Rebel News Podcast - EZRA LEVANT ｜ Held to ransom： Rebel News defies attempt to shut down conference

00:00:00.000 Hello, my friends. What a weekend it was with our Rebel News Live and our Rumble Live events.

00:00:05.200 But the strangest part of it all was the attempt by Yaara Sachs, the Liberal Cabinet Minister,

00:00:10.800 to cancel the event, and when she couldn't, to sort of beef about it online on Twitter.

00:00:16.120 Anyhow, I'll read you her attack on us and give you my response.

00:00:20.260 But first, I'd like to invite you to become a subscriber to Rebel News Plus.

00:00:23.860 That's the video version of this podcast. I want to show you a few things.

00:00:27.860 And in addition to that great video content, you also support Rebel News.

00:00:32.840 The $8 a month that it costs to be a supporter of Rebel News Plus gets you all that video,

00:00:37.800 but it also keeps Rebel News strong because we don't take any money from Trudeau, and it shows.

00:00:43.220 Okay, here's today's podcast.

00:00:57.860 Tonight, blackmail. The Liberal government tries to cancel our Rebel News conferences here in Toronto.

00:01:05.480 It's May 13th, and this is the Ezra LeVant Show.

00:01:07.840 You're fighting for freedom!

00:01:10.980 Shame on you, you censorious bug!

00:01:14.140 You know, we usually have security at Rebel News events.

00:01:26.760 If you've ever been to our events, like our Rebel News Live, our big convention,

00:01:31.080 we have every year in Calgary and Toronto.

00:01:33.660 We have security, but we really don't need it.

00:01:36.500 It's there just in case. I mean, that's like insurance, right?

00:01:39.500 When you need it, you want it to be there, and in a way, you're happy if you don't need it.

00:01:44.780 It also makes people feel a little bit more secure.

00:01:47.460 But in nine years of hosting that conference called Rebel News Live,

00:01:52.200 our day-long jamboree where people get to spend FaceTime with Rebel News talent

00:01:57.840 and with our favorite guests, we've never needed it.

00:02:00.800 And we recently booked our event for Rebel News Live, which happened on the weekend.

00:02:06.820 We booked it in Toronto at a new venue.

00:02:10.220 And again, we didn't need it, but we did it anyways,

00:02:13.840 just because, you know, these heightened tensions, as the kids say.

00:02:17.740 There's all sorts of politics boiling over.

00:02:20.240 Why not have a few extra security just in case?

00:02:23.380 Well, as we often do, in addition to having extra security,

00:02:29.940 and by the way, we bring in security sometimes to make the venue operator feel comfortable,

00:02:34.680 especially if they're new to dealing with us.

00:02:36.680 If we're booking a big hall or an event, the people we're doing business with,

00:02:42.600 they might be friendly, they might be supportive,

00:02:45.800 but they might be a little bit nervous if they've ever dealt with us.

00:02:48.560 So bringing security is as much for them as for us.

00:02:51.220 We also do one more thing that I think is probably unique.

00:02:56.680 We add an anti-cancellation clause to our contracts,

00:03:01.980 or sometimes we call it a friendship clause.

00:03:05.220 It typically says, look, you might get some angry tweets or angry Facebook comments

00:03:11.260 or even phone calls being really mad at you

00:03:15.000 for allowing rebels to have an event in your theater, in your restaurant.

00:03:18.560 But you agree not to act based on those random calls.

00:03:24.580 You agree that if things get very serious, you'll contact us

00:03:28.220 and we'll see if we can solve a problem together.

00:03:30.740 It basically says, look, if things, be aware that some people don't like our style.

00:03:36.180 Don't be freaked out by that.

00:03:37.500 And if there's an actual problem, an actual security problem,

00:03:41.000 call us and we'll work through it together.

00:03:42.840 So it doesn't lock in a vendor no matter what, because that wouldn't work.

00:03:49.500 There are some things so terrifying, such an existential threat to a venue

00:03:54.660 that they might have to cancel us.

00:03:57.580 But what we're doing is we're saying, you can't throw us out casually.

00:04:00.700 You can't throw us out for no good reason.

00:04:02.960 Let's keep those lines of communications open and let's work together.

00:04:06.180 And we've had those in effect for almost since the beginning of our company.

00:04:12.520 It's one of the steps we take because the other side plays rough.

00:04:16.680 It's like when we hire private security for our rebel reporters.

00:04:20.820 Most of the time, thank God, we don't need them.

00:04:23.500 But when we do need them, I'm glad they're there.

00:04:26.020 But the problem with this friendship clause or this anti-cancellation clause in our contract

00:04:31.540 And the problem with private security is the same problem.

00:04:37.100 Can you guess what it is before I tell you?

00:04:39.740 The problem is neither work against the government.

00:04:43.080 You've probably seen our security.

00:04:44.980 They're pretty good.

00:04:46.080 I mean, we have different security in different times.

00:04:47.920 You've probably seen our regular security guard that we have in Australia protecting Avi Yamini.

00:04:53.200 He's a huge mountain of a man named Daniel, and he's wonderful at his job.

00:04:58.500 Except for who is he useless against?

00:05:02.100 The police.

00:05:03.820 No private security in the world would go up against the police.

00:05:07.920 And no friendship clause in a contract works against the government either. 0.89

00:05:12.320 It's all designed for ruffians and rowdies and antifa and thugs. 0.92

00:05:17.140 It's not designed, what if the government is the thug? 0.88

00:05:21.740 Now, everything was going great as we were heading into the final days before Rebel News Live.

00:05:26.540 And in fact, as you know, we were reached out to by Rumble, which is one of the competitors to YouTube.

00:05:33.420 It's a video service.

00:05:35.000 It's a live streaming service.

00:05:36.100 And they said, Ezra, we're concerned about freedom of speech in Canada.

00:05:38.640 We'd like to do a Rumble live stream with Rebel News in Toronto.

00:05:42.100 We'll bring in some Rumble talent like Donald Trump Jr.

00:05:45.240 and Glenn Greenwald and Viva Frye and you guys.

00:05:48.660 And it was wonderful.

00:05:50.080 We were very excited.

00:05:51.080 We were selling extra tickets.

00:05:52.300 Maybe you were there.

00:05:52.920 Everything was going great until the venue operator told us about the shakedown he was going under at the hands of the government.

00:06:07.160 Because the venue we chose is in central Toronto.

00:06:11.280 It's a little bit north Toronto.

00:06:12.300 It's in a great big area called Downs View Park.

00:06:16.380 It has soccer arenas and hockey arenas and volleyball.

00:06:20.520 It's a huge area because it used to be an Air Force base.

00:06:24.220 In fact, there's still an airstrip there the prime minister uses to fly into Toronto from Ottawa because it's a little bit out of the way.

00:06:31.580 Anyways, the underlying land is still owned by the federal government because it's a former military base.

00:06:38.280 And it's operated by the government's landlord of Crown Land, which is a crown corporation called Canada Lands Company.

00:06:48.080 And, I mean, I knew it was on Downs View Park and I was sort of vaguely aware that it was sort of a special federal property.

00:06:54.300 But never in a million years did I think that would be an issue.

00:06:59.140 I mean, I walk the streets on government land all the time and I'm not arrested for it, at least not usually.

00:07:05.360 My friend David Menzies has been.

00:07:06.800 But in the final weeks, well, two weeks out from both the Rebel News Live event and the special Rumble Live event with Donald Trump Jr.,

00:07:16.560 our event venue operator, the person with whom we had this friendship contract, this anti-cancellation contract,

00:07:23.580 he was threatened by the Canada Lands Company property manager, Alan Schacht,

00:07:30.140 who said that the events could not proceed, he told me, unless we paid close to $50,000 in unnecessary and bizarre security costs.

00:07:47.620 Like I said, we're happy buying security anyways.

00:07:50.840 And, in fact, we're happy buying a few extra just to make sure everyone's feeling good.

00:07:56.260 But this underlying landlord had no right to impose it on a private event if the venue operator thought we were doing the right things,

00:08:05.000 which he said we were.

00:08:06.560 Not only did they demand we provide security for the entire Downsview Park area,

00:08:13.320 not only did they demand we hire Toronto Police Service, apparently they're for sale, I guess,

00:08:20.060 but they demanded, and you can see this on the insane bill they foisted on us,

00:08:24.840 they demanded that we buy barriers so that protesters could come and have an area,

00:08:32.260 and actually that we even pay for porta-potties, pay for portable toilets for those protesters too.

00:08:39.560 Now, we asked, and there was no intelligence whatsoever, no security analysis whatsoever showing that there would be protesters.

00:08:47.420 In the nine years we've been doing this, we've never had protesters.

00:08:50.680 And to say, oh, my God, this event is so terrifying and so dangerous,

00:08:55.440 you need to, what, quadruple your security, hire expensive city police.

00:09:00.740 Don't we already pay for those already?

00:09:02.560 And set up for protesters was insane and absurd.

00:09:06.760 And it was, I think, deliberately insane and absurd because the goal was not to keep things safe.

00:09:13.420 There were no protesters.

00:09:15.360 The goal was to make it impossible for the venue operator to pay that bill,

00:09:20.020 impossible and impossible for him to pass it on to us.

00:09:22.980 Because we, I think we had a grand total of 1,000 people between the two events.

00:09:29.300 You can't add on a $50 per person charge for security.

00:09:35.600 It's insane.

00:09:36.520 It makes no sense.

00:09:37.500 There was no basis for us.

00:09:38.560 And I should tell you, if there was a basis for us, we would have known and we would have paid for it.

00:09:43.700 And we would probably have said to the city, we pay taxes here.

00:09:46.440 We expect the police to do work without being hired as mercenaries.

00:09:50.820 It wasn't for that.

00:09:52.500 It was for the plan that we couldn't make the payment and we were blocked.

00:09:58.920 I should add one more thing.

00:10:00.040 Downsview Park, where we had the two events, is in the district called York Center.

00:10:04.400 That's the political district, the riding, as it used to be called, of York Center.

00:10:08.020 And who is the member of parliament and cabinet minister for York Center? 0.71

00:10:12.400 Well, no one less than Yara Sachs, that crazy left-wing liberal. 1.00

00:10:17.300 Hey, I got a question for you.

00:10:18.780 Now that I'm talking about Yara Sachs, you might remember her.

00:10:21.420 She's the Jewish liberal MP who went to take a selfie with Mahmoud Abbas, the head of the PLO terrorist group.

00:10:29.380 Speaking of that, right now in Toronto, there is a large Hamas protest going on right in the heart of the city at the University of Toronto.

00:10:38.280 And it is a threat.

00:10:39.220 And it is threats to Jews.

00:10:41.440 For example, I saw a video of a Jewish professor trying to get into the school.

00:10:44.760 He was turned away.

00:10:45.360 Do Hamas protesters, who are trespassing, by the way, do they have to pay for security?

00:10:54.000 Do they have to pay for fences? 0.99

00:10:56.040 Do they have to pay for porta-potties for counter protesters?

00:10:59.780 Or is it just peaceful journalists like us?

00:11:03.760 I attended the events, and I tried not to be mad at the ordinary cops and the ordinary security who were there.

00:11:10.340 They're just regular guys and gals who were doing a job, and they were told by their bosses,

00:11:14.040 hey, you have a special project, you're going to go hang out at Rebel all weekend and just stand around.

00:11:20.020 So, I mean, how can you be mad at an ordinary cop or an ordinary security who was asked to be there?

00:11:25.180 I told the cops to get out of the building and go fight crime.

00:11:28.420 And I didn't say it in a mean way.

00:11:29.660 I just said, you're not needed inside here.

00:11:31.900 Go outside and fight crime.

00:11:33.440 Those were my exact words.

00:11:34.840 They counted on us not being able to meet this $50,000 fake charge because no rational business person would proceed with that.

00:11:48.360 Certainly not the venue operator.

00:11:51.600 But our partners, Rumble, paid the bill.

00:11:55.720 They're a much larger company than us.

00:11:57.500 And they believed so deeply in freedom of the press and freedom of speech, and they wanted this event to go ahead.

