Free Republic

A New Year's Eve party in Gatineau, Quebec with six people present turned into a confrontation with local police who were called to the scene. The caption translates as: "the police have just assaulted a six-person 'illegal gathering' in a house in Gatineau after responding to a complaint made by neighbours. The habitants of the house resisted." The video, which has since gone viral on social media, lasts almost exactly two minutes, and shows a man separated from his family by officers and wrestled to the ground, ostensibly for breaking lockdown regulations and then resisting arrest. He ends up face...

Hundreds of thousands of people were stranded without power in and around the Canadian capital Ottawa on Saturday after a tornado touched down twice, destroying some houses and ripping the roofs off others. At the same time high winds also battered the region and Ottawa Mayor Jim Watson said it could be days before electricity was fully restored. At least six people were injured. “It’s in the top two or three traumatic events that have affected our city,” Watson told reporters. “It looks like something from a movie scene or a war scene.” The tornado hit on Friday evening, demolishing...

Until last year, Hassan Diab was leading the quiet life of a Canadian sociology professor. Prof. Diab was teaching at both Carleton University and the University of Ottawa, was said to be a popular colleague and teacher. After leaving the violence of his native Lebanon and earning his doctorate in the United States, Prof. Diab, 54, received his Canadian citizenship and appeared to settle into Ottawa. There, friends said he was a secular man with an interest in sociology and Middle East studies, and was not without a warm side. "He has a great rapport with students," said Carleton professor...