כצפוי מספר הישראלים המעוניינים לעזוב למדינה אחרת לאור המשבר הקשה הפוקד את המדינה בימים אלה הולך וגדל. זאת בעיקר לאור הרפורמה במערכת המשפטית אותה מציעה ממשלת הימין בראשות ראש הממשלה, בנימין נתניהו. קנדה משמשת באופן קבוע אחד היעדים הבולטים בעולם להגירה כולל לאלה שרוצים להגיע מישראל. בקנדה יש כיום את הריכוז השלישי-רביעי בעולם של יהודים הגרים מחוץ לישראל וגם נקודה זו חשובה לישראלים
הנה מספר תגובות בנושא שמתפרסמות בימים אלה בפורומים השונים של ישראלים בקנדה של פייסבוק – בנושא המעבר מישראל אל קנדה
אלינור כהן כותבת: יש עלייה של מאה אחוז במספר הבקשות שאני מנהלת ואני מוצפת בשאלות ממשפחות שחושבות לעבור לגור בקנדה מהסיבות הכי עצובות שיש
לגבי נושא המחאה נגד תוכנית הרפורמה במערכת המשפט כותבת דפנה קדם: בטורונטו וונקובר אנו מוחים זה שבוע שלישי למען שמירת הדמוקרטיה בישראל. היא מציעה למעוניינים להצטרף לקבוצות המחאה בטורונטו, ונקובר או גם בערים אחרות בקנדה
אסנת קמחי חושבת לעבור עם המשפחה לקנדה. היא שואלת: אנו חושבים לעבור לקנדה. נשמח לקבל עצות, טיפים והמלצות
דניאלה בואנו גם היא מעוניינת לעבור לקנדה. היא כותבת בפורום: מחפשת לעשות רילוקיישן לקנדה עם בעלי והילד בן השנה. יש לי ניסיון של שלוש שנים בצילומי רנטגן של שיניים. אשמח באם תוכלו לעזור לי בנושא
ליאת מרסו מחפשת עזרה דחופה בנוגע להגירה לקנדה ושואלת איך מתחילים ובמי היא יכולה להיעזר
עידן סטולרוב מחפשת עורך דין מומחה להגירה לקנדה
נטלי קיינן מחפשת להכיר ישראלים שגרים באדמונטון שבמחוז אלברטה כיוון שהיא מעוניינת להגר לשם
ג’ניפר סיל כותבת כי אחיה בן העשרים ושתיים הוא שחקן כדורגל (חופשי) שמעוניין לעבור לקנדה. היא שואלת האם מישהו מכיר סוכן מקומי או מישהו אחר שיכול לעזור לו
אלמוני המציין כי משפחתו מתכננת להגר לקנדה בקיץ הקרוב. הוא שואל האם ניתן לפתוח חשבון בנק בקנדה און-ליין מישראל, כדי להעביר כספים לקראת ההגעה
אלדד בלייש שמעוניין לעבור לקנדה הוא טכנאי רנטגן. הוא שואל האם בקנדה מקבלים תעודות רשמיות מישראל ומה התהליך לאישורן
מאיה טאוב מעוניינת לעבור לקנדה והיא שואלת מה האתגר המרכזי של זוגיות ברילוקיישן
אלמונית כותבת כי היא גרה כיום בישראל. היא מעוניינת לחדש את האזרחות הקנדית שלה ולהשיג אזרחות קנדית לבעלה ולילדים. היא שואלת כיצד עושים זאת בצורה היעילה ביותר ומה התנאים לכך
מעיין עופרי שהיא פרמדיקית בישראל שואלת בפורום על פרמדיקים שעובדים כיום בקנדה. היא רוצה מידע מפורט בתחום התעסוקה הזה
מספר הפורומים של ישראלים בקנדה בפייסבוק הולך וגדל עם השנים. הרשימה כוללת כיום בין היתר: חמישה פורומים שונים בעלי אותו שם של ישראלים בקנדה (הכוללים 18 אלף חברים, שמונת אלפים חברים, שבעת אלפים חברים, שש מאות חברים, כחמש מאות חברים, כשלוש מאות חברים), שני פורומים בעלי אותו שם של ישראלים בטורונטו (הכוללים כעשרים ואחד אלף חברים ועשרת אלפים חברים), ישראלים החיים בקנדה (הכולל כארבעת אלפים ושש מאות חברים), ישראלים בהייטק באמריקה – מיועד לאלה שגרים בארה”ב ובקנדה (כולל כארבעת אלים חברים), סטודנטים ישראלים בקנדה (כולל אלף שלוש מאות חברים), שני פורומים בעלי או שם של ישראלים באמריקה – מיועד לאלה שגרים בארה”ב ובקנדה (כוללים עשרים אלף חברים ואלף ארבע מאות חברים) וכן קנדה למטיילים (הכולל כתשעת אלפים חברים)
Dr. Einat Wilf and Mark Regev spoke at a Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs event Feb. 9.
Canadian Jews who don’t like the look of Israel’s new government should not withdraw from engagement with that country and its discourse, but get more involved, says Dr. Einat Wilf, a former Labour party member of the Knesset.
Leaders in the North American Jewish community are expressing concerns over the new government and aspects of its policy agenda, while others worry that the always-present fear of schisms between Israeli and Diaspora Jewry could be reaching a breaking point. But Wilf said this is a time for overseas Jews to act strategically to influence policies that reflect their priorities.
Wilf, who served in the Knesset from 2010 to 2013, is an author, businessperson and one-time foreign policy advisor to Shimon Peres. She was part of a panel convened by the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs Feb. 9. Wilf engaged with Mark Regev, who is chair of the Abba Eban Institute for Diplomacy and Foreign Relations at Reichman University and a former spokesperson and senior foreign affairs advisor to Binyamin Netanyahu. He also served as Israel’s ambassador to the United Kingdom. Yaron Deckel, the Jewish Agency for Israel’s director for Canada and a veteran Israeli journalist, moderated the event.
