KINSELLA: CBC acted unfairly and against its own rules by punishing journalist

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“Back at work.”

So said a source close to veteran CBC reporter Neil Herland — and it was true. Early this morning, Herland was back on the air, reporting on the results of Alberta’s referendum on independence.

Herland’s voice was heard for just five minutes or so, around 5 in the morning, but it was unmistakably him.

“And that is your world this hour,” Herland said. “For CBC News, I’m Neil Herland.”

May not have sounded like much, that sign-off.  But it was a big, big victory for sanity — and for those who believe in fairness, balanced journalism, and the right of Jews to live and work in Canada without being targeted with hate.

Here’s the backstory.

A month ago, as revealed first in the Toronto Sun, the publicly funded broadcaster pulled Herland off-air – and, incredibly, hit him with disciplinary action – simply because he filmed a protest taking place outside a Jewish religious service on Yom Kippur.

Herland is an award-winning journalist and producer. He’s got three decades of experience reporting news across North America. He’s also a Jew.

In late September, CBC’s addled management yanked Herland off the air — simply because he had documented a newsworthy event. Herland is a member of the congregation at Song Shul, a Toronto synagogue that uses different facilities in the downtown core.

As Herland was walking to Song Shul’s Yom Kippur service, he spotted a protest outside the Meridian Centre at Yonge St. and Sheppard Ave. As he got closer, Herland and the other Jewish attendees saw dozens of “protesters” blocking the entrance to the synagogue service, waving Palestinian flags and yelling curses and abuse. The mob yelled “free Palestine” and “Zionist alert” when Jewish congregants came near.

Journalist filmed protest, then yanked off air

Being a journalist, Herland did what journalists are trained to do: he started filming. The resulting video was disturbing, to say the least.

One man was wearing a mask and repeatedly yelling, “You’re going to Hell,” using a bullhorn pointed at Herland and others, including children. Another man screamed “baby killer.” One congregant was called an “ugly Jewish bitch” – and, when the cantor at the service went outside and smiled at a protester, another yelled: “The Jew smiles while he kills babies in Gaza.”

A Toronto Police officer told the cantor to stop “antagonizing” the protesters.

Herland posted his video on social media, where it has been watched millions of times around the world. He accompanied the post with just a few words: “I’m a journalist. And I happen to be Jewish. On Yom Kippur I went to a synagogue service in Toronto and was met by protesters trying to taunt and intimidate me from entering the building.”

He continues: “Jewish Canadians are living in a parallel world. Where police stand guard with guns outside synagogues. And Jewish schools, religious sites and businesses are targeted with bullets. And most Canadians have no awareness or understanding.”

CBC’s response was disgusting and faintly antisemitic: they abruptly pulled the broadcast veteran off-air, informing him he would be investigated. A few days later, he was dragged into a Star Chamber-style disciplinary hearing with his lawyer.

Contacted for comment, CBC management refused to say who complained, why, or why they agreed to go after Herland. They wouldn’t say if it was “Canadian for Justice and Peace and the Middle East” — an organization that expresses hatred for the Jewish state and, just a few days ago, permitted a post on its Instagram account likening the Star of David to a swastika — that mounted a campaign against Herland and bragged that it had made what it called “a formal complaint” about him.

Another item on long list of controversies

CBC acted unfairly and against their own rules: at the taxpayer-funded broadcaster, journalists are explicitly permitted to write about “lived experiences,” just as Herland did. Following the horrible 2021 mass-murder of a Muslim family in London, Ont. — and after a Muslim CBC journalist gave her personal opinion about the terror attack on a national broadcast – CBC’s Ombudsman decreed that no rules were broken.

“We will reinforce that lived experience and being a part of any one community does not constitute a conflict of interest when covering those communities. We will remind all that we value lived experience and community connections in our journalists because it helps us to broaden and deepen our journalism.”

CBC’s spokesman refused to comment on “internal” matters. And it has yet to respond to a request for comment about Herland’s return.

But it was yet another CBC controversy in a long list of controversies — in which CBC seemed to line up against Jews and the Jewish state. Several other controversies have been documented by this writer and newspaper. Most recently, there was our story revealing that CBC was refusing to call 9/11 “terrorism” – which led to critical headlines around the world, and condemnations from everyone from the federal Minister responsible for CBC to the Director of the FBI. 

Like any good journalist, Neil Herland doesn’t want to make the story about himself. He’s declining comment.

But today, at least, the story has a happier ending for a good journalist — one who was treated very, very badly by his own employer.

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