Human rights proceedings against Maclean’s magazine began to wind down yesterday. Lawyers complained of fatigue. Spectators slumped. Then suddenly, a surprise.
One of the B. C. Human Rights Tribunal hearing’s two complainants moved toward the witness stand.
Naiyer Habib, a 67-year-old cardiologist and Muslim activist, had indicated earlier this week that he would not testify. Something -- or someone -- changed his mind. He straightened his tie yesterday morning and took the oath.
Somebody had to. Dr. Habib’s fellow activist, Mohamed Elmasry, is the only other complainant in this matter, but he stayed home in Ontario, where he works as an electrical engineer. Both men allege Maclean’s magazine exposed them to hatred or contempt, by publishing an excerpt from a book written by journalist Mark Steyn. The excerpt argued bluntly that the growing influence of Islam poses a threat to the West.
Dr. Habib first described his long involvement with Islam-based activism, and the efforts he has made to foster peace and understanding between people of his faith and others. He told of his long association with Mr. Elmasry. Both men are senior members of the Canadian Islamic Congress, an Ontariobased organization that typically rails against “Zionists” in its newsletters and on the Internet. Its latest missive, published this week by Mr. Elmasry, takes aim at “Zionists the world over” who “will celebrate the 60th anniversary of the establishment of a state-for-Jews-only in Palestine.”
But Dr. Habib was not asked about the CIC. Instead, lawyer Faisal Joseph asked his client how he had reacted to anonymous comments about the Steyn excerpt, items posted on foreign Internet “blog” sites, which Dr. Habib had himself discovered in late 2006.
All week, over objections of lawyers for Maclean’s, tribunal chairwoman Heather McNaughton has allowed as evidence anonymous postings to Internet sites, even those registered outside Canada.
“Did those postings… have any impact on you, in a negative sense?” asked Mr. Joseph.
“Definitely,” replied Dr. Habib. “I accepted what they were saying, and it affected me personally.”
“You read them, and they bothered you?”
“Yes,” said Dr. Habib.
A few of the anonymous comments read at the hearing yesterday were inarguably offensive
and vile; they attacked Islam and Muslims. Some advocated or suggested violence. “At [age] 57, I have a feeling that I will not die of natural causes, and Islam will be a factor,” read one anonymous posting, left on a Californiaregistered blog site and read into the record yesterday.
“How did those comments and the additional comments on that blog make you feel?” asked Mr. Joseph.
“It’s humiliating, dishonouring, questioning our morals in Western society where we live,” said his client. While most Muslims in Canada are good citizens, “there is a handful doing certain [bad] things. [But] we do not want to be discriminated [against in] the way we have been discriminated [against].”
Maclean’s is partly to blame, he added. Foul, anti-Muslim Internet postings “were influenced by the article,” he declared. He was not asked to explain how he made this conclusion.
Mr. Joseph and Dr. Habib spent 10 minutes discussing, in a general way, the Steyn excerpt. “I think the article is discriminating. It is racial. It is full of hate,” said the witness. He was invited to read into the record or describe any specific portion of the magazine piece that he found hateful. He declined.
But Dr. Habib insisted the excerpt had negatively impacted himself and members of his family, “day by day.” Again, he did not relate when, or where, or how.
Cross examination was short and sharp. Maclean’s lawyer Julian Porter veered to another topic: Osama bin Laden. Surely, he said, the witness was not a fan. Not at all, said Dr. Habib. Bin Laden, he noted, is “twisting Islam.”
“After 9/11, you and your community must have suffered many slings and arrows?”
“Yes.”
“Because of bin Laden?” “Yes,” said the doctor.
Mr. Porter pressed further, suggesting to the witness that Muslim terrorists had much to do with rising anxiety in the West, that Osama bin Laden might attack again, that the witness and other Muslims might have something to fear, that North Americans “have the right to say ‘my God, what might happen next?’ ”
Dr. Habib agreed.
“Aren’t you worried that there will be another attack?”
“Yes,” said Dr. Habib. “I’m worried.”
And that, argued Mr. Porter, is precisely the point, and the reason this hearing makes little sense. People agree that Muslim extremists are “the most central issue of our existence in North America today. How we deal with the bin Ladens is a huge issue, and so that writers must write about it …Those are my questions.”
The hearing is expected to finish today, after closing arguments.