2 weeks Ago By [email protected] (Alex Ballingall)
OTTAWA — An Edmonton candidate dropped by the federal Liberals said Friday that he refused to apologize for praising Hamas and Hezbollah in a 16-year-old video, and that he will still run as an Independent in the Alberta capital. The ouster came as nominees for the Conservatives and Liberals were dropped ahead of Monday’s candidate deadline, including a Quebec Conservative who was turfed Friday for what a party spokesperson called “completely inappropriate” comments reportedly directed at a gun control advocate who is running for the Liberals. In Edmonton, former Alberta NDP legislator Rod Loyola, the Liberal candidate rejected after defending Hamas and Hezbollah, said in a statement that he believes there is a “moral and legal imperative” to stand up for oppressed people.
“As I told the Liberal party yesterday, I do not need to apologize for a hip-hop segment that had as its thrust the need to stand with the oppressed, nor for affirming (Palestinians’) right to live in peace, security, and sovereignty,” Loyola’s statement said. The National Post first reported that Loyola appeared at a rally in 2009, where a video uploaded to YouTube shows him praising Hamas and Hezbollah, Islamist militant groups that Canada declared terrorist entities in 2002. “Organizations like Hezbollah and Hamas really are trying to stand up for their people, and that needs to be recognized,” Loyola says in the video.
“These are movements for national liberation, not terrorists.” In his statement Friday, Loyola said he “unequivocally” condemns violence and terrorism and called the Hamas-led massacres against Israeli communities on Oct. 7, 2023 “completely unacceptable and heartbreaking.
” He added that Israel’s response “amounts to collective punishment” and human rights violations of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip. He also expressed bewilderment that he was “cancelled” for his comments “at an anti-war rally” in 2009, noting how he spent almost a decade since 2015 as an NDP member of Alberta’s legislature. Loyola said he will continue his campaign and run as an Independent candidate in Edmonton Southeast, a riding near to Edmonton Gateway, where he was nominated as the Liberal candidate last month.
“The world cannot turn a blind eye to decades of displacement, occupation, and systemic injustice. It is not extremist or divisive to demand the same freedoms for Palestinians that we expect for all people. If we believe in human rights, we must defend them without exception,” Loyola’s statement said.
Loyola declined to comment when reached by phone on Friday. While campaigning in Montreal, Liberal Leader Mark Carney confirmed that Loyola is no longer a Liberal candidate. But neither Carney nor a Liberal spokesperson elaborated on why Loyola was dropped.
Hamas was one of the principal groups behind the Oct. 7 massacres against Israeli communities that killed more than 1,200 people and saw more than 250 taken hostage. Israel responded with force in the Palestinian territory, with strikes that have hit schools, refugee camps and hospitals — most recently on Thursday, when the Associated Press reported that airstrikes killed at least 100 people, including at least 14 children, according to a local health official.
Israel’s war in Gaza has killed more than 50,000 Palestinians since October 2023, according to Gaza’s health ministry. Hezbollah, an Islamist militant organization in Lebanon, has fought Israel for years — most recently when Israel launched air and ground forces against it in an operation that killed its long-serving leader in September 2024. Later Friday, the Conservatives confirmed they had dropped another candidate — the fifth in a matter of days.
Radio-Canada first reported that Simon Payette, the Conservative candidate nominated in Bethier — Maskinongé, accused Liberal candidate and gun control advocate Nathalie Provost — who survived the 1989 shooting massacre at Montreal’s École Polytechnique — of using the incident to advance her cause. In an emailed statement, Conservative spokesperson Sam Lilly confirmed Payette will no longer represent the Conservatives. “This individual’s conduct is completely inappropriate, and cannot be excused,” he wrote.
Earlier this week, the Liberals lost two other candidates. That included Calgary’s Thomas Keeper, who was dropped after the CBC reported he failed to disclose a stayed domestic assault charge in 2005. The Liberals also faced criticism after Carney allowed the party’s candidate in Markham—Unionville, Paul Chiang, to remain after he told a Chinese diaspora news outlet that people could collect a bounty Hong Kong placed on a Conservative rival.
Chiang resigned his candidacy on Tuesday. On the Conservative side, Etobicoke—North candidate Don Patel was ejected after it emerged that Patel appeared to endorse a Facebook comment suggesting Canadians critical of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi should be deported to India to be dealt with by his government. Mark McKenzie, the Conservative candidate in Windsor—Tecumseh — Lakeshore, was also turfed by his party this week after CTV News reported he spoke about former prime minister Justin Trudeau deserving the death penalty on a podcast in 2022.
Another Conservative candidate, Stefan Marquis, who was running in Montreal, was dropped after the candidate said the party raised concerns about his social media posts. And a fourth candidate, Lourence Singh, was dropped in British Columbia’s New Westminster—Burnaby — Maillardville after the news outlet Business in Vancouver reported that he made favourable comments about the Chinese government in a 2021 podcast interview. One candidate the Conservatives have stood behind is Andrew Lawton, a journalist who worked for the right-wing outlet True North and wrote a biography of Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre before running in the southwest Ontario riding of Elgin—St.
Thomas—London South. The media outlet Press Progress reported Friday that Lawton was part of a group chat on Signal involving lawyers and leaders of 2022’s so-called “Freedom Convoy” protests against COVID-19 health measures and the Trudeau government. The outlet reported that the Signal group co-ordinated public messages about the convoy movement during the Emergencies Act inquiry, and that it included convoy leaders Tamara Lich and Chris Barber.
Both were found guilty this week of criminal mischief for their roles in the convoy’s weeks-long occupation protest in Ottawa in the winter of 2022. Asked about the report on Friday, Conservative spokesperson Lilly said by email that Lawton was “working as a journalist at the time.” Lilly noted that Lawton wrote a book that came out in June 2022 about the convoy protests.
Lawton did not respond to requests for comment on Friday. In a statement to the Star, NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh called the report “disturbing” and called on the Conservative leader to drop Lawton as a candidate. With files from Raisa Patel Error! Sorry, there was an error processing your request.
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