prices Because 'Canada Hurt His Feelings' With Reagan Tariffs Ad
"He's increasing taxes on Americans by executive fiat because he didn't like an advertisement that quoted Reagan's (accurate) views on tariffs," said one US journalist. "You (and I) are paying these taxes—not Canada."
Oct 26, 2025
Critics across North America are blasting President Donald Trump's additional 10% import tax on Canadian goods over Ontario's television advertisement featuring former President Ronald Reagan's condemnation of tariffs—an announcement that came Saturday, in the lead-up to the US Supreme Court hearing arguments on his trade war.
"The president announces an arbitrary price hike on Americans because his feelings are hurt by an ad accurately quoting Ronald Reagan's criticism of tariffs," US journalist Aaron Rupar wrote on X in response to Trump's Saturday afternoon Truth Social post.
Billy Binion, a reporter for the American libertarian magazine Reason, similarly said: "I don't get how anyone can support the president having power over tariffs after watching this exchange. He is unilaterally raising taxes on Americans—not because of a ~negotiating~ tactic or to create jobs, but because… Canada hurt his feelings. Congress needs to do its job."
Throughout Trump's trade war, experts have emphasized that Americans ultimately pay more because of his tariffs, despite the president's claims to the contrary. Research published earlier his month by the investment bank Goldman Sachs shows that US consumers are shouldering up to 55% of the costs stemming from his taxes on imports.
"Let's be clear about what this is. Canada isn't paying a goddamned thing," Independent White House correspondent Andrew Feinberg stressed Saturday. "He's increasing taxes on Americans by executive fiat because he didn't like an advertisement that quoted Reagan's (accurate) views on tariffs. You (and I) are paying these taxes—not Canada."
Melanie D'Arrigo, executive director of the Campaign for New York Health, said on X: "1. Reagan's speech is real. 2. It's public domain. 3. Americans pay the cost of the added 10% tariffs, not Canadians. 4. Trump keeps lying because he thinks you're all too stupid to fact-check. 5. The average family will pay an extra $4,900 this year because [of] his tariffs."
The tariff announcement came after Trump suspended trade talks with Canada on Thursday night over the one-minute ad, even though the Canadian federal government did not pay for it. Ontario's provincial government was behind the ad, which uses audio from Reagan's April 25, 1987 radio address on free and fair trade.
Trump on Saturday quoted from the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation & Institute's Thursday statement, which said that the ad "misrepresents" the address, the Ontario government "did not seek nor receive permission to use and edit the remarks," and the organization "is reviewing its legal options in this matter."
Several journalists and other observers have concluded that "the ad faithfully reproduced Mr. Reagan's words, just in a different order," as the New York Times' Matina Stevis-Gridneff put it.
"When someone says, 'Let's impose tariffs on foreign imports,' it looks like they're doing the patriotic thing by protecting American products and jobs. And sometimes for a short while it works—but only for a short time," the ad begins. "Over the long run such trade barriers hurt every American worker and consumer."
"High tariffs inevitably lead to retaliation by foreign countries and the triggering of fierce trade wars," the clip of Reagan's voice continues. "Then the worst happens: Markets shrink and collapse; businesses and industries shut down; and millions of people lose their jobs."
Ontario's premier, Doug Ford, said Friday that "our intention was always to initiate a conversation about the kind of economy that Americans want to build and the impact of tariffs on workers and businesses. We've achieved our goal, having reached US audiences at the highest levels. I've directed my team to keep putting our message in front of Americans over the weekend so that we can air our commercial during the first two World Series games."
After speaking with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney, Ford said, "Ontario will pause its US advertising campaign effective Monday so that trade talks can resume. The people elected our government to protect Ontario—our workers, businesses, families, and communities. That's exactly what I'm doing. Like I said earlier today: Canada and the US are neighbors, friends, and allies. We're so much stronger when we work together. Let's work together to build Fortress Am-Can and make our two countries stronger, more prosperous, and more secure."
Ford's pledge to pull the ad next week clearly did not appease the US president. Hours after Trump announced the new tariffs on Saturday, Dominic Leblanc, the Canadian minister of US-Canada trade, urged engagement at the federal level.
"As the prime minister said yesterday, we stand ready to build on the progress made in constructive discussions with American counterparts over the course of recent weeks," Leblanc wrote on social media. "We will remain focused on achieving results that benefit workers and families in both the United States and Canada, and that progress is best achieved through direct engagement with the US administration—which is the responsibility of the federal government."
Meanwhile, Carney seemed to take swipes at Trump at the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) summit in Malaysia on Sunday. As CBC reported, he said that "we have all been reminded of the importance of reliable partners—who honor their commitments, who are there in tough times, and who engage collaboratively to fix something that isn't working."
"Canada is such a partner, a dependable partner, and I have come to Kuala Lumpur to say clearly that we want to play a bigger role in this region," Carney continued, as Trump also headed to Malaysia. "Like ASEAN, Canada values the rules-based system. We respect trade agreements and the rule of law. We believe in the value of the free exchange of goods, capital, and ideas."
The escalation between the US and its second-largest trading partner comes as the Supreme Court prepares to hear arguments over the president's authority to impose sweeping tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act. Trump's Saturday remarks were widely regarded as highly relevant to the case.
