Tag: antisemitism

Under the bed, in the closet

If you’ve ever seen the movie Monsters, Inc. or its sequels, you may have an immediate visual image of what the craziest monsters look like when kids imagine what’s under the bed or in the closet. A few weeks ago, I started approaching this when we essentially moved. To clarify, we moved into our “new” house, built in 1913, more than a year ago. However, we’d all camped out in temporary spaces on the third floor while there were renovations done to the first and second floors.

We weren’t making cosmetic updates, these were basic needs like bathrooms that worked, a kitchen with heat, and other essentials. Turns out that, after more than 100 years and some poorly done, decades-old renovation choices along the way, it’s a good idea to have things fixed and updated – insulation and asbestos removal, new plumbing and safe wiring, too. We had scheduled our big “move” to the renovated second floor bedrooms for the Simchat Torah/Thanksgiving weekend. We would have had three days to manage the chaos. Little did we know that Hamas scheduled its horrific Israeli invasion and massacre for the same weekend.

Fueled by anxiety and a looming school and work deadline, we moved all four of us and dog beds downstairs. We set up kids’ clothes areas and adults’ nightstands, while we parents furtively looked at increasingly upsetting news online. I’ll probably always remember this moment in our Canadian character home renovation as when this massacre and the war against Hamas started.

We cleaned up the nearly vacated third floor, then set it up sufficiently to host another family who was visiting town the very next weekend. During the visit, we walked them over to see the Manitoba Legislature grounds while monitoring when each pro-Palestinian/anti-Israel rally might occur. There have been several now in Winnipeg, complete with pro-Israel counter-protests, with conflicts that required police intervention. We kept plowing forward amid the nightmare of the news.

Like many other places, Winnipeg has experienced acts of antisemitism. Some of it hit us personally. There was graffiti that my kids reported at middle school, and some of the bigger incidents have happened nearby or to people we know.

Like many other people have experienced, there are times when I have felt paralyzed and isolated by the overwhelming nature of the conflict. I am miserable about the loss of life, the impossibility of Israel’s situation, the fear for the hostages amid the knowledge that Hamas broke a ceasefire when it attacked Oct. 7, and that a ceasefire alone will not resolve this situation. I cannot bear the news. I also cannot look away.

The hardest task of this latest move has been the one where we open any closet door. I am still cleaning up boxes of belongings we have stored for more than a year. Things fall on me and surprise me. The worst part is the fear, the moment when the unknown jumps out at us and causes panic. Even if the box is labeled or the animated monster is in a movie, our startle instincts still cause fear when the unexpected and awful occurs.

When my kids told me about the hateful words on the test-taking dividers in math class, I didn’t feel afraid, but purposeful and angry. I wrote the teachers to report the situation and acted promptly. Within a few hours, the physical issue was addressed. The graffiti may be gone, but out there, some kid is still capable of writing more hate or worse.

Making lists, doing constructive activities – whether they are our daily obligations, additional volunteer efforts, or taking on new mitzvot (commandments) or prayers – may make us feel stronger. Also, in Mr. Rogers’ words, we can “look for the helpers.” We can ask for support from friends, neighbours, teachers, and others. We stay alert to the dangers and also strengthen ourselves with steps to make change during an incredibly difficult time.

There are lists on social media of how to protect our mental health and warnings for how to be proactive about protecting ourselves further. While this feels like new territory for us, it is, in fact, an ancient path. The prayer we use is the most compassionate call to free captives, and it begins with “Acheinu,”  “our brothers.” Old-fashioned translations call it our “brethren.” We pray for Israel, for those in captivity, and for the soldiers, too. For those who feel this leaves something out, remember that our tradition is one of shalom, peace. We pray for peace at every turn in our religious services. We’re not praying for any innocent person’s death.

I can’t say we’re all tidied up at our house and that everything has found its proper place. Daily, I discover items that we put away and then lost during this renovation and life transition. The metaphor extends to this difficult period as Jews in Israel and the diaspora. We’re not in a good place. We need to manage a truly dangerous situation. We’re losing things. Scary things surprise us. The unknown at the back of the closet is terrifying and is a living nightmare for many.

