Widespread condemnation among members of the Muslim community in Canada for the recent Supreme Court ruling in favor of the perpetrator of the attack that killed six people in a Quebec mosque several years ago.

The National Council of Canadian Muslims criticized a ruling issued by the Supreme Court on Friday, May 27, 2022, in favor of the perpetrator of the “terrorist attack” on a mosque in Quebec City in 2017, which resulted in the death of 6 Muslims and injury of 19.

The Supreme Court of Canada issued a ruling allowing the perpetrator, Alexander Bissonette, to apply for parole after 25 years of his conviction.

The council said in a statement that Muslims in Canada are still suffering from that crime.

He added that the families of the victims will have to remember this crime 20 years from now, when the time comes to grant a pardon to the perpetrator.

In 2019, Alexander Bissonette was sentenced to life imprisonment without parole eligibility for 40 years, and the court said that “imposing a sentence longer than the killer’s life expectancy” could lead to “raising doubts about the credibility of the judicial system.”

The Supreme Court ruled the unconstitutionality of one of the 2011 Criminal Code provisions that allow the judge to sentence to life imprisonment and consecutive parole ineligibility periods of 25 years for each murder in the case of committing multiple murders.

The Supreme Court said this violates the Charter of Rights and Freedoms which calls for fair and non-cruel treatment of offenders, explaining that this could deprive them of the possibility of parole before death, which is not consistent with human dignity.

Recent years have witnessed an increase in hate crimes against Muslims in Canada, especially since the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States.

The peak of hatred was the attack on the “Quebec” mosque in 2017, when a gunman killed 6 Muslims and wounded 19 others during the Isha prayer.

There was also a vehicular attack in June 2021 against a Muslim family of Pakistani origin in London, Ontario, resulting in the death of 4 of its members, when a truck driver named Nathaniel Veltman (20 years old) deliberately ran them over.

Last April, 6 worshippers were injured in a drive-by shooting outside a mosque in the city of Toronto.