Israeli-Canadian activist arrested before pro-Israel counter protest, claims wrongful charge

Ron East, the founder of the Israel-Canadian Council, was arrested before he was able to counter a pro-Palestinian protest on Sunday outside the Canadian Museum for Human Rights.

East told the Jerusalem Post that the arrest was “wrongful,” and made due to his religious and ethnic identity.

The arrest, and charge of ‘obstructing a police officer,’ was reportedly made after East parked in a no-parking zone while unloading his van and his friend’s vehicle for the protest he had planned on attending. East told the officer that his friend would move the first of 2 cars and then he would move the second because he did not want to leave his equipment alone. As his friend moved the first vehicle, East recounted how the aggressively behaving officer demanded his identification. When East asked why the officer made the request and refused to comply until it was explained, he said the officer placed him under arrest. 

Suffering caused by the arrest

During the arrest, East claimed that the officer placed the handcuffs so tightly around his wrists that it caused him pain. He told the Post that he complained of the pain to the officer, who ignored him. The police who transported him to the station loosened the restraints once out of sight of the arresting officer, claimed East.

Experiencing continued pain as a result of the restraints, East explained he sought medical attention where he learned that he suffered a carpal sprain, sprained ligaments, and a possible broken palm bone is still being investigated. East said that he has attended multiple medical appointments as a result of the injury and has needed to take medication for the pain. He has since made a formal complaint against the arresting officer.

In addition to physical injury, East showed the Post screenshots of the abuse and harassment that he has experienced by pro-Palestinian activists since his arrest. One of the many social media posts, captioned “50 lies Israel told the world,” included denials and revisions of Hamas’s atrocities against Israeli civilians. In other posts targeted at East, comparisons are made which compared Israel to Nazi Germany and said that “Hitler would be proud” of Israel today - which violates the IHRA definition of antisemitism. While Winnipeg has not adopted the definition, the province of Manitoba has.

East was released based on a promise to appear in court. 

Context to the arrest

East, a dual national of both Canada and Israel, described himself as the face of the grassroots advocacy movements in his community. Having lived in Winnipeg for over 20 years, he founded the pro-Israel group to address the needs of his community. His group had protested for the release of the hostages, campaigned for the Red Cross to do more for Israelis suffering as the result of Hamas’s violence, and for the media to use proper language when covering the conflict.

Having worked in Israel advocacy, East insisted that he had developed a strong relationship with local law enforcement. East insisted that multiple officers had reached out to assure him that they had not been involved in his arrest, which gave him the impression that the action had been planned and orchestrated.

Discussing the weekly protests, East said that an agreement had been reached between the police, the leader of the pro-Palestinian activists, and himself where the pro-Palestinian activists would be granted Saturday to protest and his group would protest on Sundays. While the agreement had been honored for a month-and-a-half, on the Sunday of the arrest the pro-Palestinian side had allegedly reneged on the agreement which is why the counter-demonstration was planned. 

East added that the same day he was arrested, pro-Palestinian protesters broke into the museum where they refused to move and none were arrested despite trespassing and violating museum policy.

The weekly pro-Palestinian protests have been far from peaceful, East told the Post. Insisting that, while the police had failed to make arrests for traffic disorders and hateful conduct by pro-Palestinian activists, there was an increasingly volatile and violent environment. East explained how Jewish homes had been attacked and had their windows smashed, had their flags stolen and much more.

“In some of our previous rallies, we’ve had flags stolen, we’ve had rocks thrown at us, we’ve been threatened and the police has done nothing,” East said. “[The police] haven’t arrested anybody, even when they were there and saw the rocks being thrown at us. Even when they were there and saw when the flag was being stolen…The police stand there and do nothing. They are afraid to engage with the other side because of the numbers; they don’t want to get into it. They don’t want to get hurt. Nothing happens to the pro-Palestinian side and the side that always gets pushed and bullied is the pro-Israel side.”