Let’s pray, if you’re the praying sort – or hope, if you’re not – for peace, for safety, for the return of captives and for the strength of those who fight on our behalf, in Israel and elsewhere in the world. Also, make yourself a list. Figure out how you’re going to get through this time. Try and focus on the light. I’m going to keep emptying moving boxes, too.

Joanne Seiff has written regularly for CBC Manitoba and various Jewish publications. She is the author of three books, including From the Outside In: Jewish Post Columns 2015-2016, a collection of essays available for digital download or as a paperback from Amazon. Check her out on Instagram @yrnspinner or at joanneseiff.blogspot.com.

המלחמה במזרח התיכון תשפיע לרעה על חיי יהודים וישראלים בכל רחבי העולם

בשלב זה ישראל מקבלת תמיכה ממרבית מדינות המערב. אך יש סיכוי שעם ההתקדמות של מבצע צבאי של צה”ל ברצועת עזה, התמיכה תלך ותרד עם עליית הנפגעים בצד הפלסטיני
(photo by Roni Rachmani)

המלחמה הקשה שמתנהלת בימים אלה בין ישראל לחאמס ויכולה להתפשט לחזיתות נוספות, צפוייה להשפיע לרעה על חיי יהודים וישראלים הגרים בקנדה, ארה”ב, אירופה ומקומות אחרים. הם צפויים לעמוד מול איומים שונים של פלסטינים ותומכיהם שמאשימים את ישראל גם במשבר הנוכחי. תומכי הפלסטינים קוראים להקמת מדינה לפלסטינים מהנהר ועד הים – שפירושה המעשי השמדת מדינת ישראל

העולם המערבי כולל צפון אמריקה מלא כיום מיליוני מוסלמים שהיגרו ממדינות ערב לאורך שנים רבות. חלק לא מבוטל מהם ממשיך לשמור נאמנות למוצאם ודתם בצורה פנאטית ורואה בישראל כמדינת אויב

עוד שגרתי בישראל טענתי שהסכסוך בינה ובין הפלסטינים וחלק ממדינות ערב יסכן גם את חיי היהודים והישראלים הגרים מחוץ למדינה. אמרתי אז שלישראל יש גם את האחריות לשמור על היהודים והישראלים, שבחרו לגור במקומות שונים בעולם ובעיקר במערב. ומוטל על ישראל לשקול בזהירות את צעדיה שכאמור יכולים להשפיע לרעה על היהודים והישראלים שגרים בחוץ לארץ

עובדה היא שאנטשימיות נגד יהודים וישראלים ברחבי העולם הולכת וגדלה, וכבר בסכסוך הקשה הנוכחי, נרשם גידול נוסף בשנה נגדם. וזו רק ההתחלה. אני צופה להרעה משמעותית עד סכנת חיים ליהודים והישראלים בצפון אמריקה, אירופה ומקומות אחרים. כבר עתה ידוע על הפגנות גדולות קשות נגד ישראל ותמיכה בפלסטינים. אלה עלולות להחמיר לעימותים פיזיים קשים עם יהודים וישראלים ואף יותר מכך. משטרות בערים רבות בעולם הדקו את ההגנה על מוסדות יהודים שונים ובהם בתי כנסת. נרשמו כבר לא מעט איומים נגד יהודים, ישראלים ומוסדות שונים בעולם ולכן השמירה מאוד חשובה במיוחד בימים טרופים אלה

בשלב זה ישראל מקבלת תמיכה ממרבית מדינות המערב. אך יש סיכוי שעם ההתקדמות של מבצע צבאי של צה”ל ברצועת עזה, התמיכה תלך ותרד עם עליית הנפגעים בצד הפלסטיני. במקביל צפויים היהודים והישראלים ברחבי העולם לסבול מגידול משמעותי באנטישמיות, התנכלויות, ואף מאיומים פיזיים

