Kahnawake Chief bristles at suggestion that the Mohawks are terrorists

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The message from Kahnawake Mohawks is unwavering and loud.

They will not buckle under to pressure from the provincial or federal governments or the residents of nearby Chateauguay, who have been particularly inconvenienced by the blockade of the Mercier Bridge.

The Mohawks blocked the bridge July 11 in support of Mohawks at Kanesatake near Oka after a failed attempt by the Surete du Quebec to dismantle a Kanesatake blockade of Highway 344. The violent, early morning assault left Cpl. Marcel Lemay dead.

The standoff at Oka and Chateauguay continues.

Grand Chief Joseph Norton on Kahnawake didn't mince words in a passionate speech at a peace rally near Oka Sunday (July 29) under blistering skies.

He bristled at a suggestion by Parti Quebecois leader Jacques Parizeau that Mohawks were "terrorists."

If peaceful negotiations failed to resolve the impasse between the Mohawks and Indians, whatever force is necessary should be used, Parizeau had said.

"I have a 16-year-old son out there. He's not a terrorist. He's not a murderer. He's not a criminal. My wife and I did not raise that boy to be any of those things, but he knows what his duty is and how can I stop him? I can't. My son is ready to sacrifice himself, so are a lot of others. They know it is right. We know it is right Kanesatake knows it is right.

Norton acknowledged there had been divisions in the community of Kahnawake, but said the Mohawks had pulled together to fight a united battle.

He left no doubt the fight would continue.

Mohawks will "fight and die for their land, for their future." The young man, who stood here with those two babies in his arms, that's what it's about. We will fight and die for those two young babies and the others. We will arm ourselves and fight for our land if no one else will defend us.

"Our great trustee, the federal government, doesn't want to defend us. The United Nations doesn't want to defend us, because they do no respect or understand our view, our nationhood, our sovereignty, our ways," said Norton.

"What we saw and what the people of Kanestake had to endure was an attack on them, on their sovereignty, an attempt to kill people, not simply to remove a barricade," he said, his voice rising in anger, "to kill them and to kill their spirit and to put Mohawk people down as well as send a message right across the country to all Native people, 'Don't you dare try to do anything of that nature, because we're stronger and we're right and we'll use our army and our police force to push you down.'"

"But what did you see? A handful of Mohawk men, women, and children repelled several hundred riot squad Quebec provincial police officers," he said to cheers from many of the 2,000 people in attendance.

The defeat embarrassed the police force and the Quebec government leading to "anger, frustration, hatred and racism, because they couldn't defeat a handful of people."

Cpl. Lemay was as much a victim of the Quebec government as were Native people said Norton, whose brother Don sang a song of condolence for Lemay's family.