Wilf said it is up to Canadian Jews to decide how to respond to the political situation in Israel. “But my personal view is that this is perhaps the time for Jews outside Israel to fund more and channel money and efforts to things that have to do not with welfare but actually with how Israel is Jewish,” she said. “North American Jews, if they want Israel to be hospitable to their kind of Jewish practice, they need to make a stark choice.”
The Conservative and Reform movements in Israel are simply too small to be major players in this discussion and so the more practical camp with which Diaspora adherents of those denominations can partner to meet their goals is the secular movement, Wilf said. This is the most likely way to advance policies such as egalitarian prayer at the Kotel, liberal interpretations of identity for aliyah and reducing the powers of the chief rabbinate.
Both panelists attempted to dispel some conventional wisdom, including that Israeli society is divided, turning its back on liberalism and getting more and more religious.
“Israeli democracy, as it stands now, is more inclusive, more representative of the greater diversity of voices than it has been probably throughout its history,” said Wilf. That diversity, by its very inclusiveness, has opened the door to ideas that can be considered contrary to traditional progressive Israeli values, she argued. “That means that more non-liberal voices are represented than ever before.”
Regev concurred. The “good old days” of early Israeli democracy were, he said, “a one-party state run by the Labour Party.… It was a much more conformist society, it was difficult for gays, it was difficult for women, it was a society that was more closed, it was difficult for Mizrahim,” he said. “Today, I have no doubt if you look at the trajectory, Israel is more liberal, more pluralist, more open, more free than ever before.”
A couple of decades ago, Regev noted, if you wanted to go out for dinner in Jerusalem on a Friday night, you had to travel to east Jerusalem. “Now, in Jewish Jerusalem, you have all sorts of places you can go to,” he said. “The idea that Israel is becoming only more religious, more Haredi, more Orthodox is just not true.”
One of the areas where most Israelis agree, said Wilf and Regev, is on the Palestinian issue. After Yasser Arafat ended the peace process and started the Second Intifada, and his successor Mahmoud Abbas demonstrated no more conciliatory a tone, Israelis realized the ball was not in their court. All they can do is wait for a change of leadership on the Palestinian side, both said.
The fiercest divisions in Israeli society right now are over proposals to reform the judiciary, including allowing the Knesset to override Supreme Court decisions by a majority vote and to hand the power of judicial appointments to politicians.
Deckel noted that Canadian legalist Irwin Cotler has warned that the judicial overhaul would make Israel a flawed democracy and other Jewish leaders in North America have spoken up in ways that are rare or unprecedented against some of what the new government is advocating.
“Is there really a threat to Israeli democracy?” asked Regev. “I’m not so sure. I don’t believe there is. I believe Israeli democracy is strong. I believe we can debate the pros and cons of the different judicial reforms put on the table without having to say this is the end of democracy.”
Both commentators think fears of the new government are overblown, although Wilf has a caveat. She has studied past Netanyahu governments and concluded their bark is generally worse than their bite or, at least, that the “hysteria” with which they were met was not commensurate with the policies they enacted.
“All Netanyahu governments, especially the one of 2015, were received with complete hysteria and none of it materialized,” said Wilf. “Sometimes the exact opposite. Netanyahu turned out to be much more centrist, careful, generally very much eschewing violence and conflict and even bringing peace agreements.”
A difference now, said Wilf, is that Netanyahu is head of a more ideologically narrow government, where in the past he had built fairly broad coalitions.
“For Netanyahu, that was very comfortable,” Regev said. “Because, when you have a coalition partner to the left of you and a coalition partner to the right of you, that allows you to be the conductor of the orchestra, so to speak.”
Regev sees a danger in Diaspora Jews who disagree with events in Israel airing dirty laundry, but Wilf said that is the least of her concerns. No matter who is in charge or what policies they advance, overseas opponents will make the same case, she said. “They still would have argued that Israel is a settler-colonial, apartheid, genocidal, white European blah blah blah,” she said. “That’s how they work.”
Addressing the widespread spike in antisemitism, Regev sees a silver lining. “You could be very cynical and you could say some things don’t change. But something has changed,” he said. “Something very important has changed. Unlike my father when he was a child and the Jews were stateless and defenceless and knocking on people’s doors [saying] ‘Please let me in so they won’t kill me,’ today we can proudly say that, if something has changed, the Jews have changed. We have a state. We have a successful state. With all our problems, Israel is a very successful country, politically, economically, diplomatically, militarily. We can protect ourselves.”
Gail Adelson-Marcovitz, national chair of the board of the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, opened the online event, which attracted more than 1,000 participants. “Many of us believe that Israel is a state of the totality of the Jewish people and not just its citizens,” she said. “While it is the citizens of Israel who elect their government, that choice has ramifications for many aspects of our partnership and specifically impacts Diaspora Jews. We feel that our interest must, at the very least, be heard, if not respected, particularly in those areas where we are impacted.”
Lindsey Tyne Johnson (photo from Lindsey Tyne Johnson)
Returning from a Birthright trip to Israel in 2019, artist Lindsey Tyne Johnson was inspired. Learning the aleph-bet, she made a laser-engraved spirit board in Hebrew, but accidentally arranged the letters left to right, as they would be in English, and not right to left, as Hebrew is read. The mistake spurred her not only to create the exhibit Hebrew Spelled Backwards, which is on display at the Kamloops Art Gallery until April 1, but to explore her cultural heritage, from which she had been estranged, and learn more about Judaism.
The other, more sombre, inspiration for the Hebrew spirit board and the exhibit was, Johnson writes in a blog post, a “desire to feel closer to my brother after the events that left him homeless and his eventual passing.”
“Born with the name Liam, my brother changed his name to his chosen Hebrew name, Noah as an adult,” she writes on her website (lindseytynejohnson.com). “My mother had mentioned our Jewish ancestry to us as children, but my brother was the only person to explore it…. I can still remember it as what my mother called ‘one of his many phases’ in his late teenage years. She chalked it up to a phase, but it’s the string I use to tie memories of my brother together.”
