When I served as mayor of Edmonton, I took pride in knowing our city was a place where people from every corner of the earth could build better lives for their families, celebrate their heritage, and co-exist in safety and mutual respect.
Our focus was on bringing people together, but today I watch that delicate fabric being torn apart — not by outside forces, but from within City Hall itself. As a Jewish Edmontonian, I know that inflammatory rhetoric increasingly impacts my own sense of safety. As a former mayor, I also worry about what it means for the inclusive, thriving multicultural city that generations of civic leaders worked so hard to build and pass on to all of us.
When an elected representative uses their public platform to amplify dangerous misinformation about a foreign conflict and alienate a minority population, it is a profound failure of civic leadership.
Yet this is exactly what Coun. Michael Janz has chosen. Unprompted, Janz used his councillor’s platform to share dangerous and false rhetoric about Israel to his Edmonton-based constituency and then went further and questioned whether there should be an Israel pavilion at the Edmonton Heritage Festival —effectively suggesting punishment for a local community based on misinformation about a foreign conflict.
When confronted about his falsehood, Coun. Janz offered no apology, no clarification, and no accountability — he simply deleted the post and doubled down by moving on to more disinformation. Sharing such claims goes beyond criticizing a foreign government; it echoes historical tropes of demonization that serve to dehumanize our neighbours.
And rather than encouraging people to enjoy the Heritage Festival as it’s intended — as an opportunity to engage across all our diverse communities and to celebrate and share the rich mosaic that makes up our city — he wants to use it to selectively marginalize and exclude. Rather than acknowledging the very real risks of antisemitism in Canada and ensuring this festival is a place where Jewish Edmontonians, too, can celebrate a connection to an ancestral homeland, he seeks to forcibly separate Edmonton Jews from their cultural ties, vilifying anyone who dares to associate with their heritage. The message it sends to our community is chilling: Your culture is only welcome if it passes my political approval.
In Edmonton today, I worry that we are watching a severe breakdown of local Muslim-Jewish relations. During my time in public life, I saw Muslim and Jewish leaders sit together, break bread, and collaborate to combat prejudice and support shared civic goals. Both communities want peace, dignity, and an end to human suffering.
However, when an elected councillor acts as an agent of division rather than a bridge-builder, those vital relationships are fractured. Instead of encouraging constructive dialogue or empathy, Janz’s actions pit neighbours against each other and sow distrust. Edmonton city council exists to serve all Edmontonians and to protect the peace and unity of our local neighbourhoods.
Bringing foreign conflicts home to ostracize a local ethnic community does nothing to bring peace overseas — it only imports division and fear into our own backyard. And it distracts city hall from the responsibilities it has to make a difference on the ground to improve life for all Edmontonians.
We deserve leaders who bring us together, who respect factual truth, and who uphold the principle that every citizen, regardless of their background or faith, belongs here. It is time for city council to reject this reckless rhetoric and get on with the job of restoring Edmonton as a place where everyone can thrive and live in safety.
Stephen Mandel is a former mayor of Edmonton.
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