{"id":27515,"date":"2026-05-01T10:28:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-01T10:28:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/27515\/"},"modified":"2026-05-01T10:28:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-01T10:28:09","slug":"antisemitism-is-quantifiably-bad-in-canada-are-canadians-just-going-to-accept-that","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/27515\/","title":{"rendered":"Antisemitism is quantifiably bad in Canada. Are Canadians just going to accept that?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Two Jewish men were stabbed after leaving a synagogue in London this week \u2013 the same area where a volunteer Jewish organization\u2019s ambulances were torched a few weeks ago. (The first responders at the latest attack? A volunteer Jewish neighbourhood watch group<\/a>.)<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s no longer safe to be visibly Jewish on the streets of London,\u201d a (non-Jewish) woman, Jan Bowman, said at a demonstration<\/a> afterward. <\/p>\n

Canadians do not want this kind of hatred here. But we are well on our way. Recent examples <\/a>include a man trying to force his way into a synagogue last weekend just north of Toronto. The next day, a few kilometres south, a stone was thrown through the window of a Judaica shop.<\/p>\n

At a bar mitzvah I attended in Toronto recently, the rabbi began the service by explaining the emergency plan in case of an attack. At a synagogue. To beaming relatives and 13-year-old kids.<\/p>\n

In case individual events aren\u2019t enough to convince the public at large, two reports released in the space of a week have come to the same general conclusion: antisemitism in Canada is at an inflection point, to quote the Standing Senate Committee on Human Rights. <\/p>\n

Marsha Lederman: Antisemitism has reached alarming levels. Now what?<\/a><\/p>\n

B\u2019nai Brith Canada\u2019s League for Human Rights\u2019 annual audit<\/a> of antisemitic incidents for 2025 calls it a \u201cnational crisis.\u201d Last year, the organization documented 6,800 incidents, the equivalent of more than 18 per day \u2013 and the highest number since it started keeping track in 1982. The increase since 2022, the year before the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on Israel that led to Israel\u2019s Gaza war, tells the real story: 145.6 per cent.<\/p>\n

They\u2019re not all shootings at schools<\/a>, and not all hate crimes, but the findings are troubling \u2013 or should be. Harassment forms the bulk of the incidents \u2013 most of it online \u2013 but there were also nearly 300 reported incidents of vandalism, and 10 reports of violence.<\/p>\n

The hate is coming from the left and the right, the report states \u2013 from teachers, student unions, a realtor. Swastikas on election signs, in public schools, on a student\u2019s dorm-room door at the University of Guelph. A group of Jewish middle-school students on a bus told by a passenger to go back to the concentration camps. Uber drivers refusing Jewish passengers. \u201cKill all Jews\u201d scrawled on bathroom walls at Concordia and McGill Universities.<\/p>\n

Lest one is inclined to deny the severity of the problem outlined by a Jewish organization\u2019s report (which would be in and of itself antisemitic), the Senate Committee\u2019s findings are also alarming.<\/p>\n

\u201cCanadian Jews have understandably felt unsafe,\u201d the report states.<\/a><\/p>\n

What is beyond comprehension is that this has been allowed to continue.<\/p>\n

For instance, Revi Mula with Canadian Women Against Antisemitism told the committee that some \u201crape crisis centres, shelters, and women\u2019s organizations have\u201d refused Jewish women due to their identity being equated with the actions of Israel.<\/p>\n

The committee also heard that increased security does not necessarily deter or reduce antisemitic events. Still, it\u2019s necessary.<\/p>\n

Australia\u2019s Royal Commission on Antisemitism and Social Cohesion, which was created after the massacre at Sydney\u2019s Bondi Beach, released an interim report<\/a> on Thursday that also noted a sharp rise in antisemitism. Among the revelations: days before 15 people were killed at the beach\u2019s Hanukkah celebrations, the region\u2019s Jewish security organization asked police to beef up security at Hanukkah events in Sydney, given the high threat level. Police said they could not devote additional officers, but would send patrols by.<\/a><\/p>\n

While police and security are now highly visible fixtures at many Canadian Jewish institutions, we\u2019re not quite at the point where the community needs to provide its own ambulances. <\/p>\n

Let\u2019s not get there.<\/p>\n

Both Canadian reports recommend the creation of a federal antisemitism task force. B\u2019nai Brith calls for more resources to protect Jews and Jewish institutions. The Senate Committee lists 22 recommendations, including education, training and a public awareness campaign.<\/p>\n

Great. The government needs to provide leadership, yes; police need to offer protection, and the courts, enforcement. But top-down can\u2019t work alone.<\/p>\n

Canadians in general have a role, too: a demonstration of the will required for change. If the urgency of this specific form of hate isn\u2019t resonating with the populace, how much will a public awareness campaign accomplish? Yes, education is key. But some tough mirror-gazing is also necessary.<\/p>\n

\u201cDo we want Canada to be the nation that succumbed to the forces of hate and abandoned its Jewish community in their time of need?\u201d writes B\u2019nai Brith Canada\u2019s Richard Robertson. \u201cIs that the narrative that we want to symbolize this chapter of our collective history?\u201d <\/p>\n

Every right-thinking Canadian should emphatically answer no \u2013 and not just Jewish Canadians. What do we want this country to be? <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Two Jewish men were stabbed after leaving a synagogue in London this week \u2013 the same area where…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":27516,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[17,3118,135,13111,13110,3119,361],"class_list":{"0":"post-27515","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-canada","8":"tag-canada","9":"tag-column","10":"tag-dei","11":"tag-lederman","12":"tag-marsha-lederman","13":"tag-opinion","14":"tag-pleasemod"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27515","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27515"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27515\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/27516"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27515"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27515"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27515"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}