"Trump is raising US tariffs on Canada by 10% because he's unhappy that Ontario ran an ad quoting Ronald Reagan on why tariffs are bad. This is, of course, insane, and Trump has no legal authority to raise tariffs for that reason," said American finance journalist James Surowiecki. "If the Supreme Court can see this and still accept Trump's national security/national emergency argument for why he should be able to impose whatever tariffs he wants on whomever he wants, they are not serious people."
"We're living in a country where the president just randomly raises taxes on a whim because he's in a snit—and no one stops him, even though the Constitution gives him zero power over tariffs," he added. "This is not a constitutional republic at the moment."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Progressive Activist Avi Lewis Launches Bid for NDP Leadership in Canada
Lewis said NDP must “fling the doors wide open, and build a party for the 99%.”
Sep 25, 2025
The longtime progressive activist Avi Lewis officially launched his bid for leadership of Canada's New Democratic Party, which he aims to revitalize with a platform of economic populism.
Lewis, a journalist and documentarian whose grandfather helped to found the NDP in 1961, says the way to bring the party back to relevance amid an electoral low point is to “fling the doors wide open, and build a party for the 99%.”
At a kickoff party in Toronto on Wednesday, the former parliamentary candidate from Vancouver railed against the “Liberal-Conservative alliance” that dominates Canadian politics. The two major parties' leaders, Lewis said, "compete fiercely in public, while behind the scenes, they collude to boost corporate profits."
"In the name of protecting the country, the government is rapidly passing and proposing legislation that will change the culture and character of Canada," Lewis said. "From sweeping aside Indigenous rights and environmental protections for so-called nation-building projects, to rolling back higher taxes on the uberwealthy and digital giants, to the generational austerity of 15% cuts to public spending, to the $9 billion that materialized in an instant for the military this year, ramping up to $150 billion a year a decade from now—the changes afoot are extreme."
Lewis pledged to “build a government that is an instrument for the people, not for corporate Canada.”
The NDP—once Canada's third-largest national political party—has been ailing of late after a dismal showing in the nation's most recent parliamentary elections. The party, which held over 100 seats 14 years ago, dropped to a new low of just seven seats in 2025, not enough to even be recognized for committee assignments or federal funding.
The humiliating showing resulted in the resignation of Jagmeet Singh, who'd led the party for eight years, but was widely criticized by those on the left for his coziness with the establishment of the dominant Liberal Party and his failure to keep the NDP competitive. It is in this state of "political wilderness" that Lewis has emerged with an ambitious change agenda.
(Video: Avi Lewis for NDP Leader)
"Life in Canada today feels on the edge," Lewis said in a video released last week announcing his leadership run. "Everyone seeking a little stability, everyone being told 'You're all on your own.'"
He identified several causes of that precarity. One was the "economic attack" from US President Donald Trump, whom Lewis described as sending "disruption grenades" in the form of steep tariffs and annexation threats. But Lewis said that Trump merely "magnifies... the everyday emergency of trying to get by in an impossible economy."
According to one survey conducted in July, 57% of Canadians said their current incomes did not allow them to afford basic necessities like housing, groceries, energy, and cell phone plans.
"Working hard doesn't earn you a living," Lewis said.
"These days, every politician claims to be shocked by the costs," he continued. "What they don't talk about is why: The billions in profits for the tiny group of corporations that control every part of our economy. Three phone providers, three grocery giants, five oil companies, and the five big banks that fund them."
Lewis' plan to confront corporate power is years in the making. Alongside his wife, the acclaimed journalist and author Naomi Klein, Lewis rolled out the Leap Manifesto in 2015 as an agenda for the NDP. Leap focused on confronting the climate crisis, but its contents formed the basis of what he now refers to as a "Green New Deal." The accelerating climate emergency remains at the center of his agenda in 2025.
"Oil and gas CEOs," he said in the video, are "not just hoarding extreme wealth," but "foreclosing on our shared future."
Lewis has never held a parliamentary office, though he has run for a federal Vancouver-area seat twice before and achieved two third-place finishes, receiving 26% of the vote in 2021 and 12.5% in 2025.
In his bid to lead NDP, he has so far leaned heavily into his family legacy and his reputation as a lifelong activist who has "butted heads with the powerful," over issues like the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and the privatization of healthcare and public transit.
"For four decades," he said, "I have stood with workers, telling stories of working-class heroes and organizing for dignity in factories and fields, classrooms and care homes, shop floors and fishing fleets."
Lewis, who also identified free trade deals as job killers, proposed a "Green New Deal" as a means to revive Canadian industry and create "millions of good-paying jobs."
He has also proposed a wealth tax, a national cap on rent increases, a public option for groceries, and expanded universal healthcare that covers "medication to mental health."
During his speech Wednesday night, Lewis described NDP as "the only party that can accurately diagnose the cause of our everyday emergency, and offer solutions as big as the crises we face."
"The federal government has the power, the resources, and the responsibility to ensure the fundamentals of a good life—healthy food, truly affordable housing, functioning public transit, and hey, maybe a proper vacation once in a while," he said. "But we won’t get it if we don’t fight for it. And that’s where the NDP comes in. After all, the NDP is the original party of workers’ struggle. And in this moment of epic change and uncertainty, the party is needed as never before."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular