B'nai Brith pleas for new PM to make Canada safe for Jews

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OTTAWA — As Canadian Jews cast a wary eye on the newly-minted Mark Carney government, one group is calling on the Liberals to quell Canada’s explosion of antisemitism.

In a letter penned to the PM this week, B’nai Brith Canada outlined measures Carney needs to take as the House of Commons prepares to awaken from its months-long slumber.

“This previously unimaginable rise in anti-Jewish hatred has had a profound negative impact on the day-to-day lives of Jewish Canadians,” the letter states.

“Jewish persons have increasingly become the targets of physical assault, threatening harassment (both online and in person), and grotesque intimidation.”

Popular targets for these violent, far-left radicals are Jewish schools, community centres, synagogues and businesses — frequent sites of protests, vandalism, and even shootings and bomb threats.

The letter contained priorities for a number of cabinet portfolios.

Canada’s next public safety minister, the letter says, must confront threats posed by ideologically-motivated extremists.

“Doing so will not only ensure that the threat posed by actors promoting hate-motivated and foreign-aligned extremist ideologies are sufficiently evaluated but will enable the minister to utilize all available resources to confront and mitigate these threats,” the letter read.

Canada’s next justice minister, for example, must do more to stop the spread of hate crimes online, while the next immigration minister needs to do a better job of ensuring those associated with hate or terror are barred from entering Canada.

B’nai Brith Canada’s Richard Robertson told the Toronto Sun he looks forward to working with the new government to end Canada’s scourge of hate.

“We’ve seen a 124% increase in antisemitism since 2022,” he said.

“This is a situation that many Jewish Canadians never believed they would find themselves in, it’s a situation that’s becoming untenable and having a drastic impact on the day-to-day lives of Jewish Canadians.”

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Observers in the Middle East are also keeping a sharp eye on Ottawa.

Gerald Steinberg, founder and president of Jerusalem-based think tank NGO Monitor, said it remains to be seen how Canada-Israel relations will fare under Carney.

“For 10 years, Canada has been largely irrelevant, other than in providing large sums for ‘aid’ that fuels the violence and is routinely diverted to terror, particularly through UNRWA,” Steinberg said.

“Ottawa’s foreign policy has echoed European virtue signaling and often repeats false accusations that demonize Israel, and contribute to the Jew hatred and violent attacks on Canadian campuses and in major cities,” he said. “Israelis and others will watch closely to see whether Carney’s new government will change course in a positive direction, and restore at least some influence.”

bpassifiume@postmedia.com
X: @bryanpassifiume