September 24, 2012: Why did Canada suddenly break diplomatic relations with Iran?

By Michael Regenstreif

As I write this column on the morning of September 14, it is exactly one week after Canada suddenly broke off diplomatic relations with the Islamic Republic of Iran.

The federal government had already quietly evacuated what was a skeletal diplomatic staff in Tehran when it ordered Iran’s diplomats in Ottawa to leave the country within five days. We hadn’t had ambassadorial level relations with Iran since 2007, and relations have been particularly strained since 2003, when Zahra Kazemi, an Iranian-Canadian photographer, was arrested, tortured and killed by the Iranian regime.

In Ottawa, it was big news in January 2011, when officials at Library and Archives Canada cancelled the Free Thinking Film Society’s screening of Iranium, a documentary critical of Iran’s efforts to acquire a nuclear bomb, bowing to pressure from the Iranian embassy. The federal government was quick to recognize how wrong it was to allow the Iranians to exert any such influence and the screening was rescheduled when Heritage Minister James Moore stepped in.

There was no shortage of reasons to break off relations with Iran. As Foreign Minister John Baird said in his statement, Iran is “the most significant threat to global peace and security in the world today.”

As Baird went on to explain, “The Iranian regime is providing increasing military assistance to the Assad regime; it refuses to comply with UN resolutions pertaining to its nuclear program; it routinely threatens the existence of Israel and engages in racist antisemitic rhetoric and incitement to genocide; it is among the world’s worst violators of human rights; and it shelters and materially supports terrorist groups, requiring the Government of Canada to formally list Iran as a state sponsor of terrorism under the Justice for Victims of Terrorism Act.

“Moreover, the Iranian regime has shown blatant disregard for the Vienna Convention and its guarantee of protection for diplomatic personnel. Under the circumstances, Canada can no longer maintain a diplomatic presence in Iran.”

While the list of Baird’s reasons for cutting our last remaining diplomatic ties to Iran’s Islamist government were spot on, the question turned on the suddenness of the announcement, which came while both Baird and Prime Minister Stephen Harper were in Russia attending the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation leaders’ conference.

All the reasons Baird cited would have been just as valid months ago and almost all of them years ago. Why the suddenness on September 7? With the situation vis-à-vis Iran such as it has been for such a long period of time, why didn’t we make this move before or why couldn’t it have waited another 10 days when the announcement could have been made in the House of Commons?

I would have to assume the government decided to act when it did because it was aware of an imminent threat – or the real possibility of a threat – to our diplomats.

There was some media speculation, denied by Baird, that we had advance knowledge of an impending attack on Iran by Israel. Baird said the safety of our diplomats was a primary concern.

Indeed, concern for the safety of Western diplomats in Iran has been a major consideration since the Islamist regime came to power in 1979 and Iranian students took control of the American embassy and held American diplomats hostage for more than a year. The United States has not had diplomatic relations with Iran since.

And, just 10 months ago, Great Britain closed its embassy in Tehran and expelled Iranian diplomats from London after mobs stormed and vandalized the British embassy in Tehran. Canada acted just four days before the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks. Might we have been aware of a particular threat tied to the anniversary?

As it happened, much of the Islamic world exploded on September 11 – when the American ambassador to Libya and three members of his staff were brutally murdered – and in the few days since in riots sparked by a crude, pathetic depiction of Muhammad, the founder of Islam, posted to YouTube. The insulting video – which was actually online for more than two months before the riots broke out – was obviously meant to inflame Muslim fundamentalists.

Early media reports accepted the filmmaker’s claim that his name was Sam Bacile, an Israeli-American. It turned out that Bacile was one of many aliases of a Coptic Christian Egyptian-American with previous convictions for financial crimes. Despite that revelation, as I write, PressTV, the Iranian regime’s English-language propaganda agency, is reporting the film to be the work of “more than 100 Zionists.”

Given what has transpired in the Middle East in recent days, Canada’s decision to act on Iran when it did, seems timely.

February 21, 2011: Will Egypt rise to democracy or fall to Islamism?

By Michael Regenstreif

Like most news junkies, I’ve watched many hours of television coverage and read countless news articles and commentaries about the situation that has been unfolding in Egypt since January 25, when mass protesters clamouring for democracy, and for the immediate end to President Hosni Mubarak’s three-decade-long grip on power, began to assemble in Cairo’s Tahrir Square.

Early in the protests, Mubarak vowed to finish his current term in office, but agreed not to stand for re-election in September.

This was not enough for the protesters, who remained determined not to give up as long as Mubarak remained in power. Friday, February 4 was promoted by protest organizers as Mubarak’s Day of Departure and, indeed, many media outlets that morning were predicting Mubarak would be gone by day’s end. He wasn’t.

It was widely expected that Mubarak would step down on February 10. Instead, he went on television and made a long speech in which he defiantly promised to finish his term. Suddenly, the next day, his resignation was announced, the army had assumed transitional power, and the protests in Tahrir Square, and throughout the country, turned into celebrations.

Hopefully, the process of real democratization will now begin in Egypt.

It was hard not to sympathize with the Egyptian protesters.

Mubarak was a brutal dictator these past 30 years. All of the freedoms and rights we enjoy in Western democracies like Canada, the United States and Israel were denied the Egyptians.

There was no free press, there was no free vote in elections, people faced torture and imprisonment without trial, and corruption was rampant. In a country where poverty is the norm, the Mubarak family is worth, according to estimates, upwards of $70 billion.

