Toronto(December 23, 2019) - The Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center (FSWC) welcomes the recent decision of the Nova Scotia Human Rights Commission to strip a recipient of its human rights award for comparing Israel to the Nazis.

This decision was a response to a series of statements made by Dartmouth resident Rana Zaman over Twitter which accused Israelis of modeling themselves after the Nazis and referring to Gaza as “the new #Auschwitz.”

In a press release, the Nova Scotia Human Rights Commission announced it was formally rescinding its award granted to Zaman on the basis of her statements which run “directly contrary to the principles of the award.”

Zama had once served as the federal NDP candidate for Dartmouth-Cole Harbour, but was fired by the NDP in June 2019 for making statements about Israel the party called “unacceptable.”

In June 2019, the Canadian government officially adopted the detailed definition of antisemitism endorsed by the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA). According to the IHRA, efforts to draw “comparisons of contemporary Israeli policy to that of the Nazis" are by definition antisemitic.