With criticism of the Canadian Museum for Human Rights’ continuing over its scandalous “nakba” exhibit, which critics say purports to frame Arabs in 1948 as the victims – rather than the perpetrators – of the war against the newly reborn Israel, defenders of the Winnipeg museum are continuing to engage in what we regard as apologetics, and misrepresenting the actual problems with the exhibit.

Judith Dueck previously served as a Director of Research, Content and Scholarship at the museum, and in an August 18 article in Broadview Magazine, a taxpayer-funded outlet we’ve critiqued for anti-Israel bias which is part of the Observer Publications charity, “The truth is never the whole story,” she wrote that “I found no fabricated evidence, invented testimony or erroneous facts” at the exhibit.

But surely Dueck knows that fabricating evidence is not the only way to misrepresent a situation. Simply omitting key context does the job equally well.

For instance, visitors have said that the museum focuses exclusively on what Jews allegedly did to Arabs in 1948, without acknowledging that the war began because Israel’s Arab neighbours attempted to destroy the newly-reborn State of Israel and commit genocide against its Jewish inhabitants. 

Telling the story of Arabs who left Israel as a result of the war is valid, but it must be contextualized by informing visitors that many, if not most, did so at the behest of Arab leaders who expected a swift victory over the Jews.

The same day, Dueck was also published in The Winnipeg Free Press, “The moral courage of public dissent,” where her opinion column claimed that fringe anti-Israel groups like Independent Jewish Voices (IJV) Canada were examples of “moral courage.” IJV claims to have some 1,000 members in Canada as of 2023, or about one in four thousand Canadian Jews, and it is unclear how many IJV members are not Jewish.

Dueck claims that these groups deserve respect because they dare “to challenge the dominant institutions” of the Jewish community. But simply being fringe or unpopular does not in itself merit respect or demonstrate courage. IJV is little more than a run-of-the-mill anti-Israel group in our estimation.

It has sponsored a Vancouver protest (alongside the extremist Palestinian Youth Movement group) that reportedly saw demonstrators praise the October 7 massacres, calls itself anti-Zionist (meaning that it denies the Jewish People a right to self-determination in their historic homeland), and has even been accused of promoting Holocaust denial and rationalizing Palestinian terrorism.

If challenging the “dominant institutions” in a community demonstrates moral courage, than by Dueck’s own logic, pro-Israel organizations are the epitome of courageous because they stand up to the institutionalized anti-Israel disinformation spread by mainstream news media outlets, government agencies, universities and more.

Moreover, if challenging the “dominant institutions” is to be praised, will Dueck also devote a future opinion column to calling on more Muslim Canadians to speak out in support of Israel, given that there are no mainstream Muslim organizations in Canada that dare to do so, and in fact, a worryingly high level of antisemitism in that community? She does not say.

In her Broadview column, Judith Dueck defends the controversial “nakba” exhibit while misrepresenting what the actual criticisms are, and in her Broadview column, she places fringe organizations on a pedestal, giving them undeserved credit for courage simply for being unpopular.

Photo credit: Judith Dueck