00:12:04.340 And, by the way, it was a huge success.

00:12:07.100 They paid the bill.

00:12:09.860 I should tell you, I spoke several times with the venue operator himself.

00:12:14.400 He was terrified of the threats against him by Ken, the land company,

00:12:19.460 that they would tear up his lease and his whole life's dream would be destroyed by it.

00:12:24.640 We had two of the best events we've ever had.

00:12:29.440 And if you were there, you know what I mean.

00:12:30.920 And if you weren't there, you can still watch them.

00:12:33.380 The Rumble live stream, about 180,000 people have watched it.

00:12:37.620 I encourage you to as well.

00:12:39.900 What's incredible to me is how brazen the government was about this.

00:12:44.160 They didn't even pretend they had a security study.

00:12:46.520 They didn't even pretend this was for real.

00:12:48.500 And they didn't pretend to be gentle.

00:12:49.840 I really felt when I was talking to the venue operator that I was talking to a hostage who was saying,

00:12:54.300 please don't fight back.

00:12:56.040 Please just pay the ransom.

00:12:58.760 Here's a tweet that Yaara Sachs did on the weekend in the middle of our conference.

00:13:04.440 And you've got to wait until that last line.

00:13:06.780 She really is interfering with police in the city. 0.97

00:13:09.520 I'll read it to you in full.

00:13:11.040 My statement on the Rebel News event in York Center with Donald Trump Jr.

00:13:15.060 Which is sort of funny because her attack that follows is really not about Donald Trump Jr.

00:13:22.140 I'll read it.

00:13:22.800 She says,

00:13:23.120 Sadly, I have learned that Rebel News will be bringing its hateful and extremist views to York Center.

00:13:31.320 The writing I am proud to represent when it holds Canada's most provocative conference,

00:13:37.480 including Donald Trump Jr. and other MAGA conservatives at Downsview Park this weekend.

00:13:41.860 Now, I should tell you that I actually live in the district.

00:13:45.820 I think I've told you that before.

00:13:46.900 I live in the writing, so I'm always there.

00:13:50.420 And I should say I feel very welcome there.

00:13:53.340 My neighbors are super friendly.

00:13:55.720 In fact, I sort of get along with, I mean, I don't know everyone on the street,

00:13:59.160 but I feel really great about my neighborhood.

00:14:02.160 And when I go for a walk, sometimes I wear my Rebel hoodie when I walk the dog.

00:14:06.960 And I get stopped at least two or three times every time I go for a walk by people who want to chat.

00:14:12.920 So I think maybe that's just where I live.

00:14:15.360 But, you know, I think Rebel News is sort of loved in York Center.

00:14:21.600 And I'm talking from people of all sorts of different backgrounds.

00:14:24.320 I mean, I hear Chinese voices.

00:14:26.140 I hear Persian voices.

00:14:27.500 I hear Russian voices.

00:14:29.020 The place I live is a real mix.

00:14:32.320 And people like Rebel News.

00:14:33.920 I'm just saying.

00:14:34.780 I'm just saying.

00:14:35.860 When she says we're not welcome in the writing, I feel pretty welcome.

00:14:40.380 I think, in fact, the only extremist around is her old pal Mahmoud Abbas.

00:14:46.620 And by the way, I went to a shopping center a few weeks ago in the heart of the writing.

00:14:50.160 And people seem to agree with me, not her.

00:14:52.060 Remember this?

00:14:52.900 Backstabbing us right in front of our face.

00:14:54.500 Is she actually holding his hand?

00:14:56.620 I know.

00:14:56.940 It's crazy.

00:14:57.560 Yeah, R.S. Sachs.

00:14:58.520 Yes.

00:14:59.020 And this is a bad guy.

00:15:01.340 She has disowned her own people.

00:15:02.940 And I think she's looking for political gains. 1.00

00:15:04.900 I'm not surprised by anything.

00:15:06.360 Am I afraid?

00:15:07.160 I'm very afraid.

00:15:08.080 Anyways, back to her statement.

00:15:09.320 Sorry, I went on a tangent there.

00:15:10.360 She says, while I am a strong supporter of the right to free speech, let me be clear

00:15:15.720 that the vile views espoused by Rebel News are not welcome in York Center, nor do its residents

00:15:20.940 support them.

00:15:22.680 Whenever anyone says I support free speech, but, always ignore everything after the word,

00:15:28.660 but.

00:15:29.080 They don't.

00:15:29.720 And come on, do you really think that Trudeau's liberals actually support free speech?

00:15:35.800 I mean, for heaven's sakes, they put us under martial law because some truckers honked their

00:15:40.400 horns.

00:15:41.560 Again, I'm in York Center every day, which is more than Yara Sachs can say.

00:15:45.940 It's the opposite.

00:15:46.940 I actually haven't seen anyone support her.

00:15:49.740 Rebel News, its commentators, staff, and associates have espoused everything from anti-Semitism to

00:15:57.600 Islamophobia.

00:15:59.380 Yeah, no, I don't think so.

00:16:01.900 I think we're pretty pro-Israel.

00:16:04.580 In fact, sometimes people call us rabbi news.

00:16:07.660 I don't know if you ever heard that one, or rebel Jews. 1.00

00:16:10.620 They say that in a mean way because we're pretty pro-Israel.

00:16:13.760 I think, I mean, I think we're fair.

00:16:15.220 I think we're, you know, we're pro-Taiwan also.

00:16:17.640 We're pro-America also.

00:16:18.820 There's a lot of countries we support.

00:16:20.200 We support Israel.

00:16:21.080 And it's not just because I'm Jewish.

00:16:22.260 Most of our staff are not Jewish.

00:16:24.920 I am Jewish.

00:16:27.000 But our concerns about radical Islam, I think, are normal concerns for all Canadians.

00:16:35.500 Concerns she obviously doesn't share because she hasn't put out a tweet condemning the University

00:16:41.120 of Toronto Hamas encampment.

00:16:43.360 Isn't it really weird?

00:16:45.160 She's got more hatred for Rebel News than the Hamas supporters.

00:16:48.880 Let me keep reading.

00:16:50.480 This is her again.