חברת אייר קנדה מהירה לפטר טייס מוסלמי שהתבטא נגד ישראל וכתב בחשבון הטוויטר שלו: “היטלר גאה בישראל”. מוסטפא איזו השתתף בהפגנה במונטריאול בעד הפלסטינים נגד ישראל והוא אף הצטלם עם צעיף בצבעי דגל פלסטין. זו לא הפעם הראשונה שאיזו מתבטא נגד ישראל ותומך בפלסטינים אך הפעם מתברר שהוא חצה את הגבול ובאייר קנדה מיהרו לפטרו

ראש ממשלת קנדה, ג’סטין טרודו, גינה את מתקפות הטרור נגד ישראל בהתייחסו להתקפה של חמאס על עשרות ישובי עוטף עזה בה נרצחו למעלה מאלף שלוש מאות ישראלים, נפצעו למעלה מארבעת אלפים ונלקחו בשבי קרוב לוודאי כמאה וחמישים אזרחים, חיילים, ועובדים זרים. בהודעה שפרסם בטוויטר אמר טרודו כי פעולות אלימות אלה בלתי מקובלות באופן מוחלט. אנו עומדים לימין ישראל ותומכים באופן מלא בזכות להגן על עצמה.  מחשבות שלנו תמיד עם כל אדם שנפגע. חייבים להגן על חיי אזרחים, חתם טרודו את הודעתו. מנהיג האופוזיציה והמפלגה הקונסרבטיבית, פייק פוליוויר, גינה באופן חד משמעי את הפלישה של טרוריסטים של חמאס לישראל ואת האלימות האכזרית שהם הפעילו נגד אזרחים חפים מפשע. לדבריו לישראל הזכות להגן על עצמה בפני התקפות אלה ולפעול נגד התוקפים. מנהיג מפלגת השמאל אן.די.פי ג’גמיט סינג כתב בחשבון הטוויטר כי הוא מגנה את ההתקפות הנוראיות שביצע החמאס בישראל. אסור לעולם לפגוע באזרחים וכל החטופים צריכים להיות מחשוררים באופן מיידי. לדברי סינג יש חשש מההתפתחויות עתה. טרור ואלימות לא יפתרו דבר

Open letter – Jewish media outlets worldwide call for combating the surge in antisemitism

The following piece, an initiative of the Jewish News in London and the Jerusalem Post, is being published simultaneously in Jewish media outlets around the world.

Two decades ago, the former British Chief Rabbi, Lord Jonathan Sacks, astutely likened antisemitism to a constantly evolving virus. One that, in the modern era, specifically targets the Jewish nation-state.

He aptly described this prejudice as a deeply ingrained malignancy, perpetually lingering beneath the surface of society. For many of us in the global Jewish community, the great man’s words were not merely a statement of truth but also a stark reminder. Until recent days, the extent and intensity of this virulent strain of hatred were tragically underestimated.

While the need for stringent security measures at schools and synagogues has long been a familiar reality, the realization that such profound levels of hatred and indifference to the threat exist on a global scale has been a devastating shock.

We dared to hope such malevolence had been relegated to the annals of history.

Today, in an unprecedented moment in Jewish history, we unite as Jewish news outlets spanning borders, continents, and religious affiliations to issue this open letter – something we never envisioned as necessary or even conceivable.

The events of recent weeks have surpassed even the somber portrayal offered by Rabbi Sacks all those years ago. Some of those who propagate hatred, concealing their prejudice under the veneer of being ‘anti-Israel,’ no longer find it necessary to obscure their malice.

We’ve witnessed raw hatred against Jews in cities across the globe.

In Dagestan, a mob ran towards planes on a runway to check passengers’ passports, hunting for disembarking Jews.

In Sydney, when authorities lit the famous Opera House in Israel’s colors, a crowd sang ‘Gas the Jews’.

In Lyon France, a woman was stabbed at her home, and a Swastika was spraypainted on her front door.

In London, red paint was daubed on Jewish school doors and the Wiener Holocaust Library.

In Berlin, Magen Davids have been spray painted on homes, a haunting echo of scenes in that German city 90 years ago.