“My brother was the first person I witnessed who explored their Jewish heritage,” Johnson told the Independent. “When he moved to Vancouver in his early 20s, he legally changed his name to his Hebrew name, Noah. He struggled a lot with his mental health, and there were times when I felt like I was losing the brother I grew up with. It was an attempt to feel closer to him that I went on Birthright and had a bat mitzvah. I wanted to remember the part of him that was happy, passionate and excited about life.
“My brother lost his life to fentanyl in 2021. It was devastating and broke my family apart,” said Johnson, who has two other siblings. “Many struggle to understand substance abuse/mental illness’s connection to generational or cyclical trauma. It’s unfair to look down upon those who might suffer from those things. I try my best to advocate for the destigmatization of mental illness where I can, though I’ve had to be careful not to let others’ ideas also negatively affect my mental health.”
While not a large exhibit, Hebrew Spelled Backwards is powerful, thought-provoking in a serious way, but also using humour. For the exhibit’s images, Johnson explains on her website, “The sandy colour palette was chosen as a tribute to the desert, a significant location in Jewish history and culture. I use digital media to blend traditional Jewish motifs with modern techniques, creating a dynamic visual experience.”
Johnson said, “Like many artists, my process is sporadic and requires a particular head space to create something I’m happy with. I often have ideas for pieces while doing mundane daily activities; if I don’t write them down, they’re lost forever. I practise a lot of sequential art, which is usually silly comics about everyday life, but they’re generally never seen by other humans. My style reflects the graphic novels I like to consume. I can’t help but be inspired by artists like Craig Thompson and Marjane Satrapi, both visually and thematically. My dream is to produce a graphic novel one day.”
The Hebrew Spelled Backwards exhibit comprises not only Johnson’s artwork, but her voice. Each picture has a QR code and viewers can hear Johnson give explanations of the Hebrew words and some context for the images, making the exhibit more accessible and inclusive. The illustrations variously include Jewish symbols and/or Hebrew text, supernatural elements, pop art iconography (a Warholesque can of Birthright’s Instant Bat-Mitzvah, for example) and current topics of concern, like rapper Ye’s antisemitic comments, poignantly drawn as a short series of cellphone text messages from a mom to her child that ends with the child asking, “mum, why is ye mad at us?” This is one of the works that, as the exhibit description reads, “examines the complexities of identifying as Jewish and the fear and uncertainty that often come with it.”
“I have a couple of fears about identifying myself as Jewish,” Johnson told the Independent. “Initially, when diving into Jewish culture and Judaism as a religion, I was afraid people might not think I was ‘Jewish enough,’ since only one of my parents has Jewish ancestry. My siblings and I were raised without Jewish traditions or education…. Having a bat mitzvah really helped with that fear, though. I’m also grateful that I’ve never really encountered anyone from the Jewish communities I’ve belonged to that has made me feel that way.
“RaeF” by Lindsey Tyne Johnson
“The other part of that fear was that people would think differently of me or assume certain tropes or ideologies about me if I publicly identified myself as Jewish. This is an unfortunate reality I’ve experienced, even if subtly. Most commonly, people think I’m OK with antisemitic jokes or jokes that involve the Holocaust. It’s an exhausting thing to experience.”
Putting together the exhibit has allowed Johnson not only to explore her fears, but also her own biases.
“Creating these pieces required me to reflect on the experiences of people like Batsheva Dueck (aka Cynical Duchess, a modest fashion content creator) or more conservative Jews, who experience more assumptions made about them based on their dress or religious beliefs,” she said. “Since working on this exhibition, I’ve been more sensitive to times when I’ve excused antisemitic values expressed by my peers or acquaintances. When I lived in Brooklyn, I lived with someone who spoke quite negatively about Hasidic communities. This has been an excellent opportunity to witness my biases and encourage others to reflect on their biases or assumptions, too.
“It’s also allowed me to tie other pieces of my identity together,” she continued. “I’ve been able to connect my Irish ancestry with my Jewish ancestry, for example. It has given me a sense of wholeness or completeness and I’ve accepted that I can be many things all at the same time and I’ve accepted that that’s OK. We all contain multitudes.”
Johnson went to Ireland this past summer to visit where her Ashkenazi family moved to in the 19th century, and “to visit the Irish Jewish Museum and Waterford treasures.”
“I was probably in the fourth grade when my mother talked to my siblings and me about it,” said Johnson of first learning about her Jewish heritage. “It was after I had come home and talked about how we were learning about World War II at school. It was surreal to hear my mother, an immigrant from England, talk about a side of our ancestry that had never really been discussed before. I didn’t understand what it meant at the time.”
Johnson herself has lived many places. She was born in Edmonton in 1993, but her family moved to Saskatchewan and then Prince George, B.C., shortly after.
“I spent most of my youth in Prince George but moved to Dawson City, Yukon, as soon as I could save up enough money to attend the Yukon School of Visual Arts,” she said. “Yukon SOVA is a one-year foundational arts program. Still, I decided to stay in the Yukon upon completion and remained in the territory for about five years before I moved to Brooklyn in 2018. I was in Brooklyn for only half a year before moving to Kamloops to be closer to my family, but it made a lasting impression. Going from a territory of 35,000 people to my neighbourhood in Williamsburg with four times that amount was dizzying.”
Johnson said she loves the Kamloops Jewish community. “I joined shortly after moving to Kamloops from Brooklyn and felt incredibly welcomed,” she said. “The [Okanagan Jewish Community Centre] president, Heidi Coleman, is a huge inspiration and comfort to me. It’s pretty relaxed in terms of how often we have gatherings. We don’t have a synagogue or a place to meet, so we usually celebrate holidays at someone’s house. The ‘younger’ (20 to 30 years old) of us have a close bond, and I often have a group of us over for various holidays, too.”
Johnson is currently in her third year at Thompson Rivers University, where she is doing a bachelor’s in criminology. “I’m most interested in victimology,” she said. “I think Canada and most of the world fail victims of crime to an astronomical degree. It’s wild to think about how much attention we give criminals without considering how we could better support the survivor or victims of their crimes.”
Artistically, she is planning a piece that more specifically honours her brother Noah. “I want to educate the general public about how the consequences of generational or cyclical trauma can lead to mental health struggles like substance abuse,” she said. “I would like to highlight that it’s not specifically someone’s ‘fault’ for struggling the way they do.”
When news broke that a Jewish person had been shot near a Los Angeles synagogue on Wednesday a week ago, the police statement said there was “no evidence” that the shooter had been targeting Jewish people. When another Jewish person was shot the next day, near the same synagogue, police repeated that these appeared to be separate incidents and that there was again no evidence that Jews were being targeted. Both victims were injured but survived.
When a single suspect in both shootings was arrested Friday, it turned out he has a long history of bombarding Jewish acquaintances and others with violent antisemitic threats.
There is nothing to be gained by having police or anyone else speculate on motives during or in the immediate aftermath of a crime. But if police are going to venture in that direction anyway, why err on the side of randomness? Denying the possibility of antisemitic intent until evidence makes it impossible to do so is a too-common response. It has happened around the world.
In 2015, two days after terrorists murdered 12 people at the offices of the French magazine Charlie Hebdo, ISIS-affiliated extremists took hostages and murdered four people at a kosher supermarket in Paris. Then-U.S. president Barack Obama referred to the attack on an explicitly Jewish store as “a bunch of violent, vicious zealots who … randomly shoot a bunch of folks in a deli in Paris.” There was, of course, nothing random about the “deli” that was chosen.
It happened again during an antisemitic attack in Jersey City, N.J., in December 2019, when six people were murdered. Police initially said they believed the kosher market was randomly chosen and there was no evidence of terrorism. Within hours, they acknowledged that the perpetrators had “targeted the location they attacked.”
In 2022, there was an 11-hour hostage-taking at a synagogue in Colleyville, Tex., in which there were thankfully no casualties but the perpetrator. A police spokesperson said immediately after the incident that the hostage-taker’s demands were “specifically focused on issues not connected to the Jewish community” and, two days later, officials amended this to “a terrorism-related matter, in which the Jewish community was targeted.”
The reality was less oblique. The perpetrator chose that synagogue because it was closest to the federal penitentiary holding a terrorist he sought to free. He chose a synagogue because that would be the surest way to get his demands met since, as he told the hostages, the U.S. “only cares about Jewish lives” and because “Jews control the world.”
What is this instinct to deny that antisemitism is a cause of antisemitic violence until the evidence makes denial untenable?
In her book People Love Dead Jews, Dara Horn posits that efforts at Holocaust education in recent years may be having the opposite of the intended effect. Rather than making people sensitive to anti-Jewish ideas or crimes, it may set the bar too high. When a few people are murdered in Paris or shot in Los Angeles, after all, it’s not the Holocaust. If the only thing a person (or a society) knows about antisemitism is the Holocaust, then cases of hate crimes involving a couple of people are, well, nothing to get too concerned about.
There may be a denial not only of the magnitude, but of the very existence of the phenomenon itself. We are in a time of reckoning about race and racism. These issues are a central fact in our collective discourse. But antisemitism does not fit neatly into this narrative. When skin colour is the defining factor, white-passing Jews are excluded from the discourse and non-white Jews are made even more invisible than they too often already are. Moreover, the outcomes by which racism is measured are, to some extent, economic inequities. Proof of racism is seen in reduced economic outcomes: higher unemployment, lower household wealth, fewer opportunities. These are not, collectively, how antisemitism manifests. Ergo, in some eyes, this means antisemitism does not exist – or does not have the serious, quantifiable impacts other forms of racism have.
Antisemitic incidents, including violent crime, are at alarming levels, according to every survey and measure available. The least that law enforcement, media and ordinary people can do under the circumstances, when a Jewish individual or community is attacked, is avoid retrenching into a defensive position that defaults to the assumption that anything but antisemitism is at work.
Richmond city council adopted the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance working definition of antisemitism Feb. 13 after a contentious discussion, as part of a broader anti-racism framework. The vote was 6 to 3.
Councilor Alexa Loo had originally moved adoption of the IHRA definition but withdrew it and proposed adoption of a broader anti-racism statement. The motion that passed endorsed terminologies and definitions from the federal government’s Anti-Racism Strategy, which includes anti-Asian racism, anti-Black racism, Islamophobia and antisemitism.
“Today, Mayor [Malcolm] Brodie and Richmond city council sent a strong message that antisemitism or hate in any form have no place in society,” said Ezra Shanken, chief executive officer of the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver, in a statement after the vote. “The IHRA definition will help the people of Richmond identify antisemitism in all its manifestations so that they can help put a stop to it and protect the values of diversity, equality and community that we cherish.”
Three speakers addressed council supporting the motion and two spoke in opposition. An opponent said the definition is an attempt to “shut down criticism of the Israeli occupation,” stating, “A significant amount of what is considered antisemitic is simply critical speech directed toward Israeli human rights violations against Palestinians.”
Councilor Alexa Loo, who originally moved adoption of the IHRA definition but withdrew it and proposed adoption of a broader anti-racism statement. (photo from City of Richmond)
“We’re not getting into geopolitics here,” said Loo, speaking to her motion. “We’re not condoning government actions. But we are setting out what behaviours are acceptable here in Richmond and we’re working to keep our community safe.”
Councilor Carol Day cited differences of opinion on the definition of antisemitism as justification for voting against it, but the mayor disagreed.
“If unanimity of opinion is the standard here, we will never get there,” said Brodie. “I do believe that the community has spoken on this one and that’s why I’m going to support what’s in front of us.”
Councilor Andy Hobbs refuted arguments he had heard that the IHRA definition is “a slippery slope” and contended that adoption would not prevent “anybody from criticizing a state, whether it’s Israel or whether it’s China or whether it’s another country.” Those free speech rights are enshrined in law, he said.
Councilor Michael Wolfe, who voted against, said the motion had “put a wedge into the community.” He noted that council received 27 messages opposed to the motion and nine in support. “It’s 3-to-1,” he said.
Day, who with Kash Heed also opposed the motion, noted opposition from, among others, the New Israel Fund of Canada, Canadian Labour Congress, the B.C. Civil Liberties Association, the Canadian Association of University Teachers, 40 faculty associations, Independent Jewish Voices Canada “and even Holocaust scholars.”