00:16:51.300 They claim to support the Jewish people, but traffic in the Great Replacement and Soros 0.99

00:16:56.820 conspiracies, anti-Semitism by any other name. 0.99

00:17:00.240 She's a total kook. 1.00

00:17:01.840 Our last trip to Israel last fall was to the Holocaust Museum. 0.61

00:17:06.500 And then we went to the United Arab Emirates to talk about Donald Trump's Abraham Accords

00:17:11.160 peace deal.

00:17:12.280 That's like we actually took people to Israel and to the UAE to talk about friendship and

00:17:17.780 peace and being pro-Israel.

00:17:18.940 So her last trip was to visit that terrorist Mahmoud Abbas. 0.94

00:17:22.720 It's crazy.

00:17:23.460 Oh, and by the way, that George Soros thing, it's not a conspiracy theory.

00:17:29.420 Her buddy, George Soros, has been found out to be one of the funders of these Hamas hate

00:17:36.000 marches in the West.

00:17:37.420 I mean, how many times does she have to reveal herself?

00:17:41.040 Yarra Sachs gives a standing ovation to that Nazi, Yaroslav Hanke, in parliament.

00:17:46.700 Yarra Sachs poses with a modern-day Nazi, Mahmoud Abbas. 0.60

00:17:50.580 Yarra Sachs supports George Soros, who's funding the anti-Israel protests. 0.91

00:17:54.680 After a while, you have to wonder, is Yarra Sachs a self-hating Jew and a self-hating Canadian? 0.85

00:18:01.240 All right, back to her tweet. 0.72

00:18:02.820 In recent weeks, Rebel News has attacked me personally, mailing my entire writing and launching

00:18:09.560 an attack website.

00:18:10.840 I will not be bullied from doing my job, and I will not be lectured on how to be Jewish

00:18:14.960 by one of Canada's leading disseminators of age.

00:18:17.500 Look, I know what she's talking about, the mail-out.

00:18:20.880 Remember that postcard?

00:18:21.800 It was a mailing of her own photo.

00:18:24.440 If that's an attack, maybe she should ask herself why she posed for the photo.

00:18:31.520 Hey, by the way, why didn't she go to an Israel event in Toronto over the weekend called Yom

00:18:37.000 Hazikaron, it's sort of Israel's National Day?

00:18:40.080 I don't know why she didn't go there.

00:18:42.100 I mean, you'd think she would go.

00:18:43.760 I think she went there because she didn't want to be booed by the members of the Jewish

00:18:49.240 community who see right through her.

00:18:51.080 All right, her tweet goes on for a bit, but let me hurry up.

00:18:53.240 She says, it is unfortunate, but not surprising, that Donald Trump Jr. will attend this conference.

00:18:59.840 It's not surprising.

00:19:01.040 He's done more for peace and for Israel than anyone I can think of, the Trump family, at

00:19:05.940 least.

00:19:06.180 I mean, who would you choose if you cared about Israel and cared about peace, and if you hated

00:19:11.260 terrorism, who would be on your team, the Trumps or the Trudeaus?

00:19:16.900 I know which side Israel would count on, and I know under whose side there was peace for

00:19:22.320 a decade.

00:19:23.920 Canada has beautiful attractions, shows and events.

00:19:27.680 Rebel News event is not one of them.

00:19:30.600 That's just weird.

00:19:31.640 And actually, it was a great event, and I met so many wonderful people, and we had booths

00:19:36.900 there and stuff, and we had great food and fun merch and books, and Tamara Leach played 1.00

00:19:45.200 a concert.

00:19:46.760 It was pretty awesome.

00:19:48.860 And you know what?

00:19:49.920 I know you're not going to believe me, but I really mean this.

00:19:51.960 If Yara Sax had actually showed up with an open mind and was willing to talk, I think she

00:19:57.880 would have really liked it.

00:19:59.840 I mean, she would have had an earful, but if she would have been polite and made her 0.94

00:20:03.600 own case, I think there could have been some harmony there.

00:20:05.700 But she's just a hater.

00:20:07.940 Anyhow, like I say, if you want to see it, you can go and find it on rumble.com.

00:20:11.700 We did a live stream of the first day, about 180,000 views.

00:20:15.740 It's incredible.

00:20:17.440 In the end, she talks about her conservative opponent.

00:20:20.120 Let me read it.

00:20:20.640 She says,

00:20:20.940 What hateful views and extremism?

00:20:37.840 Yara Sax never really says.

00:20:39.660 I don't think she knows.

00:20:40.780 I mean, I don't think she writes her own stuff.

00:20:44.840 I think she is, remember that movie, Anchorman, where Will Ferrell literally reads whatever 0.90

00:20:51.100 in the teleprompter and they have a joke, don't put anything dumb in the teleprompter 0.92

00:20:55.660 because he'll say it. 0.90

00:20:56.740 I think that's Yara Sax.

00:20:58.300 Remember, this is the first time I heard of Yara Sax when she stood up in parliament and

00:21:02.480 read cue cards or something that she obviously didn't write.

00:21:06.520 And either it was a prank or people said, give that to Yara, she'll read anything.

00:21:11.540 Remember this?

00:21:12.460 How much vitriol do we have to see of Honk Honk, which is an acronym for Hail Hitler, 0.51

00:21:19.300 do we need to see by these protesters on social media?

00:21:23.480 So Honk Honk means Heil Hitler. 0.99

00:21:27.540 She's crazy. 0.99

00:21:29.720 She's embarrassing. 1.00

00:21:31.140 And she obviously doesn't believe in free speech. 0.95

00:21:34.260 Oh, and let me just end her little rant. 0.99

00:21:36.460 She says,

00:21:36.800 He won't because he and Rebel News hold the same extremist fringe views that got him kicked

00:21:41.700 out of Doug Ford's caucus.

00:21:44.380 No, I don't think he's extremist or fringe.

00:21:46.600 Roman Baber actually was super calm and mellow.

00:21:49.120 If you remember, he was a conservative MPP, provincial parliamentarian, who very thoughtfully

00:21:54.820 and calmly opposed mandatory lockdowns and mandatory vaccines.

