April 28, 2014: New Quebec government should just let go of the secular charter issue

By Michael Regenstreif

In my March 17 column, I argued that the Parti Québécois (PQ) government’s proposed Charter of Quebec Values, which sought to ban public sector workers – from government bureaucrats to police and from daycare workers to doctors – from wearing clothing or symbols that signify their religious beliefs (including headgear such as kippot, hijabs and turbans, and jewelry such as necklaces with a noticeable Magen David or cross) was perhaps the main issue of Quebec’s provincial election on April 7.

The election was “very much about values,” I wrote, “and it remains to be seen which values Quebecers will choose.”

I wrote that column on March 7. A couple of days later – with then-premier Pauline Marois at his side – media baron Pierre Karl Péladeau declared his candidacy for the PQ and, with a now-famously raised fist, he made Quebec separation the ballot box question.

Everything changed in that moment. Clearly, the vast majority of the Quebec electorate had no interest in holding another divisive referendum on separation. While the charter remained an issue – and the PQ tried in vain to re-establish it as the main issue, thinking it was the key to their potential victory – it was Quebec separation that ruled the election. Marois called the election because polls indicated she could use the charter to turn her minority government into a majority. Instead, Quebecers, in their wisdom, handed the PQ a most humiliating defeat.

Watching the election results come in on April 7, one could almost hear all of Canada breathe a collective sigh of relief.

And, with their defeat, the PQ’s Charter of Quebec Values was dead in the water.

But, the day after the election, Philippe Couillard, the Quebec Liberal leader and premier-designate, said his government would bring in its own charter of secular values, affecting a more limited range of public sector officials in “positions of authority.” While the range of those positions was not defined, it would apparently not include most bureaucrats, doctors, nurses, teachers and daycare workers.

But, still, the question must be asked. Why is there a need for a solution to a problem that does not exist? Couillard’s new government should take the same position as the federal government and the other nine provinces and just let the issue go.

April 7, 2014: The message of Passover is a message for our time

By Michael Regenstreif

I ’ve mentioned before that Passover is my favourite Jewish holiday because the message of freedom from slavery and oppression is so inspirational.

During Passover, we recall the slavery endured by the ancient Israelites in Egypt and celebrate their struggle for freedom and the exodus from Egypt led by Moses. As the Passover Haggadah tells us, all of us, in every generation, must view ourselves as personally moving from the bondage of slavery to freedom.

That message of every generation viewing ourselves as moving from slavery to freedom via the Israelites’ exodus from Egypt seems to me to be a lesson from our sages that the message of Passover is not just to remember something that may have happened thousands of years ago, it is that the message remains eternally relevant for all time.

In the 1850s – not very long ago in relation to the many centuries since biblical times – when African American slaves in the United States were struggling for their own freedom from slavery, they took great inspiration from the story of our exodus from slavery in Egypt. Harriet Tubman, the leader of the Underground Railroad, which spirited slaves from the American South to freedom in Canada, was code named “Moses.” The code name for Canada was “the promised land.”

As Jews, we remember the six million of our people murdered by the Nazis during the Holocaust. We also remember the Nazis enslaved millions of Jews, including so many of those they murdered. That dark period of our history ended just 69 years ago. Later this month, on April 27 and 28, we’ll mark Yom HaShoah, and it’s not a coincidence that the Holocaust Remembrance Day comes so soon after Passover as it is tied to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising that began during Passover in 1943.

Shockingly, the Global Slavery Index indicates there are now 29.8 million people living in some form of slavery around the world. And, while the vast majority of those are in such countries as India, China, Pakistan and Russia, no country is immune. Even Canada is listed as having about 6,000 people living in slavery.

The journey from slavery begun by Moses continues in our own time.

The Jewish state debate

There is a debate raging about whether Palestinian recognition of Israel as a Jewish state is essential to a peace agreement and that debate has found its way to page 33 of this issue. Guest columnist Bob Dale insists the recognition is essential, while columnist Mira Sucharov says it is unreasonable.

Israel was created as a Jewish state after the United Nations voted in 1947 to partition Palestine into a Jewish state and an Arab state. Rejectionism of a Jewish state has been at the heart of every conflict Israel has faced, from the 1948 War of Independence, to the rocket barrages the villagers in Sderot face from Gaza, and to the delegitimization campaigns on university campuses. It seems to me that two states for two peoples needs the acceptance of who those people are (which, of course, does not mitigate the imperative for minorities within Israel to enjoy full rights of equal citizenship).