If Canada is serious about holding Israel to account, it must do more than put forward symbolic votes at the UN. Only when the Trudeau government begins to listen to Palestinian voices and rejects the leading proponents of the “new anti-Semitism” thesis which seeks to label criticism of Israel as a form of anti-Jewish discrimination, will we be capable of moving forward together.

Online gender-based violence, from doxxing to deepfakes to real life massacres, are becoming increasingly common as technology embeds deeper into our lives, yet governments and tech companies seem to largely ignore this devastating, sometimes fatal, issue. If we are serious about eliminating misogyny, we need to include conversations about online gender-based violence and tech-facilitated violence.

By posting the student video in a host of online venues, pro-Israel apologists ensured that their outrage would go viral, that it would criminalize an innocent young student, and stoke anti-Arab sentiments among their adherents. But the irony in this propaganda effort is this: as with COVID, the viral spread of digital matter does not discriminate politically. It can both serve and destroy its users.

Prisoners are at a higher risk of contracting COVID-19, and the response to this risk within correctional facilities across Canada has only created an alternate outbreak of health problems. For prisoner advocates like Michelle Gushue of the Elizabeth Fry Society, the most compassionate and effective response to this problem is removing people from these institutions and returning them to their communities.

Institutionalized people in Manitoba are experiencing the brunt of COVID-19—from jails, to long-term care homes to hospitals. Our demands for a just recovery must centre those most impacted by the virus, and this requires a movement away from neoliberalism towards a system of rapid decarceration and deinstitutionalization. Only then can we begin to reckon with the legacy of austerity and adopt more ethical models of care.

For as long as Winnipeg and other Canadian cities passively choose not to house people, they actively affirm and secure the right of developers and landlords to profit from inequality. Housing is a human right, not a commodity, and the consumer model of tenancy isn’t working. The only way to truly guarantee that people have high-quality, affordable housing is through public ownership.

The Ford government’s adoption of the IHRA definition is troubling, because it gives license to those who would like to paper over the institutionalized discrimination faced by nearly two million Palestinian citizens of Israel. It also harms other anti-racist initiatives by setting a troubling standard for freedom of expression while also threatening academic freedom.

Headingley Correctional Centre, a provincial jail on the western edge of Winnipeg, is among the sites hardest hit by the pandemic. As of Friday, October 30, the jail had 69 confirmed cases—mostly prisoners along with a handful of staff. Canadian Dimension spoke with someone whose husband is incarcerated in Headingley. After a major bout of sickness, he was finally diagnosed with COVID-19.

On any given day, over 9,200 people in the city of Toronto meet one of the definitions of homelessness. Shelters in the city generally reach an average occupancy rate of approximately 98 percent every night, and 76 percent of the homeless population claim that the key factor in improving their situation is “aid and accommodation in paying the high rents of the city.” COVID-19 is making the situation even worse.

44-year-old Richard Kakish passed away after an incident involving the Winnipeg Police in August 2017. Richard died after being kicked and repeatedly punched by officers during an arrest. He was a father of four, and grandfather of three. Here, James Wilt speaks with Richard’s daughter about her father’s killing and her family’s struggle for justice.