00:21:58.940 I actually think he was the best elected official in Canada in terms of calmly and with footnotes

00:22:07.320 and extremely politely saying, I think we're going the wrong path.

00:22:11.980 I don't think he's extreme at all.

00:22:14.440 I mean, there were some wild men who opposed lockdowns and vaccines.

00:22:19.800 I mean, I don't think they'd mind me calling it.

00:22:21.920 I don't think Maxime Bernier or, you know, Randy Hillier, I don't think they would mind

00:22:28.840 being called a wild man because they sort of are.

00:22:32.200 Roman Baber is so buttoned down.

00:22:34.440 I think he's the kind of guy who mows his lawn in a suit.

00:22:37.280 You know, he's so proper.

00:22:40.060 He's certainly not one to do something crazy like, say, Honk Honk stands for Heil Hitler.

00:22:44.440 But look at this last line in her tweet.

00:22:47.940 She says, well, I deplore that this conference is taking place.

00:22:53.380 I urge Toronto's police to take steps to keep all participants safe.

00:22:59.200 What?

00:23:01.060 What's that part there?

00:23:04.020 It couldn't be any clearer.

00:23:08.020 Yeah, RSX, the federal government cabinet minister, used government resources, including

00:23:12.720 her Twitter account, to weaponize a crown corporation, to silence a group of peaceful 0.98

00:23:19.900 political critics.

00:23:21.760 And she just bagged about it.

00:23:26.520 Ironically, our theme was stopping C-63, the censorship law, which contains a provision

00:23:33.600 for the house arrest, the preemptive arrest, a kind of restraining order against anyone

00:23:39.520 who the government believes is likely to commit hate speech, speech the government hates.

00:23:46.160 If they pass C-63, maybe that's what they'll do the next time to stop us.

00:23:52.660 Not foist a $50,000 extortion fee on us, but just throw us in jail.

00:23:59.120 Do you doubt your RSX would do it?

00:24:02.880 Stay with us for more.

00:24:15.680 Sometimes it feels like you're surrounded every day, a new university encampment supporting

00:24:21.460 Hamas, and really, in not very vague language, condemns Jews or Zionists, which most Jews

00:24:29.100 are.

00:24:30.040 And it can be frustrating, because where are the police?

00:24:33.140 Where are the police who would arrest you if you weren't wearing a mask?

00:24:36.740 Who would arrest you if you were out past a curfew in Montreal?

00:24:40.240 Well, they have a very light touch here, don't they?

00:24:42.920 I mean, I remember the total freakout at the trucker convoy in Ottawa when some liberal

00:24:48.080 provocateur held a Nazi flag for about five seconds, just long enough for a liberal affiliated

00:24:54.640 photographer to snap it, then tucked it away, and that was the national conversation for

00:24:59.000 a week, proof that these were all Nazis. 0.52

00:25:01.000 Whereas, for example, you can see here in Calgary, someone not hiding their identity,

00:25:05.480 not an agent provocateur, a pro-Hamas supporter, just full-on giving the Sieg Heil salute, the

00:25:13.040 Nazi salute, and nothing.

00:25:15.100 And by the way, there were politicians at that event who have not been asked to disavow.

00:25:21.300 It can be demoralizing.

00:25:23.200 I mean, I was at Columbia University, one of the finest universities in the world, and

00:25:27.740 I just can't believe how it's fallen.

00:25:30.080 And I think part of my shock is not the depravity of the protesters, but the meekness of those

00:25:38.140 who control the ground.

00:25:41.420 Columbia University is not a public space.

00:25:43.380 It's a private university with rules, and yet they decline to enforce them.

00:25:47.740 It's even worse in some cities, like in Washington State.

00:25:52.300 On the other hand, I suppose the states that fix their problems aren't in the news long

00:25:57.720 because the spectacle isn't there.

00:25:59.640 I saw this the other day, where pro-Hamas protesters took to the street in Florida, blocking the highway

00:26:07.140 outside Disney World.

00:26:09.140 According to this report, they were only there 11 minutes before police cleared the streets.

00:26:15.820 Take a quick look at this Twitter tweet.

00:26:17.320 Other universities have responded very vigorously.

00:26:20.500 UNC just voted to take all the money from their DEI spending, diversity, equity, inclusion spending,

00:26:28.840 and redirect it towards campus police.

00:26:32.120 They're not defunding the cops.

00:26:34.060 They're refunding the cops.

00:26:37.480 And so I look across the wasteland of Canadian universities, and I've personally put eyes on campuses as diverse as, I was at UBC the other day,

00:26:46.840 and we've covered McGill and U of T, our friend David Menzies there.

00:26:51.780 But what about Alberta?

00:26:53.660 What about Alberta?

00:26:54.820 I mentioned before, in Calgary, right outside City Hall, there was someone given the Sieg Heil.

00:26:59.740 And remember, the mayor of that city boycotted a Jewish community event because it had a star of day with their Jody Gondek,

00:27:07.240 the most unpopular mayor in that city's history.

00:27:10.100 But what about the campus encampments in Edmonton and Calgary?

00:27:17.000 Well, here's some footage of the police clearing out the encampments at the University of Alberta.

00:27:25.100 Take a look at this.

00:27:26.260 Hey! 0.99

00:27:27.840 Hold the line! 1.00

00:27:41.220 Oh, we shall not be moved.

00:27:43.700 Oh, we shall not be moved.

00:28:13.700 Oh, we shall not be moved!

00:28:15.400 Oh, we shall not be moved.

00:28:19.480 Oh, we shall not be moved.

00:28:23.080 Oh, we shall not be moved.

00:28:33.680 Go...

00:28:37.660 Go! 0.95

00:28:39.720 Go make pig! 1.00

00:28:42.060 Quite a contrast to what we saw at UBC or McGill.

00:28:54.740 And our friend Sidney Fazzard in Calgary has been attending these Hamas events and the 0.99

00:29:01.420 encampment, and he was there for hours as the police decided to move in.

00:29:07.120 He joins us now from Calgary, and he's going to walk us through the events as they happen.

00:29:12.060 Sid, first of all, thanks very much for being here, and thanks for going to sort of a risky

00:29:17.100 environment.

