I was sitting on a plane flying from Halifax to Toronto (passing, of necessity, through northeastern US airspace), thinking.

I recalled a conversation I had nearly 20 years ago with Monia Mazigh, wife of Maher Arar. We all remember him. In 2002, Arar, a Canadian citizen, while returning from a family holiday in Tunisia, changed planes at JFK airport in New York en route to Ottawa. On Islamophobic and false information supplied by Canada’s RCMP, the US agencies shipped (“or rendered”) Arar to be interrogated, tortured and imprisoned in Syria. For nearly a year he was held in a rat-infested solitary cell 6 feet by 4 feet that he calls a “grave”.

Mazigh, worked tirelessly to free Arar: she won the support of Alexa McDonough, then-leader of the NDP. Alexa was the only party leader to sound the alarm about the role of Canada’s spy agencies, including CSIS, in the US’s “War on Terror” in the wake of 9/11.

Above: Maher Arar and Dr Monia Mazigh each received an honorary Doctor of Letters degree from Nipissing University in June, 2007.

Mazigh gave a talk in Halifax about Arar’s illegal arrest, noting the RCMP’s role in his appalling torture and imprisonment. Afterwards, I suggested to Mazigh, who has a PhD in finance and academic experience, that she apply for a faculty position at Saint Mary’s University where I was a prof. She told me it was impossible. Relocating to Halifax ensured any trip to visit relatives in Ottawa would entail flying over US airspace. And despite Arar being completely cleared by a Canadian public inquiry, the US would not allow him to even fly over its airspace—never mind to land.

The US bullied us; Canada colluded with them…

The other day when my plane was flying over the US, I thought about Arar. The irony didn’t escape me. It’s been 23 years since the Arar case, when Canadian authorities including the RCMP, CSIS and senior bureaucrats colluded with the CIA and CIA Counterintelligence to incarcerate an innocent Arar.

What’s changed? Not much – The US bullied us; Canada colluded with them.

I got a little frisson reading the January issue of The People’s Voice, published by the Communist Party of Canada. There is a great article “The Alphabet Soup Strategy: How Canada hides its military base system” by Cymry Gomery of the Montreal chapter of World BEYOND War. Gomery points out Canada has

– 10 domestic army bases

– 4 navy bases

– 12 airforce bases

– 4 NORAD bases, in Yellowknife, Rankin Inlet, Iqaluit and Inuvik for which our government committed $38.6 billion over the next 20 years.

– 4 overseas military “support hubs” created since 2009 in Germany, Kuwait, Jamaica and Senegal

Gomery insists that the world is becoming

“more violent under the boot of Western ‘civilization.’ Every new base and every new dollar in military spending brings us closer to nuclear war and nuclear winter.”

Since World War II ended, the US has invaded Korea, Vietnam, Grenada, Panama, Iraq and Afghanistan, to name a handful

“The real aim of US imperialism is to turn the Caribbean into a US lake, take away or prevent the right of peoples anywhere to work out their own destiny … … the role US imperialism [is] to order the world in its image.

“The Monroe Doctrine is now the Reagan Doctrine. [sound familiar?] Gunboat diplomacy, the use of armed force as in Grenada, Nicaragua and the Middle East, interference in the sovereign affairs of other nations—this is the ugly face of US imperialism. And Canada is its ally.”

Today, US imperialism’s grasp seems more deadly; once the wrath and war-waging of the US was more or less confined to “developing” aka Third World countries and murdering people of colour. Since World War II ended the US has invaded Korea, Vietnam, Grenada, Panama, Iraq and Afghanistan, to name a handful.

Napalm Girl, a defining image of the 20th century and the reach of US imperialism. Photographed by Nick Ut. The photographer is now in dispute; as “visual and technical” evidence “leans toward” an emerging theory that a Vietnamese freelance photographer, Nguyen Thanh Nghe took the photo.

People used to say “that was then” – there are no more Vietnams on the horizon. But today we know there may be US boots on the ground – even here – in Canada. Certainly Trump threatened another ally – Denmark. Trump and the powerful in the US have been successful in stampeding the Liberal government, opinion makers and corporate leaders seriously to the right. While we wait to see more –we are doing America Lite.

How long will it be before the Canadian government puts more restrictions on our civil liberties?

These federal bills threaten all of our rights – especially for those people who refuse to be silenced by Israel.

1) Bill C-9: The “Combatting Hate” Act

Bill C-9, the Combatting Hate Act, is aimed at preventing hate crimes but instead threatens the Charter rights and freedoms of all people in Canada. … Bill C-9 would give police the right to determine which symbols are “principally associated” with a listed terror entities. The cops will also be able to assess the motives, intentions of protesters. There will be increased jail sentences, and severe limits to free speech that will exacerbate a “chill” among those protesting Israel’s genocide – for example. There is already a serious crackdown on support for Palestinians, and anti-genocide activists.

So, for example, the Feds could outlaw keffiyehs as a symbol of hate; or chant lyrics like “from the river to the sea…”

2) Bill C-2, the Strong Borders Act, tabled in June 2025 is aimed at keeping drugs notably fentanyl out of Canada and drug runners, and stop money laundering. Who do you think demanded that? As the ICLMG (International Civil Liberties Monitoring Group) point out,

“The legislation is anti-privacy, anti-migrant and anti-refugee and will make people across Canada less safe by arbitrarily limiting the ability of individuals to claim asylum in Canada, in violation of international human rights law; allowing for the mass cancellation or suspension of immigration documents and applications (ex: visas, permanent residency cards) for entire groups of people, including individuals from certain countries, based on undefined “public interest” reasons; allowing police and intelligence agencies warrantless access to our personal information, in violation of privacy rights; granting the government the power to issue secret orders to internet service providers to modify their systems to facilitate surveillance and possibly undermine encryption, placing our data at risk; allowing Canada Post to open and search our letter mail; and much more.”

3) Bill C-12, the Strengthening Canada’s Immigration System and Borders Act, wastabled in October 2025 as more than 300 civil society organizations https://ccrweb.ca/en/over-300-organizations-unite-demand-complete-withdrawal-bill-c-2 coalesced to oppose Bill C-2 and Bill C-12 because of risk of privacy violations through surveillance and rights for refugees and migrants. According to the Canadian Immigration Lawyers Association, “Bill C-12 shifts core immigration functions into a national security framework, bypassing the established legislative structure.”

The Federal Government is betting that as long as Canadian repression is a smidgen less fascistic than what’s going on in Trump’s United States, it will be able to get away with it.

This could be the tip of the iceberg.

Cartoon at the top: “Price of Free Speech” by Signe Wilkinson, at The Philadelphia Inquirer.