‘Denied the Holocaust’: Tory MPs Criticize Liberal Ministers for Taking Photo With Palestinian President

Foreign Affairs Minister Melanie Joly rises during question period in the House of Commons on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on Dec. 11, 2023. The Canadian Press/Sean Kilpatrick

Two Jewish Conservative MPs expressed outrage this week after a picture surfaced of two Liberal cabinet ministers “holding hands” with Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president who is known for his anti-Semitic policies.

Foreign Minister Melanie Joly and Mental Health and Addictions Minister Ya’ara Saks met with Mr. Abbas and Palestinian Authority Minister of Foreign Affairs Riad Malki while visiting the West Bank this week.

“In the West Bank, we met with President Abbas to discuss the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, the future governance of the Palestinian Authority and the work to advance towards a two-state solution,” Ms. Joly said in a March 14 X post.

Her tweet was accompanied by a picture of her shaking hands with Mr. Abbas while Ms. Saks appeared to be holding the Palestinian leader’s other hand.

A government press release said Ms. Joly discussed “the pathway to a sustainable peace through the creation of a Palestinian state living side by side in peace and security with Israel” with Mr. Abbas and Mr. Malki.

Tory MP Melissa Lantsman took to social media within hours of the picture being posted to criticize both cabinet ministers for posing with a man who not only “denied the Holocaust” and Oct. 7, but  “set up the Martyrs Fund that rewards families of terrorists who kill Jews.”

The state’s Martyrs Fund pays monthly cash stipends to the families of Palestinians who are killed, injured, or imprisoned while carrying out violence against Israel.

“You held this guy’s hand,” she said. “You have lost your mind Yaara Saks and your constituents now know it.”

Fellow Conservative MP Marty Morantz expressed similar sentiments.

“Two of Justin Trudeau’s cabinet ministers (Melanie Joly and Ya’ara Saks) holding hands with rabid anti-Semite, Holocaust and Oct. 7th denier Mahmoud Abbas,” he said on X. “Absolutely shameful.”

‘Misleading Remarks’

Mr. Abbas is infamous for comments made last August that Nazi leader Adolf Hitler’s slaughter of six million European Jews was because of their business practices, not their faith.

“These people were fought because of their social function related to money, usury,” Abbas said in a speech to senior members of his Fatah movement. “From Hitler’s point of view, they were sabotaging, and therefore he hated them.”

Leaders from around the globe condemned the remarks and the European Union also released a statement.

“The speech contained false and grossly misleading remarks about Jews and anti-Semitism,” the EU said. “Such historical distortions are inflammatory, deeply offensive, and can only serve to exacerbate tensions in the region.”

In his doctoral thesis in the 1970s, he downplayed the Holocaust, questioning the extent of the Nazi genocide. He has since distanced himself from those assertions but has continued to make remarks that many have called anti-Semitic.

In one such incident in 2022, he accused Israel of committing “50 Holocausts” against Palestinians. Mr. Abbas apologized, but only after being chastised by German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.

Ms. Joly’s trip to the West Bank this week comes a week after Ottawa promised to reinstate funding for the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East (UNRWA). Canada had suspended funding to the agency due to allegations some of its personnel took part in the Hamas October massacre.

Funding was reinstated because of the “dire humanitarian crisis in Gaza,” the government said.

Ms. Joly, in her meetings with Mr. Abbas and Mr. Malki, said Canada would continue efforts to provide humanitarian assistance to Palestinians and would push for “increased delivery of aid by all means possible, including through existing land entry points and by sea.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.