00:29:18.020 I mean, I don't think you were in grave peril, but you absolutely could have been hit either

00:29:23.240 by a protester, or you could have, I suppose, come within range of some reaction by the police.

00:29:30.160 In fact, I don't think the police were thrilled to see you.

00:29:32.280 So thanks for being on the front line.

00:29:34.000 That's the best of rebel journalism, and we're right up there with the cameras.

00:29:38.220 So thanks for doing that.

00:29:39.960 Well, absolutely, and thank you for having me on today.

00:29:41.760 I should say it's a top of the potential risk there of these aggravators in the crowd.

00:29:47.680 I also have a pretty serious knee injury.

00:29:50.100 So I was actually limping around the entire time, but as you can see, it was well worth

00:29:54.720 being there to see what went down.

00:29:56.360 It was quite the enforcement that was taking place.

00:29:59.900 I understand, at least in the University of Alberta case, that three quarters of the people

00:30:05.320 in this university encampment were not even students.

00:30:08.200 There were people who were opportunistically going to make some sort of a political statement.

00:30:14.620 I think that lends credibility to these university administrators who were saying, get out of

00:30:19.660 here.

00:30:19.860 We're actually a place for learning.

00:30:21.480 Tell me what it looked like in Calgary.

00:30:23.560 And why don't you throw to some clips that you recorded that illustrate the case?

00:30:28.120 Tell us, think us through it, because you were there for hours.

00:30:30.140 Well, and that's absolutely it.

00:30:32.660 When it comes to, I'll address this first, when it comes to the organizers of these events,

00:30:36.460 you'll notice that the police are negotiating or conversing, I should say, with activists

00:30:42.220 within the community.

00:30:43.240 They're not conversing with the student demonstrators who are on site, because realistically, there

00:30:47.880 are far less of them than there are people who do not belong at that university.

00:30:51.460 Whether it's activists, whether it's people within the Islamic community, as we saw, the

00:30:56.760 signage there that they have kind of represents this idea, too, of the indigenous relations

00:31:01.900 on the matter, which is kind of ironic.

00:31:04.140 But they go with that, and they go with North America as being Turtle Island, and they lace

00:31:08.840 in all of these different claims together.

00:31:10.720 You can see there's queers for Palestine as well. 0.97

00:31:13.140 And there was even a full-blown Muslim prayer section that we saw on the field just beside

00:31:18.560 the encampment.

00:31:19.200 So there's some interesting stuff going on there.

00:31:21.880 But again, I can't stress enough the fact that these are activists that are embedding

00:31:26.200 themselves into these quasi-student demonstrations.

00:31:29.860 I mean, by nature of having a quote-unquote encampment on a university, you're going to

00:31:34.340 have students that do have sympathy toward the demonstration.

00:31:38.380 Obviously, there's many people at a university.

00:31:40.360 But by far, these people are the agitators on site.

00:31:44.220 And you can actually see in the morning, it was very calm.

00:31:48.040 They had actually gotten there at 6.30 in the morning.

00:31:50.500 They were issued trespass notices by the staff of the university in the morning as well.

00:31:57.000 And then the Calgary police showed up.

00:31:59.960 They were actually just hanging around in large numbers a few blocks away from the encampment.

00:32:05.420 And they were waiting literally all day.

00:32:07.700 At one point, maybe around 5, 6 o'clock, the Calgary police, they came in with a riot squad.

00:32:14.820 But first, they announced, hey, guys, you have to leave.

00:32:17.380 You've been issued the trespass notice.

00:32:19.340 It's time to go.

00:32:20.820 This isn't a negotiation.

00:32:22.580 It's time for you to leave.

00:32:23.660 You're trespassing on university school property.

00:32:25.880 Many of these people not even being students, although some alleging to be staff members of

00:32:30.420 the university embedded in the encampment.

00:32:34.020 So they arrived.

00:32:35.780 After they arrived, the riot squad, all of the members of the encampment, they actually kind of

00:32:41.740 clustered together and they had a conversation amongst themselves.

00:32:45.300 They established what the damage might have been if they were to stay and get arrested,

00:32:50.560 whether or not if they were a student, they would perhaps have to deal with being expelled

00:32:55.340 or trespassed from the property, which could complicate that.

00:32:58.500 But they even warned as they were deciding what to do as the riot police showed up, they

00:33:03.940 warned if you're not a student or if you're on a student visa, you should separate yourself

00:33:10.000 from this instance because there might be additional repercussions.

00:33:13.960 So a real smorgasbord of activism that's going on at these places, it's very interesting.

00:33:18.980 But a beautiful moment happened.

00:33:21.160 I think it's a little slightly comical, is that the demonstrators decided, okay, the

00:33:25.860 riot police are here.

00:33:26.560 They've given us the choice.

00:33:27.420 We have to leave, you know, take your stuff and go kind of thing.

00:33:29.900 Or do we want to stay?

00:33:31.400 And they held a vote and the vote was 23 people wanted to stay and 17 people wanted to leave.

00:33:37.840 And as soon as they made that announcement, the Calgary police decided, okay, there's, you

00:33:42.600 know, 20 feet of empty space here where the tents are still set up.

00:33:45.480 And there's a police, not a police line, sorry, a wall that they had constructed.

00:33:51.840 So the police moved in.

00:33:53.160 They took out the stuff that was in this empty space as the activists were all gathered together.

00:33:58.400 And then they stopped.

00:33:59.480 And they stopped for hours saying, you guys got to go.

00:34:03.000 They re-entered the conversation with these activists who were there and said, look, you've

00:34:07.820 only got one option, really.

00:34:08.940 You've got to go.

00:34:09.580 And then they waited hours, hours.

00:34:11.240 And then you can see again, this whole time throughout the day, it's these activists that

00:34:16.480 are conversing with the university staff, that are conversing with the Calgary police.

00:34:21.340 They're the intermediary here.

00:34:23.060 And you can even see them later in the footage when a clash breaks out.

00:34:27.340 They're behind the scenes as they push the students to the front to engage with police.

00:34:31.640 Isn't that interesting?

00:34:32.820 Do we know who they were?