On campuses across the United States, ‘martyrs’ who butchered Jewish children in their beds on October 7 are being celebrated, while a student at Cornell University was arrested for posting death threats against Jews.

This is not a call for two states living side by side in peace. This is not legitimate opposition to Benjamin Netanyahu and his government.

How could we have been so blind to this malignancy in our midst?

And yet, all that we have seen so far isn’t even our worst fear. Our gravest concerns lie in what the future may hold.

Meanwhile, some world leaders act as cheerleaders, sometimes inadvertently but at other times, not. Colombia’s president Gustavo Petro said: “If I had lived in Germany of 1933, I would have fought on the side of the Jewish people, and if I had lived in Palestine in 1948, I would have fought on the Palestinian side”.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said: “Hamas is not a terrorist organization”.

The head of the UN Antonio Guterres said 7/10 “didn’t happen in a vacuum”.

No, it didn’t, Mr Guterres. It required decades of indoctrination, years of holding up terrorists as heroes to be lionized, a sure way to fame and, often, fortune, and the presence of a terrorist organization whose central aim is to wipe Israel – and every one of our a Jewish family and friends – off the face of the earth.

Have no doubt, that Hamas is cheering those ‘from the river to the sea’ chants because a Palestine between the river to the sea leaves not a single inch for Israel.

Why do so many still seek to deny what’s in Hamas’ own charter?

And why are so many good people still silent when cheerleaders for terrorists decide the worst massacre of our co-religionists since the Holocaust is a good moment to open up a second, global front targeting Jews on campus, at work, on the streets, and at home?

Clearly not everyone marching under the Palestinian flag fantasizes about our deaths or the destruction of the world’s only Jewish state.

But please, try to understand that whether it’s one person, 100 people, or 10,000, the chilling impact of seeing so many people echo and excuse hateful chants is profound.

It’s not easy to speak on behalf of Jews in one country, never mind the world, nor do we purport to. As journalists, we report, opine, and comment. But the level of fear among our readers is like nothing in memory. It feels like those two equilateral triangles that combine to form our beloved Star of David represent a six-pointed target.

This is heightened by the fact there will be those who dismiss every word in this piece as having been written in bad faith, part no doubt of our supposed control of power and the media that has manipulated their warped minds. There will also be Jews who tell you this article doesn’t speak for them. Before those in the media feel the urge to put them on the airwaves in an attempt at ‘balance’, please first ask for an ounce of proof that they represent more than a tiny band of misfits. Some are more likely to stand alongside the Iranian regime that is so despised by much of the Muslim world than they would with most Jews.

Please don’t, however, mistake this growing fear for a lack of determination to fight our corner as citizens deserving of support and protection in our home nations, or doubt our solidarity as a people numbering just 16 million. In fact, we’ve never been so determined, so energized, so united and so proud, as highlighted by the huge uptick in sales of Stars of David. The incredible response in holding rallies, supporting charities, and fighting running battles on social media is something that will remain a source of pride for as long as those horrific images from Kibbutz Beeri and the peace rave.

This unity has been a light in the darkness. Another has been the support, publicly and sometimes not, of our real friends in all communities. Again, we will never ever forget this.

Our collective Jewish heart bleeds for the families of those who lost relatives in the Hamas atrocities and those facing agonizing waits for news of the kidnapped men, women, and children. Whether directly or not directly, many of our readers will be connected to these innocents. But our hearts bleed too for the innocents killed in Gaza as a result of this entirely unnecessary war launched by Hamas.

Over the unbearably painful days ahead, we – as providers of news for secular or religious Jews, those who frequently critique Israeli policy and those who don’t, those who see Israel are central to their identity, and those who are drawn nearer by crises such as this – call on the world to listen and treat us as you would want to be treated.

It shouldn’t be too much to ask.