“Clearly, I don’t know as much as the scholars know,” said Day, “but if they are against it, why are they against it? Is it our job, as a Richmond city councilor, to override all of these groups that I just mentioned and go with something that has been brought down by the federal government? I don’t think it is.”
She said that city council’s responsibilities are roads and infrastructure. “I think this is, to be honest, way above our pay grade,” said Day.
Michael Sachs, a Richmond resident and community leader who is also regional director of Jewish National Fund of Canada, was one of the speakers in favour of the motion. He took exception to Day’s comment.
“A city councilor should be representing and serving the citizens of the city and the community,” Sachs told the Independent. “In actuality, the fact that she is trying to dismiss it is below the pay grade.”
Sachs also noted that Wolfe’s argument that he had received a 3-to-1 ratio of messages opposing the motion is a misreading. All five Richmond-based Jewish organizations – Beth Tikvah Congregation, the Bayit, Chabad Richmond, the Kehila Society and Richmond Jewish Day School – endorsed a letter of support. They collectively represent about 4,500 people, said Sachs.
Although Loo had earlier proposed adoption of the standalone IHRA definition, Sachs said he and others agree that the broader scope is preferable. Anti-Asian hatred and antisemitism both saw startling spikes during the pandemic and the demographics of Richmond, which has an Asian-Canadian majority, makes this especially relevant, he said.
While the IHRA definition was adopted as part of a larger package, Sachs said the discussion at council focused almost exclusively on antisemitism.
“The definition is now on record, it’s been passed,” he said.
Despite assertions that free expression was on the table, Sachs said the facts disprove it.
“At the end of the day, no one’s free speech is really being removed,” he said. “In actuality, hate speech is still continuing to rise.”
A 1923 studio portrait of the In zikh (Introspectivist) poetry group. Celia Dropkin is surrounded by (clockwise from bottom left): Jacob Stodolsky, Aaron Glanz-Leyeles, B. Alquit, Mikhl Likht, N.B. Minkoff and Jacob Glatstein. (photo from Yiddishkayt)
The Vancouver Jewish Film Festival is welcoming audiences back to the theatre this year. Screenings take place at Fifth Avenue Cinemas March 9-16 and the Rothstein Theatre March 17-19, with some films streaming online March 19-26. Here is but a sampling of the many festival offerings. For the full lineup and tickets, visit vjff.org.
Poetry that burns
As much as the world has progressed in the last century, Celia Dropkin’s unabashedly sexual, emotionally raw, intense, even violent, poems would cause a stir today. Most of her poems are short but powerful, saying things that still would not be said in polite company. A new film, a work-in-progress, offers insight into Dropkin’s life and the circumstances that fueled her creativity, love, anger, imagination.
Burning Off The Page: The Life and Art of Celia Dropkin, an Erotic Yiddish Poet will make its public debut at the Vancouver Jewish Film Festival. Scheduled to be at the screening are local film director and co-producer Eli Gorn and author Faith Jones, who is featured in the film, which includes comments from several writers/scholars and musicians, as well as from some of Dropkin’s relatives. Bracha (Bee) Feldman is the writer and co-producer of the documentary.
Dropkin was born in Belarus in 1887. Her father died when she was little, leaving her mom, a young woman, with two small kids to raise, “mostly resolved to become No One’s wife.… So my mother’s concealed, hot ache / rushed, as from an underground spring / freely in me. And now her holy / latent lust, spurts frankly from me,” writes Dropkin in her poem “My Mother.”
Unconventional views of motherhood were among the many unique aspects of Dropkin’s writings – she had six children herself, one dying in infancy. She was also greatly influenced by a dead-end love affair with Hebrew writer Uri Nissan Gnessin, who she met in her late teens. In 1909, she ended up marrying Samuel (Shmaye) Dropkin, who, because of his political activities, had to flee Russia to the United States a year later; she and their first son joined him in New York in 1912.
In New York, Dropkin was part of the burgeoning Yiddish cultural scene in the 1920s and ’30s. Despite the acclaim she received for her avant-garde work, she never garnered the respect her male counterparts did, and was criticized for depicting women as sexual beings. She struggled with depression, and wrote about it and the dark sides of love. Dropkin died in 1956, having spent the last years of her life painting – a talent for which she also had.
Burning Off the Page is a captivating mix of Dropkin’s poetry, talking heads, music, illustrations, archival photos and videos. (CR)
Life in the “new world”
In iMordecai, Fela (Carol Kane) and Judd Hirsch (Mordecai) are an adorable old couple living the retiree life in south Florida. Their son, Marvin, may or may not be a complete schlemiel (as Mordecai puts it) but each member of the family is dealing with their own stuff.
In a charming opening, Mordecai’s birth in a Polish shtetl is recounted and his memories of the past – including the chasm created in his family by the invasion of Poland and the Holocaust – are cast in striking animation. The family’s real life is also a bit cartoonish – as are the characterizations. Kane, who in this film and elsewhere seems incapable of not being hilarious, is a sweet old bubbe always with a side-eye for any of the other women in town who might be trying to steal her man – after 50 years of apparent devotion. Mordecai is struggling to remember the past while adapting to new technologies – thus the ironic title – and in the process makes friends with a young woman, Nina (played by Azia Dinea Hale), whose own family has its very specific issues.
Although the subjects are sometimes bleak, the film is a breezy dramedy. When Marvin (Sean Astin) explains to his father that Fela is experiencing dementia, the response is subdued brilliance.
“It means that her mind isn’t working like it used to,” says Marvin.
“So, whose is?” the father replies.
There are themes of split personalities, of apples falling not far from trees, and of intriguing coincidences – including running into an old neighbour from Canarsie in the “new world” of Florida. This forces Mordecai to kill off the imaginary brother he invented (it makes sense in the film) for comedic gold.
iMordecai isn’t going to win best picture, but it is a fun and sometimes poignant confection that veers from cheezy to charming to slapstick. When it gets serious, it gets a bit shlocky but damned if the final scene doesn’t get you in the throat. (PJ)
Maintaining a legacy
The stress and anxiety are palpable as Greg Laemmle is forced to consider selling his business, which has been in the family more than 80 years and which is an L.A. institution. But director/producer Raphael Sbarge didn’t start out to make a documentary of this crucial moment in 2019 – and what came after. He was simply interested in the history of the Laemmle family, which goes back to Hollywood’s beginnings.