According to many security experts, the best hope for a positive outcome – a transition to democracy – was Mubarak’s early departure. And now that that has happened, we will watch anxiously to see how the situation develops.

The Egyptian people demonstrating in Tahrir Square seemed anxious for real democracy. Their movement did not seem to have been motivated by Islamism or anti-Zionism.

A democratic Egypt would be in Israel’s best interest and would likely maintain the state of peace – as cold as it may be – that has endured since Mubarak’s predecessor, Anwar Sadat, and Israel’s then-prime minister, Menachem Begin, signed the first Arab-Israeli peace treaty in 1979.

Israelis recognize that.

Sallai Meridor, Israel’s former ambassador to the United States, wrote in a February 10 Washington Post op-ed, “If a real democracy, committed to the values of freedom and peace, were to emerge in Egypt, Israelis would overwhelmingly support it.”

But, as I’ve written before, nothing is simple in the Middle East.

While U.S. President Barack Obama has promised the Americans will stand by Egypt as it transitions to democracy, many Israeli pundits and pro-Israel advocates have expressed deep fears that the democracy movement in Egypt could well fail and lead to a takeover by the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood.

Almost certainly, such an outcome would be disastrous for Israel and for the peace process. And, if history is any indicator, it would also be disastrous for the Egyptian people, as an Islamist regime – witness Iran since 1979 – would be undoubtedly as brutal, if not more so, as Mubarak’s long reign has been.

It is often pointed out that Israel is the only democracy in the Middle East. As I continue to watch the events in Egypt unfold, it is with the hope that, soon, this will no longer be the case.

Iranium revisited

The threatened protests that caused Library and Archives Canada officials to cancel the Free Thinking Film Society’s screening of Iranium on January 18 did not materialize when the film finally was shown to a sold-out audience on February 6; a much larger audience, no doubt, than the film would have attracted before the Iranian Embassy turned the screening into a major media event.

If you missed the screening, Iranium is being shown for “free online for a limited time,” at iraniumthemovie.com. Not only is it a stark reminder of the threats posed by a nuclear Iran, given the unfolding events in Egypt, it is also a warning of what can happen when a democracy movement fails.

February 7, 2011: Iranian Embassy garners national attention for local film society

By Michael Regenstreif

The Free Thinking Film Society was thrust into the national media spotlight last month, thanks, it seems, to the interference of the Iranian Embassy in Ottawa, questionable responses from Library and Archives Canada, and unequivocal support from members of the federal cabinet.

I left the Bulletin office a few minutes after 5 pm on January 18 and was about to head downtown to grab a quick bite to eat before heading to Library and Archives for the Free Thinking Film Society’s screening of Iranium, a new documentary critical of Iran’s Islamist regime, including its efforts to acquire a nuclear bomb, a matter of paramount concern to Israel and most other Western democracies, including Canada and the United States, as well as to moderate Arab regimes in the Middle East.

The event was also to feature a presentation by Clare Lopez, a former U.S. Central Intelligence Agency officer and expert on Middle East and counter-terrorism issues.

I was tuned to CBC Radio and heard an announcement that the Iranium event was cancelled under circumstances that included an objection from the Iranian Embassy in Ottawa, a couple of envelopes with mysterious white powder that had been dropped off at the Library and Archives building (the white powder turned out to be harmless), and calls to Library and Archives from “members of the public” threatening protests if the film screening was allowed to proceed.

The CBC had Fred Litwin, the Free Thinking Film Society’s director, on the line and he said he’d received a call at 4 pm from Library and Archives telling him there were protesters inside and outside the building, that security could not be assured, so the event was cancelled.

My first thought was to wonder just who the “pro-nuclear Iran” protesters would be.

In a chronology that he repeated to me on the phone a few days later, Litwin said that he immediately headed to the Library and Archives building, arriving at 4:50 pm. There were no protesters, just employees leaving.

Litwin was then told there were no actual protesters, just the supposed “threat of protests.”

It turned out that the cancellation that day was the second time Library and Archives Canada officials had pulled the plug on the scheduled screening.

The day before, Litwin was notified that the screening was being cancelled because of “complaints.” The complaints, he later learned, were from the Iranian Embassy.

Litwin contacted the office of Federal Heritage Minister James Moore, which wasted no time in having Library and Archives Canada reverse the cancellation.

At first, the Library and Archives Canada officials tried to get the Free Thinking Film Society to move the screening to the Museum of Nature (at a substantially increased rental fee), but the society held its ground and, within hours, and with obvious pressure from Moore’s office, the screening was reinstated at the Library and Archives auditorium.

The cancellation and reinstatement the day before happened so quickly that news of it didn’t circulate widely until after the subsequent cancellation the next day, just three hours before the Iranium event was to take place, in the wake of the threat of protests and the white powder hoax.

Given the circumstances of the cancellation, it was inevitable, and entirely predictable, that it would become a major story. It was equally inevitable and predictable that the federal government could not allow the Iranian Embassy or threats from protesters to have veto power over an event in a federal government building mere steps from Parliament Hill.

How could the Library and Archives Canada officials not understand that? How could they have capitulated to a complaint from the Iranian Embassy so easily?

The Free Thinking Film Society’s screening of Iranium, including the presentation by Clare Lopez, was rescheduled for Sunday, February 6, 7:00 pm, at Library and Archives Canada.

Had the Iranian Embassy not interfered in the first place, a few hundred people would have seen Iranium on January 18. Instead, millions of people across Canada were made aware of the film thanks to the news reports.

That’s what happens in a free society when you try to suppress free speech or, in this case, free thinking.