School Board Votes to Support Candidate who Smeared Rival, Acted in ‘Undignified’ Manner

For a moment, Shalani Bel thought she’d finally found justice.

Bel was a candidate in a 2024 school board election that saw a political rival smear her as “Ms. Gaza” while others attempted to associate Bel with antisemitism. Soon, her children said their classmates had heard Bel was an antisemite and supporter of the militant group Hamas.

In the end, Bel lost the election, accepted the result and moved on with her life. But she still decided to file a complaint with the English Montreal School Board (EMSB)’s ethics commissioner.

“I wanted my children to see their mom standing up for herself,” said Bel, a Concordia University teacher whose three kids attend EMSB schools. “I am a woman of colour in a world where we don’t always see justice done. I wanted my kids to know we can fight back.”

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It took nearly two years, but in a Feb. 2 ruling, the ethics commissioner found that Bel’s rival candidate, Julien Feldman, did in fact smear her. Feldman referred to Bel as “Ms. Gaza” in a text message to an EMSB voter and continued to attack her on social media throughout the campaign.

The commissioner ruled that Feldman’s behaviour was “neither dignified nor in keeping with his office,” suspended him for 15 days, ordered him to make a $250 donation to UNICEF, and publicly apologize to Bel.

“I was extremely gratified with the decision,” said Bel. “We cannot do politics this way, especially not when we’re being elected to help our kids in school.”

But her victory was short-lived.

At an EMSB council meeting on Feb. 10, Feldman’s colleagues voted to invalidate the ethics commissioner’s findings and rescind his punishment. This, despite evidence that he had lied about the text message and had six prior sanctions for similar ethics violations over the past 16 years.

In the end, every EMSB commissioner save for one — Jessica Houde-Woyciuk — voted for a motion to exonerate Feldman because of “non-compliance with delays,” as first reported in The Montreal Gazette. In school board elections, candidates run with parties, and the councillors who absolved Feldman were part of his team, led by EMSB chair Joe Ortona.

The EMSB did not provide further comment, and none of the 10 councillors contacted by The Rover responded to our questions as of publication.

Two sources inside the EMSB said the motion presented by the ethics and governance committee wasn’t part of the agenda circulated ahead of the meeting. It was added just before the meeting and councillors had only a few minutes to read the motion before voting on it, according to the sources. 

Further complicating matters, Feldman sits on the ethics and governance board, though it’s unclear whether he participated in any discussions regarding the motion as none of the councillors contacted by The Rover responded to our request for comment.

The sources say Feldman wasn’t present for the vote to rescind his punishment.

“On the face of it, that’s so corrupt. That (Feldman) was part of the committee that absolved him, it’s hard to trust that process,” Bel said. “The whole time, I wanted to believe that it was just him who was at fault. I filed one complaint, just against him, and I had the evidence to back it up. I don’t know why the rest of the council made it so easy for him to do this.”

In Quebec, the EMSB plays a pivotal role in anglophone politics, often serving as a launchpad for higher political office. Former commissioner Patricia Lattanzio moved on to become a federal member of parliament with the Liberals in 2019, and Paolo Galati was elected to Laval’s city council in 2021 after serving on EMSB council. There are current and former council members who worked for Liberal MP Anthony Housefather and former Liberal MP Marlene Jennings.

The current slate of councillors all ran under the same ticket as board chair Ortona, who was a candidate for Ensemble Montréal in last year’s municipal elections. Some of Ortona’s candidates had experience doing fieldwork for federal elections and canvassing for potential voters.

In Bel’s case, she says it was her middle child — a teenager — who acted as her de facto campaign manager. And it was him who was most affected by the smear campaign.

“It hurt me, how much it affected my son,” Bel said. “A lot of people with much more experience in EMSB politics warned me about Feldman. They said he plays dirty and to watch out for him. I didn’t pay attention because I still couldn’t believe anyone would stoop so low for this kind of office. It’s a school board election.”

The text message in which Feldman referred to Bel as “Ms. Gaza” was sent to the parent of an EMSB student who was eligible to vote in the 2024 elections. Frédéric Henri, who issued the ethics ruling, wrote that Feldman’s rhetoric against Bel extended to social media with the goal of tarnishing her reputation among voters.

Throughout roughly 40 hours of ethics hearings, Bel represented herself before the ethics commissioner while Feldman was represented by an attorney paid for by the school board.  When factoring in preparation for the case, Bel estimates the legal fees paid for by the EMSB are in the tens of thousands of dollars.

During his testimony, Feldman first argued that “Ms. Gaza” wasn’t in reference to Bel but rather EMSB volunteer Mubeenah Mughal. He then said that it was an “off-the-cuff” remark in a private text message sent to another member of the Jewish community. His argument later evolved to claim that he was using “Ms. Gaza” in reference to Bel’s campaign style.

Under cross-examination, Feldman was forced to admit that there was no evidence of Bel ever taking a public position about Israel’s war on Gaza. This, according to Henri’s 54-page ruling, undermined Feldman’s credibility.

Bel had also claimed that Feldman enlisted other candidates in a smear campaign against her, but Henri said there wasn’t enough evidence to support this claim.

“I don’t think Feldman actually believes I’m ‘Ms. Gaza,’ I really think it was just a political tactic,” Bel said. “But I know there’s at least one elected EMSB commissioner who has told people I support terrorism. To have a majority of (council) take the side of the people smearing me, I think it reflects poorly on the EMSB.”

Beyond its ties to the federal and provincial Liberals, the EMSB has played a major role in checking the Quebec government’s power. The school board won its challenge to Quebec’s Bill 21 religious symbols ban in Quebec’s Superior Court, where a 2021 ruling struck down parts of the law as unconstitutional. 

And while that ruling was overturned on appeal, the EMSB is continuing its fight against the religious discrimination of Muslim, Jewish and Sikh teachers before the Supreme Court. Bel says the EMSB’s decision to absolve Feldman undermines this very important work.

“I’ve had Black, Brown and Muslim parents talk to me about how they are afraid to speak out, they’re afraid they’ll receive the same treatment I did,” Bel said. “The EMSB has a huge role to play in advancing the rights of minorities in Quebec. But to see the council just wash its hands of this, none of these parents feel safe anymore.”

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