“Though we had no idea where this film was headed, Only In Theatres took on a life of its own through changing markets and slipping sales,” writes Sbarge on the film’s website. “Then, the pandemic hit and the Laemmle story became the microcosm of the macrocosm – theatres were forced to ask big questions about resilience and viability. The entire Laemmle Theatre chain closed for more than 16 months, and many never reopened. We were able to witness the Laemmles’ extraordinary challenges and triumphs during what was the most tumultuous and emotional 24-month period in the theatre’s history.”
Laemmle Theatres was established in 1938 by brothers Kurt and Max Laemmle, who were nephews of Carl Laemmle, founder of Universal Pictures. The next generations to run the theatres were Max’s son, Robert, and Robert’s son, Greg, who has three sons. The cinemas were apparently groundbreaking in Los Angeles for screening independent and foreign films, and Only In Theatres sets Laemmle’s in the context of the importance of film in general, and arthouse cinemas specifically. He interviews many filmmakers, who talk about the movies that inspired them and the value of seeing a movie in a theatre, of having that collective experience.
Only In Theatres begins with how Greg and his wife Tish met, and gets into the family’s history. Among the interviewees is Greg’s (at the time) 103-year-old great-aunt Alyse, who was married to Kurt and was there when the legacy began.
In July 2019, after a bad year, Greg Laemmle must decide whether to sell that legacy. It is a gut-wrenching choice on many levels and, after months of agonizing over it, considering various purchase offers, he decides he can’t let go. Less than three months later, COVID hits.
Only In Theatres is both a love letter to arthouse cinemas, and an insight into the burden of legacy and how all the accolades in the world don’t pay the bills. If you truly want a business you love to succeed, then show ’em the money. That’s the support that ultimately matters. (CR)
Tradition vs. modernity
Against the magnificent backdrop of the Italian countryside, a family of French Orthodox Jews arrives on an annual two-week sojourn to inspect citrons to be packaged and distributed as etrogs for Sukkot.
Where Life Begins picks up the story of two families – the Italian Catholic farmers and the French Jews – who go back a long way. This year, though, Esther (played by Lou de Laâge), the 26-year-old and still unmarried (!) daughter of the French Zelnik family, is engaged in a profound internal struggle with her faith. She is bridling against the constraints of her religious obligations. At the same time, Elio (Riccardo Scamarcio), one of the sons of the original farm family and now in charge of orchard operations, is questioning the obligations to the land that have befallen him.
Lou de Laâge (Esther) and Riccardo Scamarcio (Elio) in Where Life Begins. (photo from Menemsha Films)
The French/Italian, Catholic/Jewish dichotomies are gently juxtaposed but the more powerful contradictions and stressors have to do with separation from family – literal in Elio’s case, figurative but no less wrenching in Esther’s. More immediately, both are confronting their lives in terms of the footprints of the past and the futures they envision for themselves. Each aches for a different path but to embark on it would require a massive break with expectations and everything they have known.
This annual pilgrimage is a tradition made extra festive by the singing and dancing of Georgian migrant farm workers. The joyfulness of the foreigners from the east may not prove that happiness is something one has to travel to find, but it suggests that uprooting from familiar surroundings need not be all grief and loneliness either.
The narrative of Where Life Begins is not an original storyline. Tradition and modernity in conflict; family obligations versus self-actualization; the possibility of forbidden love: these are among the oldest themes in literature and film. Handling these topics with originality and artfulness is what makes or breaks a film like this. This movie does it with nuance and absent simplistic tropes. The southern Italian landscape makes the whole thing easy on the eyes. (PJ)
The exhibit Shedding Some Light on the Jewish Community in Vernon is at the Museum and Archives of Vernon until the beginning of April. (photo from Alexandra Fox)
If you are passing through the Okanagan between now and the beginning of April, check out the exhibit on Vernon’s Jewish community, which recently went up at the Museum and Archives of Vernon. Last month, I sat down with collections and exhibits intern Alexandra Fox to chat about it.
Between sips of hot chocolate at a local café, we bonded over the fact that we are two queer Jews from the Lower Mainland, who grew up spending winters up on SilverStar Mountain Resort with family, and both find ourselves currently in Vernon. We also share a love of local Jewish community history.
Carmel Tanaka: What inspired you to curate an exhibit about Vernon’s Jewish community?
Alexandra Fox: When I came here, I found that there weren’t a lot of openly Jewish people and most of the non-Jewish community was not aware of the Jewish community. I wanted to shed some light on a community that has often gone under the radar and that’s why I titled the exhibit Shedding Some Light on the Jewish Community in Vernon. It was partly a pun on certain traditions of lighting candles, too.
Basically, I wanted the exhibit topic to be something that meant a lot to me. I come from a multifaith family, with my dad being Jewish and my mom being Protestant. Growing up, Jewish identity had been a confusing thing for me as, technically, I am not Jewish, due to it being matrilineal but it was always the religion I connected with the most. Maybe this is in part due to always being told that I look Jewish. However, you cannot always tell if someone is Jewish, as there is so much diversity in the community. I wanted to curate this exhibit so that I could honour my identity a bit more.
CT: What have been some of the reactions to the exhibit?
AF: The reactions to the exhibit have all been positive so far and I believe it will stay that way. I’ve had a few questions about certain Jewish traditions that are represented by the items in the exhibit but they have all been very respectful. Some of my co-workers have also congratulated me on making an excellent exhibit.
CT: During the research and curation of the exhibit, did anything surprise you? Did you face any challenges?
AF: I was surprised by how small the Jewish community was when it started in the 1970s – it numbered only 20 people – and how small it really still is. The 2021 Census … in the case of Vernon, it shows that most Jewish people identify as Jewish but are not practising. This trend doesn’t surprise me because I think a lot of Jewish people in other communities are the same, but the numbers of Jews (both ethnically and religiously) are so small.