00:34:34.380 Like, are they, for example, when I was in the United Kingdom on one of their huge marches,

00:34:39.160 there are Muslim organizers, but there's also old stock white Brits with the Socialist Workers

00:34:46.000 Party or other communist groups.

00:34:48.380 There's a bit of a, I mean, you mentioned the hodgepodge of different activist groups.

00:34:51.520 Would you say that the bosses here, you say they were putting the students at the front,

00:34:56.280 who was doing that or organizing?

00:34:58.640 Was that anti-foot types, white leftists?

00:35:01.580 Was it Muslim or Arab folks?

00:35:04.260 Who were the masterminds?

00:35:05.740 Well, I've been taking a look at some of the footage and some of the live streams that

00:35:09.880 people put out there to see who is involved.

00:35:11.740 Now, I don't necessarily want to go too deep into who they are, because I've just kind of

00:35:15.780 started looking at this.

00:35:17.080 But for some of the individuals there, you've got people that are, you know, activist musicians

00:35:21.060 that are promoting drag events.

00:35:22.520 You've got people that are going to communist events.

00:35:26.280 It's really interesting.

00:35:27.380 You've got people that are associated with immigration as well.

00:35:30.260 And many of these activists who aren't students have photos, selfies that they have with the

00:35:35.680 current mayor, Jody Gondek, the former mayor, Naheed Nenshi, even federal people like the

00:35:40.920 prime minister in Jagmeet, Justin Trudeau, and then Jagmeet Singh as well.

00:35:44.600 So it's interesting that these people are showing up on campus, disrupting and probably,

00:35:50.080 I mean, I can't make this assertion, but I would assume that the funding is probably

00:35:53.460 coming from some of these older individuals who've been engaged in this activism for a while.

00:35:57.500 Isn't that interesting?

00:35:58.360 Sometimes I have called Antifa the street teams of the left-wing political parties.

00:36:03.700 They're sort of the thugs that get brutal.

00:36:05.840 And if these folks are literally posing for selfies with Jody Gondek or Justin Trudeau,

00:36:10.580 it explains a lot.

00:36:12.400 Let me ask you a question, because I've attended a few of these different campuses, and I can

00:36:17.820 get a few questions in, but when they Google who I am or when they, if I ask too sharp a

00:36:24.060 question, they immediately clam up and say, we're not talking to you.

00:36:27.480 Talk to our spokesman, and the spokesmen don't like talking to me either.

00:36:31.580 Now, maybe that's just me.

00:36:32.660 Maybe I'm hard to like.

00:36:34.220 Did you have any interaction with them, or did they shun you as well?

00:36:38.820 And I find this an interesting question, because protesters usually want their message heard.

00:36:45.040 And even if they're just shouting at you, at least they're getting their message out.

00:36:48.600 Did they interact with you, or did they sort of blacklist you too?

00:36:52.060 Well, I should say, and I mentioned this off the top where I had a bit of an injury, and

00:36:57.140 I knew that this could be a bit of a tense situation depending.

00:37:01.500 And obviously, many of these individuals may not like or may decide to target me as a Rebel

00:37:05.380 News journalist.

00:37:07.720 So I did keep a distance for this one, because I wasn't in a position to necessarily run away

00:37:12.460 rapidly if a gang of them collected on me.

00:37:15.260 But given their rhetoric, and given what I'd seen at the demonstration, they are not keen

00:37:20.400 to talk to people.

00:37:21.280 The media, I overheard them, mainstream media, I should say, saying, yeah, they're not going

00:37:26.260 to give us, you know, talk to us or give us an interview.

00:37:29.120 And there's a lot of that.

00:37:30.300 We see that at all these demonstrations.

00:37:32.000 And in large part, it's because they don't actually know what they're talking about.

00:37:35.400 And if I could just say that, the one song you'll hear them singing, we shall not be

00:37:39.740 moved, we shall not be moved.

00:37:40.920 And look into the history of where that comes from, and that tells you exactly what these

00:37:44.600 people know about the protests they're advocating for.

00:37:46.720 Yeah, I think one of the funniest things I saw was at the Fashion Institute of Technology

00:37:51.240 in New York City, right after the encampment broke in there.

00:37:55.100 And I saw a couple of gals flying flags. 1.00

00:37:57.540 And I thought, what is that flag?

00:37:59.240 I mean, I don't know all the flags in the world, but I didn't recognize these.

00:38:03.900 And I asked them, and they said, oh, they're the Palestinian flags?

00:38:07.400 No, they weren't.

00:38:08.620 And I mean, listen, not knowing a flag is not the end of the world.

00:38:11.740 But these folks, here's what I think.

00:38:14.400 Some of them, there's some ethnic or religious solidarity.

00:38:17.540 Some of them, it's just fight the man, fight the power.

00:38:20.880 A lot of it is what Dr. James Lindsay says, the issue isn't the issue.

00:38:25.040 The revolution is the issue.

00:38:26.700 So yeah, fight the man, I'm there.

00:38:29.020 And look, it's also exciting.

00:38:30.620 You're a young person at springtime.

00:38:32.560 Maybe you're feeling your oats.

00:38:33.860 Let's go do something exciting.

00:38:35.100 Let's have a team spirit.

00:38:36.300 Let's be excited on the front page of the newspaper.

00:38:40.540 I mean, there are a lot of social reasons, too.

00:38:45.120 When I was at Columbia University, a lot of the trans people who clearly were having social difficulties in life, if I may say, they found a sense of community there.

00:38:56.880 So there's a lot of reasons to attend these things besides what's written on the placards.

00:39:01.060 Well, listen, I really want to thank you for going there at some personal risk, and I'm glad you didn't get hurt because in the past, some of our people have been hit.

00:39:09.060 It's an 18-minute master video, and I encourage anyone to see it.

00:39:14.780 And, Sid, you've been covering the – in fact, it was your footage, I think, that caught – at least it's still footage – some of the craziness outside City Hall.

00:39:22.680 There was that Sieg Heil, which eight months ago would have caused a freakout in society, but now it's just normal.

00:39:30.960 So, Sid, thanks very much for covering these things in Calgary.

