GOLDEN GATE GABFEST — Prime Minister JUSTIN TRUDEAU heads to San Francisco this week for the annual Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation ministerial meeting, the first time the City by the Bay is hosting the event. So too are Foreign Affairs Minister MELANIE JOLY and Trade Minister MARY NG. — On the PM’s APEC agenda: Talking with world leaders about “opportunities in the digital economy, sustainable economic growth, women’s economic empowerment, trade facilitation, and energy and food security.” — If you’re going to San Francisco … Don’t expect a gentle ride. Trudeau and Co. will have a hard time escaping certain thorny issues. The summit is being hosted on the home turf of big American tech giants, which Canada has rankled in a few ways through new online publishing and tax policies. The JOE BIDEN administration is urging the international community behind the scenes to extend the moratorium on a global digital services tax … as Canada pushes in the other direction. Without a signed agreement, expect fireworks to fly come January. — Not just the U.S.: You also might have noticed Canada and India aren’t on the best of terms at the moment and that Canada’s Indo-Pacific strategy ran into a … hitch. Ottawa is looking to diversify its engagement and trade with Indo-Pac countries while the India part of the strategy is on ice, following the drama unleashed by Trudeau’s international assassination allegation. Secretary of State ANTONY BLINKENsaid the U.S. wants to see Canada and India move ahead in the investigation of the murder of Khalistan activist HARDEEP SINGH NIJJAR. Trudeau’s comments Friday produced a new wave of negative press in India ahead of the summit. He said the country “violated the Vienna Convention” by “arbitrarily revoking the diplomatic immunity of over 40 Canadian diplomats in India.”“If bigger countries can violate international law without consequences, then the whole world gets more dangerous for everyone,” he said. — Big items for the U.S.: Reporter QUEENIE WONGwrites in the LA Times that the major meeting of world leaders isn’t expected to produce “any major breakthroughs,” but a few issues are top-of-mind for Biden: U.S.-Chinese tensions, climate change, drug trafficking, the Israel-Hamas conflict and Russia’s war with Ukraine. FROM FAINT HUM TO ROAR — This is the last parliamentary constituency “break” week before the annual Christmas countdown crunch that sends the nation’s political machinery whirring into overdrive. — Soon to dominate the agenda: The state of Canada’s finances in tough economic times. The rush to introduce pharmacare legislation that will test the viability of the Liberal-NDP pact. And the Conservatives’ push for a carbon-tax carve-out for farmers as the bill that would do that, C-234, finds itself gummed up in the Senate. — Bureaucrats duke it out: Circle Tuesday in your calendar for the one big event set to bring high-stakes parliamentary drama this week. The government’s Chief Technology Officer MINH DOAN is scheduled to appear before the government operations committee for a return serve following last week’s juicy twist in the ArriveCAN saga. CAMERON MACDONALD, an assistant deputy minister at Health Canada, had told the committee Doan lied to MPs at an earlier appearance, when the government’s top IT guy said he wasn’t involved in the decision to hire GCStrategies to build the controversial C$54 million pandemic-era travel app. Under fire in Question Period about the revelations last week, Trudeau called the allegations “extremely concerning.”CAMPBELL CLARK’s take in the Globe on the rarity of such a bureaucratic brawl: “This doesn’t happen in Ottawa.” COMMUNITIES ON EDGE — Following a string of hate-related incidents, such as firebombings of Montreal synagogues and bullets fired into Jewish schools in that same city, antisemitism was a theme that coursed through the weekend political talk circuit, as the Israel-Hamas conflict stretches into its sixth week. --> On Global’s West Block, Liberal House Leader KARINA GOULDtold MERCEDES STEPHENSON that “there’s a lot of sadness and fear out there,” and many, “particularly Jewish people right now, are feeling very worried here in Canada.” “We’ve seen a huge rise in antisemitism. We’ve seen a huge rise in Islamophobia as well. And both of those things are, in many ways, two sides of the same coin.” --> On CTV’s Question Period, Canada's Special Envoy on Preserving Holocaust Remembrance and Combatting Antisemitism DEBORAH LYONS said “we have to come together — all Canadian communities, all Canadian leadership — to address this almost unprecedented time of pain and suffering and confusion, and anxiety about the future.” She appeared alongside AMIRA ELGHAWABY, Canada’s special representative on combatting Islamophobia. --> Lyons also made it on ROSEMARY BARTON LIVE, where she said she’s only into the fourth week of her job, and she’s spent a lot of her time on the road hearing from Jewish communities across Canada. “This is not an Ottawa-bubble job.” — Who’s saying what: Montreal Liberal MP ANTHONY HOUSEFATHERposted on X: “Nothing happening in the Middle East excuses antisemitic hate & threats & attacks in Canada.” Conservative MP MELISSA LANTSMAN on the shots fired at the school on Sunday: “How many times does this need to happen before the Federal government takes concrete action? Enough with the words.” Former Public Safety Minister MARCO MENDICINO, also on the gunshots: “These criminals need to be caught, stopped and cracked down on.” | 
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