Some of the challenges that I faced while creating the exhibit were during the call-out phase and during the editing phase. Since our museum didn’t have any Jewish objects in the collection, I had to do a call-out to the community…. I felt limited to reaching out to practising Jews rather than those who identify as ethnically Jewish because I didn’t have a lens into the community and was only able to reach out to the Okanagan Jewish Community Centre and Chabad House. Only the Okanagan Jewish Community Centre agreed to loan some objects to the museum for the exhibit.
CT: What resources did you use in compiling the exhibit?
Alexandra Fox, curator of the exhibit Shedding Some Light on the Jewish Community in Vernon. (photo from Alexandra Fox)
AF: The resources I used to compile the exhibit were from Census data analyses, the Okanagan Jewish Community Centre website, the Chabad website, some existing pictures in Vernon’s museum archives, as well as Ronnie Tessler’s research from the Jewish Museum and Archives of B.C., which focused more on Kelowna than on Vernon.
CT: Community archival projects are limited to the availability of resources. If you were able to continue researching Vernon’s Jewish community, what stories would you like to dive further into?
AF: Only after finishing the exhibit did I find out that one of the people who developed SilverStar was Jewish, so if I were to continue researching Vernon’s Jewish community, I would totally dive further into finding out about that family. I would like to know if the SilverStar community even knew about Dr. [Michael] Lattey being Jewish.
Also, if I were able to continue researching Vernon’s Jewish community and developing the exhibit, I would extend the call-out to more community members so that I could expand the range of people represented by the exhibit, such as Vernon’s very own, the Saucy Soprano Melina Schein, who won Food Network’s Wall of Bakers and who I only found out about after the exhibit.
As an intern at the museum, I seemed to be quite limited in who I could extend the call-out to and I wish I had met with you, Carmel, before the coffee meetup because then I could reach more community members, especially those not affiliated with community organizations or synagogues.
I would also like to dive deeper into the 2021 potential sale of Nazi memorabilia by Dodd’s Auction, a local and much beloved auction house. The memory of the Holocaust is very present in Vernon’s Jewish community so when these items were included in the auction, the community – Jewish and non-Jewish – successfully demanded that it be halted, and the items were returned to the consigner. It’s important to me to ensure that these stories and this part of local history are heard.
CT: Your exhibit, the first of its kind in Vernon to my knowledge, is a wonderful “Jewifying” of museum space. Why is it important for the Jewish community to share our stories in rural towns like Vernon?
AF: “Jewifying” the museum space, as with creating space for any other groups that have been historically left out of museum space, is a very important thing. I think it is especially important in museums located in rural towns because these are the places that are most likely to have fewer interactions with any minority groups…. In many rural towns, the Jewish people (or any other minority group) feel like they have to hide that part of themselves and I think it is very important to show them, and the rest of the community, that you don’t have to hide your identity.
CT: Is there anything else that you’d like to add?
AF: I’d like to add that this is the first exhibit I have curated and, although limited by time and other factors, I poured my heart into this exhibit, which had a personal connection to me. When embarking on this exhibit, as mentioned earlier, I wanted to do something that was personal to me. It was either something about Jewishness or queerness and I decided to choose the former. My sister is in Israel right now, volunteering on a kibbutz, and I felt that curating this exhibit would be my way of honouring my identity.
Carmel Tanakais the founder and executive director of JQT Vancouver, and curator of the B.C. Jewish Queer and Trans Oral History Project (jqtvancouver.ca/jqt-oral-history-bc) and the Jewpanese Oral History Project (@JewpaneseProject on Instagram). She has family ties to Vernon, and it was a Japanese-Canadian friend who tipped her about Fox’s exhibit.
Itamar Erez’s May Song is inventive on many levels.
The most difficult thing for artists to do, and the aim which is most central to their consciousness, is to create something original, something new, something that is their own. We recognize the music of the greats because of their distinctive musical signatures, and all artists work towards this, with varying degrees of success. Itamar Erez, as evinced on his five previous recordings, and no less on his latest musical offering, May Song, is just such a distinctive artist – one with a voice and musical signature all his own.
An Israeli-Canadian guitarist, pianist and composer based in Vancouver, Erez is already quite celebrated, and deservedly so, and has been recognized by his musical peers and reviewers the world over (including the Jewish Independent). He is a globetrotter, musically and literally. His music is tinged with timbres, melodies and rhythms that evoke the confluences of the many cultures of the world.
Created and recorded in 2021, and released in October 2022, May Song is the most recent step on his musical journey, and it breaks new ground in a number of ways. Significantly, Erez’s guitar is not present here – the emphasis is on composing and improvising from the keyboard.
“Over the last three to four years, piano is definitely more my focus,” he said. “Music was written with the piano in mind, and involved some polyrhythms and layers that are not possible to be performed on the guitar without some overdubs, which was not the direction I wanted to take.”
Erez began his career as a writer of through-composed music for others to play. Though he still creates such compositions, he has evolved as a composer, and is in a creative phase where he celebrates the improvisational qualities of music.
“I think that there is a shift in my music over the years,” he said, “going from through-composed music and being a composer who writes for others in the early days to a composer/performer/improviser, where the improvising part is growing to be just as important as the rest.” About May Song, he said, “I felt that the best part of the music is in what happens in the moment. The tunes will sound different each time. So this is a time of letting go of controlling the music and letting it unfold.”
His collaborating musicians on this recording have been working with him regularly for some years now. Jeff Gammon on bass and Kevin Romain on drums are tremendously in sync with Erez, bringing out the nuances of his musical gestures and style. No less, his longtime collaborator on clarinet, the world-class and gifted François Houle, carries the melodies on several tracks.
Conceived, prepared and recorded during the pandemic, Erez describes the project on his Bandcamp page as being “all about, for me, emerging from darkness and doubt into lightness and joy….”
Picking up on this thought, permit me to put forward my own take on this progression in the recording – as the moods and content move, generally speaking, from darkness to light, from doubt and concern to resolution.
