All About Yves: Activist Engler Targeted by Montreal Police at Behest of Aspirant Israel-Supporting Pol
Feb 27, 2025
Thursday morning, February 20th, 2025 Yves Engler presented himself to Montreal police for arrest, as ordered.
[Update: Yves was released Monday evening, and will face trial April 25th failing Montreal authorities dropping charges. - Ape]
Though
facing multiple charges, the Canadian author, journalist, and activist
had no reason to believe he wouldn't be bailed out in time to spend the
weekend with his wife and young children. But that wasn't to be.
Engler's bail was denied Thursday evening without cause given, and again
on Friday when he refused to agree to a gag order forbidding he write
about his ordeal. He writes,
"...[T]he
officer told my lawyer she wants to impose a condition for my release
saying that I’m not allowed to discuss the case. That is a flagrant
violation of my freedom of expression, but is presumably designed to
protect the police officer, Kurtz and her legal team from
embarrassment."
Initially Engler was charged with "harassment and
indecent communication" for his response to unelicited tweets on his
TwitterX timeline from Canadian Zionist media personality, Dahlia
Kurtz, (police say Engler describes Kurtz as a "genocide supporter" and
"fascist"; accusations he readily admits are accurate). Subsequently,
Montreal police added charges, alleging Engler's articles detailing his
arrest by them and published at the Canadian Foreign Policy Institute,
along with an email letter campaign soliciting support for his release,
constitute a threat.
Specifically, the Service de Police de la
Ville de Montréal (SPVM) cite "intimidation, harassment, harassing
communication and “entrave” or interference" towards its arresting
officer. As of writing, the SPVM have released no more information, or
replied to requests for comment.
Reporting for the University of
Windsor Law's 'Jurist News', Pitasanna Shanmugathas quotes Senator for
British Columbia, Yuen Pau Woo's letter of support for Engler at
ActionNetwork. In it, Senator Woo says he supports Yves' right to
denounce Israel's genocide in Gaza and to "call out" those aiding and
abetting its crimes there adding,
"It is incumbent on the police
to explain the grounds for any charges laid against Mr. Engler and to
demonstrate that his rights are not being infringed. To compound the
charges against him because he has shared information about his plight
is abusive."
Thousands agree. By Saturday night, two days after
his arrest, the online petitions site, ActionNetwork tallied nearly
10,000 letters of support for Engler, as well as a recorded statement of
support coming from tireless Palestine defender and former Pink Floyd
member, Roger Waters who says,
"Let's hope this awful nightmare
of crucifying people who stand up for human rights goes away soon. But
until it does, we must stand shoulder to shoulder...Yves I'm with you
all the way, brother."
The arrest has too been picked up by
alternative media across Canada and in the United States, where all are
concerned for Engler's welfare, and the conditions of his detention.
Green Party of Quebec leader, Alex Tyrrell writes on TwitterX, that
during his video linked bail hearing, Engler appeared without his
eyeglasses, and was repeatedly interrupted by the judge before being
hustled out of the box. Tyrrell says,
"When Yves asked why his
release was opposed, the judge dismissed his question, saying it was at
the prosecutor’s discretion, and advised him not to speak."
Those
were Engler's last words heard from detention. Before reporting to
authorities though, Engler addressed media on the charges outside the
police station saying,
"This is obviously an attack against
freedom of expression but really what it is is a use of the policing and
legal system to target someone that opposes the Canadian government's
complicity in a genocidal rampage by Israel that's left at least 100,000
people killed in Gaza."
Adding,
"Over the past 15 months
[Dahlia] Kurtz has become a leader in Canada’s fascist movement, posting
incessantly about purported Jewish victimhood and the anti-genocide
"mob" who should be "deported". A compulsive liar, Kurtz openly calls
for state violence against those challenging Canadian complicity in
genocide."
Still incommunicado, Engler's father and co-author of
the book, 'The Ugly Canadian' took to his son's TwitterX feed Friday
(https://x.com/EnglerYves) to provide an update on Yves' situation.