00:39:33.680 Last word to you.

00:39:35.020 Yeah, absolutely.

00:39:35.560 And if I could say, you know, in regards to the individual doing the Sieg Heil, that wasn't the first time we saw that at one of these Calgary Palestinian protests either.

00:39:42.160 There were other individuals who do that, and if I could express the big difference that I see between these current demonstrations and what we saw, let's say, during the Freedom Convoy, is in the Freedom Convoy,

00:39:52.220 if there was somebody who waved a Nazi flag or came there expressing these extremist thoughts, they would actively be pushed out by the crowd.

00:40:02.740 The crowd would say, what are you doing here?

00:40:04.360 This is not us.

00:40:05.120 We don't want to be associated with whatever nutbaggery is going on here.

00:40:08.740 Whereas, in these protests, currently, we see that person with the Sieg Heil.

00:40:12.920 You know, one person walks over and says, you know, we don't know what they said, but realistically, they aren't getting these people out of their groups.

00:40:19.340 They are bringing these people into their umbrella, these people with extremist tendencies.

00:40:23.620 You're so right.

00:40:24.500 It reminds me of what Douglas Murray said about the UK, which is, if you went to a big protest and you saw people with swastikas, you wouldn't go back.

00:40:34.020 You just wouldn't go back.

00:40:35.080 But these folks see it, they see that sort of thing, and they go back every week, which, even if they themselves aren't flying it, they're fine with that.

00:40:43.020 That tells you a lot about them.

00:40:44.480 Well, Sid, keep up the reportage on this.

00:40:48.240 You know, it's very interesting that Alberta's police in Calgary and Edmonton were the most vigorous, but it's not shocking to me.

00:40:55.440 It reminds me of some of the Texas or Florida police who have been very vigorous.

00:41:00.800 And I think it's sort of like graffiti and James Q. Wilson's theory of broken windows.

00:41:08.480 If you see a broken window and it's not repaired, pretty soon every window is going to be broken because the message is that's how we are around here.

00:41:17.300 We don't care.

00:41:18.300 We don't enforce the law.

00:41:19.740 We're not vigilant.

00:41:21.320 We're not watching you.

00:41:22.740 Go ahead and do it.

00:41:23.660 That graffiti, when Rudy Giuliani cleaned up New York City, he cracked down on the small stuff first to set a new tone of what we don't allow here.

00:41:32.440 And one of the most heartbreaking things about these encampments is it's sending a signal.

00:41:36.880 We allow lawbreaking.

00:41:38.080 We allow trespassing.

00:41:39.000 We allow graffiti.

00:41:39.580 We allow mischief.

00:41:40.520 We allow anti-Semitism. 1.00

00:41:42.520 And we allow lawlessness.

00:41:44.520 That's just who we are now.

00:41:45.960 So it's good to see that Alberta is saying that's not who we are.

00:41:49.920 And your report has helped show us that.

00:41:51.440 Take care and stay in touch, my friend.

00:41:53.760 Absolutely.

00:41:54.300 And likewise.

00:41:54.900 All right.

00:41:55.280 There you have it.

00:41:55.700 Sidney Fouzard in Calgary, Alberta.

00:41:57.620 Stay with us.

00:41:58.580 Your letters to me next.

00:41:59.860 Here's your letters from you to me.

00:42:13.460 Maritime Mom says this government is worse than the mafia.

00:42:16.040 It really felt like the mafia or some sort of shakedown like that.

00:42:19.800 When I was talking to the event venue operator, he said, please don't cause a fuss.

00:42:24.720 I could lose my livelihood.

00:42:26.140 I'm just doing business with you for a weekend, but I have to stay here forever.

00:42:29.120 Like, he was terrified of them.

00:42:31.640 Darren says, they thought that $49,000 would be enough to shut down the event, but they

00:42:36.140 were wrong.

00:42:36.740 So it should be safe to assume that next time they will demand much more.

00:42:40.280 Yeah.

00:42:40.560 Well, I'm worried that they'll manufacture some sort of crisis or by then they'll have

00:42:44.060 this restraining order, this preemptive arrest for hate speech.

00:42:49.120 CLD says, ah, so according to her, truckers are bad, terrorist leaders are good.

00:42:53.620 Absolutely.

00:42:54.280 I mean, it's so weird.

00:42:55.200 I mean, listen, I talk about many things.

00:42:57.740 If you said, Ezra, what are the top five things you'd talk about?

00:43:02.080 Freedom, smaller government, I hate censorship.

00:43:07.780 I'm worried about trans extremism these days.

00:43:10.240 Um, I, you know, I mean, you don't want to talk about ethical oil sometimes.

00:43:16.560 I, um, talk about immigration.

00:43:19.600 I talk about Israel since October 7th, but I don't think I do so obsessively.

00:43:24.380 In fact, I'm, I'm actually more concerned about what's happening in our own cities with

00:43:27.940 these Hamas hate camps.

00:43:28.960 What I mean by all of that is, I don't think Jewish stuff is in the top five issues we cover

00:43:36.660 here.

00:43:36.960 I mean, I suppose maybe if you count Hamas encampments, but I think those are an offense 1.00

00:43:42.000 to everyone.

00:43:42.740 Like, like they're chanting against the West.

00:43:45.120 They're chanting for communism.

00:43:46.580 I guess my point is, I consider myself pro-Jewish, but Rebel News is much more than that.

00:43:53.120 And the vast majority of Rebel News staff are from every different background, Christian,

00:43:58.440 Muslim, Hindu, any different background. 0.54

00:44:01.860 As long as you believe in freedom, you're a rebel in my eyes.

00:44:05.860 So it's sort of weird that they're coming for us.

00:44:08.440 We're getting it from both sides.

00:44:09.680 But as long as we stay true to you, the viewer, I think we'll be okay.

00:44:14.000 That's our show for today.

00:44:15.680 Until tomorrow, on behalf of all of us here at Rebel World Headquarters, to you at home,

00:44:18.920 good night and keep fighting for freedom.

Rebel News Podcast - May 13, 2024

EZRA LEVANT ｜ Held to ransom： Rebel News defies attempt to shut down conference

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