The album begins with “Chant,” an invocation, as it were. Beginning with sparse piano string harmonics, it moves into Middle Eastern-sounding modal patterns, finding in-between notes as harmonies, evoking maqam-like (maqam = Arabic mode) gestures. The music gives way to sweet chords, a simpler melodic setting, a chant with out-there harmonic invention, always questioning.
“Hourglass,” with its quick five-beat underpinning, evokes a state of restless anticipation. Here the polyrhythmic utterance is quite pronounced, as the clarinet states the melody in a different metrical frame. The ensemble is tight and the rhythmic threads are followed excellently. There is an interweaving of improvisations followed by an extended solo for drums.
About polyrhythms, and in the hope of clearing away any mental barriers to the enjoyment of the music, let me briefly explain the concept. Polyrhythmic work is the putting together of two different beat patterns simultaneously. In “Hourglass,” the repeated five-beat pulse is overlaid by a melody in a different beat pattern. This gives the music a sense of suspension, and may even sound improvisatory while being a compositional device. So it is freer and more indeterminate than a strict groove.
Track 3, “Catch Me If You Can,” continues this five-pulse underpinning, but is brighter and livelier, a playfulness, a glimmer of hope. It segues into a quick three-beat, and there is a conversation between this three and the five, free and harmonically uncluttered.
“You And Me” features a steady three-beat underpinning, with a sadder more contemplative mood. A call-and-answer dialogue gives way to a piano improvisation over the groove. A bass solo intervenes, and the dialogue continues until its plaintive ending.
“March” reintroduces the clarinet, and very much sounds like a movement out of darkness into light. The darker chords never take over the mood, though some darkness lingers. By turns, explosions of melody give way to broader strokes. The clarinet solo begins to soar, inviting all to break free.
“May Song,” the title track, opens by stating the melodic theme contemplatively, then gives way to a five-beat pattern overlaid with the theme in cross-rhythm. This is varied with a second theme, which is somewhat anthemic and declarative, yearning and even victorious. By the end, there is a sense of quietude, gratitude and resolution.
Finally, “Long Way Home” begins in a quiescent manner, with a bit of a crying voice, but it continues the declarative, resolved and personal statement previously arrived at. The piano is answered in bass and drums, and a dialogue ensues, giving way to a slow, patterned statement of increasing force. Yes, there may still be some darkness to be overcome, but we have arrived at a hopeful state nonetheless.
May Song is inventive on many levels – melodic, harmonic and rhythmic. Never idle, the music is varied, always searching, with an intensity even in its quieter moments. There is a mastery here, especially in the use of polyrhythmic elements, but complexity is always balanced with an enjoyable harmonic and melodic richness. Erez’s musicians all evince a depth of feeling and understanding that give the music great integrity.
About his future direction, Erez shared, “My upcoming album will be a duet album with Hamin Honari (an amazing Persian percussionist). We went to the studio for two days recording improvisations … this is the first time I did something like that, it felt very exciting.”
Speaking for myself, I truly look forward to following Erez on his continuing musical journeys. He is a singular artist of prodigious talent, to whose music it is always rewarding to listen.
May Song is available for digital download at itamarerez.bandcamp.com. For information about upcoming shows and all things Itamar Erez, visit itamarerez.com.
Moshe Denburgis a Vancouver-based composer, bandleader of the Jewish music ensemble Tzimmes, and the founder of the Vancouver Inter-Cultural Orchestra (VICO).
Shelly Bordensky is the JCC Inclusion Services support worker for PRISM. (photo from JCCGV)
A new program at the Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver aims to equip 13-to-17-year-olds with leadership skills, personal insights and paid work experience. Funded by a grant from the Diamond Foundation, the Pre-employment Program for At-Risk Youth within an Inclusive Supportive Modality (PRISM) is seeking referrals of young people who could benefit from this supportive introduction to the world of work. The workshops begin March 23 and meet weekly on Thursdays, 3:30-7 p.m. The referral deadline is March 9.
“Our definition for youth who may benefit from this program is intentionally broad,” said JCC Inclusion Services support worker Shelly Bordensky. “The goal of the program is to limit risk factors for youth, such as social exclusion – youth who may live in lone-parent homes; are recent immigrants or refugees; are living with mental health challenges or diverse abilities; are historically underserved; or are otherwise marginalized – by building skills, networks of support, and exposure to possible future career paths in Jewish communal work.”
“When you care about a teenager, whether as a parent or other trusted adult, you are keenly aware that raising a child includes preparing them for life out in the real world,” added JCC social worker Lisa Cohen Quay. “The amazing part of the PRISM program is that it isn’t just about a first job. Sessions include learning about what jobs exist in Jewish agencies, meeting with a vocational counselor, writing a resumé, taking care of your mental well-being, and so much more – not the least of which is the opportunity to try working in an area of interest at the JCC.”
Quay further explained that this paid work opportunity also gives teens an adult employer to serve as a vital future reference. “It will be wonderful if this program excites teens to come be part of the work force with those of us serving in Jewish agencies, or in another community centre,” she said. “The relationships and insights they develop in PRISM can set them on that course.”
PRISM is an offering of JCC Inclusion Services, under the direction of Leamore Cohen. For more information and accessibility supports, Cohen can be contacted at [email protected] or 604-638-7288.
– Courtesy Jewish Community Centre of Greater Vancouver
Jack and Edie Austin (photos from JCC Jewish Book Festival)
Former federal cabinet minister and senator Jack Austin, who has been involved in politics and public policy for more than 50 years, and his daughter, Edie Austin, editorial page editor of the Montreal Gazette, will be in conversation with Ronald Stern, founder and president of Stern Partners, on Feb. 28, 7 p.m., at the Rothstein Theatre as a Cherie Smith JCC Jewish Book Festival epilogue event.
The two will discuss their book, Unlikely Insider: A West Coast Advocate in Ottawa, about Jack Austin’s public service. With both historical perspective and an eye to the future, Austin reflects on events and people whose impacts are still being felt, and on the enduring challenges of Canadian life. For tickets ($18) to attend the event, visit jccgv.com/jewish-book-festival.
