B’nai Brith Canada is strongly disappointed that a B.C. man convicted of communicating online statements that wilfully promoted hatred against Jewish people has been sentenced to a mere six months of curfew and a ban on public online activity.
Arthur Topham was facing a maximum sentence of two years in prison. During his time as founder of the racist and antisemitic website www.radicalpress.com, he had called for Jews to be forcibly sterilized, claimed that Canada is “controlled by the Zionist Jew lobby,” and described Jewish places of worship as “synagogues of Satan.”
Topham was first arrested after B’nai Brith alerted the RCMP to his activities.
At the sentencing for his conviction at a Quesnel, B.C. courthouse on Monday, Topham told the court that it was his “duty to alert the … public to the imminent threat …. [of] the Jewish lobby.”
“This sentence is a mere slap on the wrist, which will do little to protect Canadian Jews or preserve the multicultural mosaic of our society,” lamented Michael Mostyn, Chief Executive Officer of B’nai Brith Canada. “The timing is especially disturbing, as Canada’s Jewish community reels from a series of bomb threats against our community centres, inspired by the same hateful ideology that drives Mr. Topham.
“Mr. Topham is a committed and unrepentant Jew-hater, who persisted in publishing lurid antisemitic content on his website throughout this legal process,” Mostyn continued. “Canada’s laissez-fair approach to hate crimes continues to fail minority groups and puts them at increased risk of attacks against their lives or property.”
