Another interesting story about Canada....

This is getting no publicity in Canada...read the whole interview...

Frontpage Interview’s guest today is Howard Rotberg, the author of The Second Catastrophe: A Novel about a Book and its Author (Mantua Books). The novel explores the problems faced by a pro-Israel historian after he wrote a book comparing Islamists to Nazis, and the situation for Israeli Jews today with that of Jews in 1939. Rotberg is a Canadian author who has faced the manufactured wrath of Islamists after they made up allegations against him.

FP: Howard Rotberg, welcome to Frontpage Interview.

Rotberg: Thank you.

FP: Let’s begin with the trouble you began having after the release of your novel.

Rotberg: Several years ago, at a book lecture at the Waterloo Ontario store of the monopoly book retailer in Canada (with 72% of Canadian retail book sales), I was attacked by a Palestinian and an Iraqi, who shouted me down, with shouts of “you have no right to be heard if you are pro-Israel.” Then when I could no longer speak, and folded up my notes, and audience members asked the hecklers to be quiet and let me speak, the Iraqi shouted “he is a fucking Jew.” The lecture was stopped.

The only employee present was a young woman with a hijab. She later told some people in attendance that she was Palestinian and knew the hecklers. She later reported to her boss, fraudulently, that I said that “all Muslims are terrorists.” Later she changed the allegation in a written statement, also fraudulent, that I said that “all Middle Easterners are terrorists.” No matter how ridiculous, the PR person for Chapters stated in a press release that they were sorry that patrons had to hear racist statements from both the hecklers and the guest author.

Later an allegation appeared on the internet that I supposedly said at the lecture that “all Arabs and Muslims deserve to die.” In this case I got the internet site to furnish me with the IP address for the computer from which emanated this terrible allegation. Then I obtained a court order compelling the internet service provider to disclose the name and address of the computer owner. The allegation was posted in the name of a Jewish person, but I had reason to believe that such a person could never state that.

When I got the court order I found out that the source of the internet posting was a Palestinian family who lived a few doors away from the Jewish family whose name they appropriated for the internet allegation. I also did some detective work and found that the daughter of the family was a school friend and fellow member of the local university Muslim Students Association with the Palestinian, then 18 year old, book clerk, who started this little fraud. It had large repercussions. When I complained to the President of the book chain about the press release, she did not take it well. In one week, the book chain “banned” my book, returning some 300 copies to the publisher, and stated on their web site that the book was “unavailable”. Of course, refusing to carry it on their website was an indication of their animus; it costs the chain nothing in terms of shelf space to have it available by web-ordering, but the “fatwa” was a complete one.

FP: So what’s happening now?

Rotberg: I am still trying to get a court case heard against the book chain, but their lawyers are quite successful in stalling the case. Canadian newspapers do not want to cover the matter, because they receive large advertising dollars from the book chain.