Gary Engler writes,
"Yves
will have a bail hearing Monday 9am. He has called for supporters to
attend. The hearing will determine whether or not Yves will be freed
pending trial and if he will be allowed to write in detail about what is
happening to him including naming the complaint and the police officer
who have accused him of harassment. He has no interest in naming the
police officer but insists that he should be able to name the influencer
who regularly publishes hateful anti-Palestinian content online."
Engler's
arrest comes at a time of increasingly oppressive measures taken by
police against Palestinian solidarity throughout the social democracies
of the West. These measures often invoke anti-terrorism statutes, like
Section 12 of Britain's Terrorism Act 2000, invoked to hold journalists,
Kit Klarenberg in May of 2023, and Richard Medhurst in August of last
year when arriving at UK airports Luton and Heathrow respectively, and
to mine their communication devices for information. Section 12 was also
cited in the SWAT-styled assault on English activist, Sarah Wilkinson's
home and the sexagenarian's violent arrest.
Medhurst's Vienna
home was also raided just two weeks ago, it appears, in service of
British intelligence agencies; while American journalist and publisher
of The Electronic Intifada (ei), Ali Abunimah was roughly taken into
custody by Swiss authorities January 25th and held, much as Engler is
now, with no avenues of communication to the outside world. Abunimah's
UK-based ei colleague, Asa Winstanley too experienced harassment and the
seizure of his computers and other devices. He quotes Abunimah in an
article about his arrest in and deportation from Switzerland saying,
"I
can only conclude that my unlawful imprisonment was intended to
suppress freedom of expression by preventing me from speaking openly
about the genocide in Palestine, as well as to punish me for views I’ve
expressed in the past that someone in power did not like."
And
then there's Germany, whose draconian laws suppressing pro-Palestinian
activism, including entry bans can be applied across the Schengen Zone.
Pro-Palestine
activism suppression may be the case with Engler in Canada too, but it
could be more than that. As well as writing a baker's dozen of books
highly critical of Canadian foreign policy, (the only person in the
country to have hammered on this theme as persistently) Yves is too a
disruptor of the first order, literally.
Engler and activist
lawyer and journalist, Dimitri Lascaris founded the Disruption Network,
and under its rubric have embarrassed both public officials and Canada's
mainstream news organizations with ambush interventions asking normally
media-cosseted representatives pointed questions on issues like aid to
Israel's genocidal campaign in Palestine. Few of the country's political
and business elite are likely upset to hear of his troubles with the
law, but their Schadenfreude may be short-lived.
Talking about
his arrest in Switzerland, Ali Abunimah expressed surprise the local
powers that be there would amplify what would have been a small teach-in
on Palestinian solidarity and resistance into a national scandal and
international embarrassment for the normally politically low-profile
Swiss. Likewise, with nearly 10,000 signatures as of this writing, and a
growing chorus of outrage, the petite bureaucrats behind Montreal's
arrest of Yves Engler may soon come to rue their counter-constitutional
transgression.
As it stands, Yves will again appear before the court Monday February 25th, and as Gary Engler says,
"If
you support Yves please come to the Palais de justice at 1 Notre Dame
East in room 3.12 on Monday morning at 9:00am. You can also support his
work by donating at http://YvesEngler.com/donate
"Please do what you can to draw attention to this case. #FreeYvesEngler."
[UPDATE: Kurtz and Oberman filed a complaint with the Senate Ethics Committee against Senator for BC, Yuen Pau Woo Friday, February 28th saying his support of Yves' free speech poses a threat to Dahlia Kurtz - Ape]
Chris
Cook hosts Gorilla Radio, where Yves Engler has appeared as a guest
numerous times. Archives at GRadio.Substack.com, GR blog at:
https://gorillaradioblog.blogspot.com/ and on Telegram at:
https://t.me/gorillaradio2024
Thanks to Pitasanna Shanmugathas:
https://www.jurist.org/news/2025/02/canada-dispatch-montreal-activist-jailed-after-series-of-charges-over-israel-gaza-social-media-posts/
