The City of Vancouver\u2019s integrity commissioner this month declared that Mayor Ken Sim breached the city\u2019s code of conduct by criticizing Councilor Sean Orr\u2019s presence and comments at an anti-Israel rally last year.<\/p>\n
The report concluded that Sim misused the influence of his office by holding a press conference to criticize Orr over inflammatory social media posts and his attendance at an anti-Israel protest alongside very problematic speakers and organizations. The report said Sim should apologize to Orr or face censure by council.<\/p>\n
Ezra Shanken, chief executive officer of the Jewish Federation of British Columbia, said in a statement that the conflict commissioner\u2019s report represented a double standard, and expressed gratitude to the mayor for raising our community\u2019s concerns.<\/p>\n
Nico Slobinsky, on behalf of the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, criticized Orr for not showing accountability for past social media posts, including claiming that city planners were controlled by a \u201csecret cabal of Jews,\u201d and calling for the \u201cdestruction of both Israel and Canada.\u201d While a city councilor, Orr spoke at the \u201cFlood for Palestine\u201d protest organized by Al-Awda, a group with links to the terrorist entity Samidoun.<\/p>\n
The brouhaha at city hall is just one in a small avalanche of administrative, legal and political episodes in recent years that have left many Jews feeling abandoned and betrayed by the institutions and legal protections ostensibly in place to protect them and other minority communities.<\/p>\n
Many Jews feel under attack and, despite pleasant words from some elected officials, actual tangible responses often seem weak or absent. For example, the flooding of a Vancouver neighbourhood with hate messages against Jews and Israel have been effectively ignored by city officials. Clearing them away has been left to local residents. Nothing, apparently, has been done to reprimand the individual known to be perpetrating the graffiti and vandalism, despite laws and bylaws against precisely this sort of behaviour.<\/p>\n
In Ontario, some progress has been seen recently. Toronto authorities responded to demonstrations in Jewish neighbourhoods by tightening enforcement, restricting marches from entering residential streets, and arresting some participants and investigating alleged incidents of hate speech and public incitement. Ontario\u2019s Premier Doug Ford has been vocal in defending Jewish communities and, no doubt, his unequivocal position gave some political cover to police and others to take action.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n No similar political leadership has been seen in British Columbia, where the unresolved case of Charlotte Kates remains a sore point for many in the Jewish community. Vancouver police arrested Kates in April 2024 after remarks at a Vancouver rally in which she praised the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks and venerated their perpetrators as heroic. Police recommended charges for public incitement and wilful promotion of hatred. Nearly two years later, Crown counsel has still not announced a charge decision. Pressed by the Independent, the premier\u2019s office pointed to prosecutorial independence, arguing that charging decisions rest with the BC Prosecution Service, not elected officials.<\/p>\n This may be fair justification, but piled upon so many instances where words and actions that are perceived by Jews as hateful and inciting go officially unchallenged leave many Jewish people with an overall sense that they are being abandoned by those who should be enforcing anti-hate protections.<\/p>\n Parliament is now considering Bill C-9, a proposed online harms law that carries numerous provisions that Jewish leaders support. But many people are leery of more laws that likely will not be enforced, provisions intended to increase safety for minority communities \u2013 Jews, in particular \u2013 but that will not have their intended impact, whether because police do not enforce them, the Crown does not pursue charges or, if it reaches that level, courts do not convict. The proposed new federal law has much to recommend itself but, if it is just going to be another law on a dusty legal shelf, it will not change the situation we face.<\/p>\n The case of Vancouver\u2019s mayor, who called out egregious incidents only to be called on the carpet himself \u2013 and ordered to apologize \u2013 portends a chilling on those who would stand up for the Jewish\u00a0<\/span>community.<\/p>\n We have laws in this country, but many of them are not being enforced. Very few Jews in this country, we confidently venture, believe the system is working as it should.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The City of Vancouver\u2019s integrity commissioner this month declared that Mayor Ken Sim breached the city\u2019s code of conduct by criticizing Councilor Sean Orr\u2019s presence and comments at an anti-Israel rally last year. The report concluded that Sim misused the influence of his office by holding a press conference to criticize Orr over inflammatory social […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[801,21800,2251,5752,3597,24409,1742],"class_list":["post-48975","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-from-the-ji","tag-antisemitism","tag-ken-sim","tag-law","tag-police","tag-politics","tag-sean-orr","tag-vancouver"],"blocksy_meta":{"styles_descriptor":{"styles":{"desktop":"","tablet":"","mobile":""},"google_fonts":[],"version":8}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48975","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=48975"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/48975\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=48975"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=48975"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=48975"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}