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Ontario School Board Warns of $1,000 "Reward" for Recordings of Muslim Students Praying

The cash reward is meant to identify students "spewing hate" — and is the latest front in a battle against religious accommodation in Ontario.

An Ontario school board is warning staff to be "extra vigilant" about a video circulating online that offers a $1,000 reward for recordings of Muslim students "spewing hate speech during Friday prayers."

The video is the latest development in the controversy surrounding the accommodation of Friday prayers, which has been around in some form for nearly 20 years at the Peel District School Board, located near Toronto.

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A group of parents has been campaigning hard for the last two months to convince the board to end the accommodation of the congregational prayers, which last 15 to 20 minutes at midday, culminating in a heated meeting last week, that devolved into chaos and saw a Quran torn to shreds.

Police are now looking into a video posted on March 29 by former fringe Mississauga mayoral candidate Kevin Johnston that calls on viewers to send in videos of Muslim students praying within 24 hours of filming them. Johnston, who runs a right wing blog called Freedom Report, says the person submitting the video must identify students by name and reveal the school they go to.

"I am offering $1,000 of my own money, cash reward, for any of you out there that can sneak a camera into one of these mosque-eterias or mosque-stages or mosque-gymnasiums and get me the footage."

They'd also have to be willing to turn ownership of the footage over to Johnston, who falsely claims that sermons are delivered in Arabic and that supervisors are paid — in fact, they are conducted in English, except for verses read directly from the Quran and are supervised by volunteer staff members.

Johnston also said he had Arabic translators on hand who would help him determine if the sermons contain "anti-Jewish, anti-Christian, and anti-infidel" hate speech.

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