Niagara’s ‘Pilloried’ Regional Chair Responds to Charges of ‘Double Standard’ Over Lighting Up Colours, Raising Flags at Region’s Headquarters

Members of Niagara’s Palestinian Community Continue to Ask Why a Flag and Lights for Israel, Why Not for Them

A News Commentary by Doug Draper

Posted March 24^th, 2024 on Niagara At Large

Niagara, Ontario – For the third Regional Council meeting in a row, members of Niagara’s Palestinian community were there, pressing the council for some public show of sympathy and support – in the form of a flag raising or lighting up the Region’s headquarters – for the humanitarian crisis their friends and relatives are going through in the Gaza Strip.

At this latest of the three meetings, held this past March 21^st – and unlike the first one on January 25th  that turned raucous after a  large delegation from their  community was blocked from addressing the council – three members of the community were granted time at the podium.

With Niagara Regional staff now working to develop a “flag raising and Niagara sign lighting policy,”, the three speakers used some of their time at the podium to question why Niagara Regional Chair Jim Bradley decided – following the murderous attack on Israeli citizens last October 7^th –had the sign at the Region’s  headquarter’s lit up  in the colours of the Israeli flag but so far has not done the same for Palestinians suffering and dying in the ongoing Hamas/Israeli War.

“The request to light the Niagara sign in the colours of Palestine is fully in accordance with the current lighting policy,” said St. Catharines resident Saleh Waziruddin, one of the three speakers at the March 21^st regional council meeting.

“There is only one reason for the reluctance to light the Niagara sign in the colours of Palestine.” Wasiruddin continued. “It is because some see Palestinians as dangerous, and see Palestinian resistance to (Israeli) occupation  … as terrorism in one-sided war propaganda that has been widely debunked,” he charged.

Munajat Najmudin,  a Palestinian-Canadian living in  Niagara Falls  and another of the three speakers, said; “Our (Niagara Regional) Chair was immediately able to recognize and empathize with the Israelis in our community who have suffered in this conflict, but for the Palestinians? Month after month after month, utter silence.”

‘We didn’t ask you (members of the Region’s council) to light the sign because we need something from you,” she added. “we are asking you because we want our Regional Councillors and our Region to be able to make at least a symbolic gesture, a symbolic stand on the side of humanity.”

Najmudin finished her tearful remarks with a request for a moment of silence for the victims of the ongoing war. The moment of silence was observed except for what sounded (on the livestream feed this journalism was watching) like a few seconds of muffled drunning from Palestinian supporters in the gallery.

 St. Catharines Regional Councillor Haley Bateman told her fellow councillors later that during the moment of silence there was also  one member of council making some comments off mike but loud enough for at least a few others to hear.

Bateman asked for an apology from the councillor for speaking during the moment of silence, then later asked for Bradley to issue one on behalf of the council. Bradley said he is not in the practice of issuing apologies for individual councillors. It is up to the councillor to do that if he or she sees fit, the Chair added, and so far no apology, as of the time this news commentary was posted, has been issued.

Then, at the end of the March 21^st, Bradley had this to say in response to the questions, concerns and grievances raised by the speakers and by members and supporters of Niagara’s Palestinian community -–

“I have been under attack constantly,” said Bradley, going back at least to the January 25th  council meeting when a long list of delegates from the Palestinian community was blocked from speaking and the council overwhelmingly voted against a  motion drafted by Bateman being tabled – a motion that, among other things, called  for the colours of the Palestinian flag to be displayed for a day outside the Region’s headquarters.

“When the (October 7^th) terrorist attack took place on Israel,the people attacked were not an army. They were people attending various functionsaround their farms and so on, and some of the people who were killed were Canadians who were peace activists,” said Bradley.

Bradley went on to say that when he had the Regional Headquarter’s sign lit up in the colours of the Israeli flag “in sympathy of the victims” of the   October 7^th terrorist attacks, he was far from alone.

The colours of the Israeli flag were also lit up  on the waters of the Horseshoe and American Falls in Niagara, on Canada’s Parliament building in Ottawa, on the Empire State Building in New York City, on the White House in Washington, D.C., on the Eiffel Tower in Paris, France, on the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, Germany and on many other high-profile sites around the world.

“Subsequent to that,” said Bradley, “a war took place and that war is still going on.”

Hamas and other terrorist groups have continued firing rockets into Israel and are still attacking commercial traffic along the Red Sea, he said, “and Israel has embarked on a war in Gaza where there are many people affected by that. This is a war action on (Israel’s) part.”

“My (decision to light the regional headquarters in the colours of the Israeli flag) had strictly to do with a terrorist attack that took place (on civilians and not an army),” Bradley continued to stress.

It was made, he said, in the same way that many governments around the world decided to demonstrate sympathy and support for the United States following the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Centre in New York and Pentagon in Washington, D.C. that killed close to 3,000 civilians on September 11^th, 2001.

Now, Bradley concluded, “we are in the middle of a war. I have not requested that the building be lit up in Israeli colours, although they continue to be attacked and I have not request that it be li up in Palestinian colours although they are under attack. …That (lighting up the building) is what happens often when there is a specific terrorist attack specifically aimed at innocent people who are not in the armed forces …

“I know I have been pilloried for that but that is my reason for doing that (lighting the building) on that occasion,” Bradley added.  “I have great sympathy for all the people who have been affected by this situation.”

“Council will now make a rule or policy related to flag raising and lighting the building and I am quite happy to live within that policy,” he said, before stressing one last time that he directed the building to be lit after October 7^th in response to a “terrorist attack” on innocent people.

“I think I owe council an explanation on that,” said Bradley. “Others may not hear it and some may not accept it anyway, but that is my rationale.”

It remains to be seen how many members of Niagara’s Palestinian community and how many members of Niagara’s community at large accept the Regional Chair’s explanation.

For at least some, it may never come.

For a related piece posted on Niagara At Large, click on – January 25th Niagara Regional Council Meeting Was A Disgrace | Niagara At Large  .

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