Watch them blame Israel

A restaurant in Vancouver closed for a day, calling for people “to hold the Zionist occupation accountable” for the war in Gaza. Writer Loolwa Khazzoom notes, “When terrorists blow up Israelis, there is often an undertone of accusation: it’s Israel’s fault, the narrative goes, that these tragedies happen…. But who truly was responsible for creating Palestinian desperation, and who is accountable for remedying it?” (photo by Larry Barzelai)

On 9/11, I was 20 blocks away from Ground Zero, sleeping in the living room of a friend when she woke me up, screaming hysterically – something about terrorists and an airplane crashing into one of the Twin Towers. As I tried to comprehend what was happening, my friend turned on the television and, right then, the second plane crashed into the second tower, as we watched in horror.

My thoughts came in this order: Now they’ll understand what it feels like to live in Israel. Watch them blame this on Israel. OMG we’re going to die.

Two decades later, on the morning of Oct. 7 – in the wake of what some are calling Israel’s equivalent of 9/11 – I felt the pain of collective Jewish agony, and promptly reached out to my friends and family in Israel, including those living close to the Gaza border.

Unbeknownst to many, those in the border towns, such as Sderot, are predominantly working-class Mizrahim and Sephardim – children and grandchildren of the 900,000 Jewish refugees from throughout the Middle East and North Africa. They are the ones predominantly getting pummeled by Hamas rocket fire, as the world yells about “white European colonist settler Israelis.”

So, it’s no surprise that, after the initial feelings of shock and outrage, grief and concern, I once again thought, “Watch them blame this on Israel.” And they did, within hours – with a BBC News interview going so far as to compare the Hamas attack to the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising.

It’s nothing new, of course. When terrorists blow up Israelis, there is often an undertone of accusation: it’s Israel’s fault, the narrative goes, that these tragedies happen. By creating Palestinian desperation, Israel has created Palestinian terrorism. But who truly was responsible for creating Palestinian desperation, and who is accountable for remedying it?

The Arab world is called just that for a reason. Beginning in the Arabian Peninsula about 1,300 years ago, Arab Muslims launched a brutal campaign of invasion and conquest, taking over lands across the Middle East and North Africa. Throughout the region, Kurds, Persians, Berbers, Copts and Jews were forced to convert to Islam under the threat of death and in the name of Allah.

Jews were one of the few indigenous Middle Eastern peoples to resist conversion to Islam, the result being they were given the status of dhimmi – legally second-class, inferior people. Jews were spared death, but forced to endure an onslaught of humiliating legal restrictions – forced into ghettos, prohibited from owning land, prevented from entering numerous professions and forbidden from doing anything to physically or symbolically demonstrate equality with Arab Muslims.

When dhimmi laws were lax and Jews were allowed to participate to a greater degree in their society, the Jewish community would flourish, both socially and economically. On numerous occasions, however, the response to that success was a wave of harassment or massacre of Jews instigated by the government or the masses. This dynamic meant that the Jews lived in a basic state of subservience: they could participate in the society around them; they could enjoy a certain degree of wealth and status; and they could befriend their Arab Muslim neighbors. But they always had to know their place.

The Arab-Israel relationship and the current crisis occur in the greater context of a history in which Arab Muslims have oppressed Jews for 1,300 years. Most recently, anti-Jewish riots erupted throughout the Arab world in the 1930s and 1940s. Jews were assaulted, tortured, murdered and forced to flee from their homes of thousands of years. Throughout the region, Jewish property was confiscated and nationalized, collectively worth hundreds of millions of dollars at the time.

Yet the world has never witnessed Middle Eastern and North African Jews blowing themselves up and taking scores of Arab innocents with them out of anger or desperation for what Arab states did to the Jewish people. Despite the fact that there were 900,000 Jewish refugees from throughout the Middle East and North Africa, we do not even hear about a Middle Eastern/North African Jewish refugee problem today, because Israel absorbed most of the refugees. For decades, they and their children have been the majority of Israel’s Jewish population, with numbers as high as 70%.

To the contrary, Arab states did not absorb refugees from the war against Israel in 1948. Instead, they built squalid camps in the West Bank and Gaza – at the time controlled by Jordan and Egypt – and dumped the refugees in them, Arabs doomed to become pawns in a political war against Israel. Countries such as Syria, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Libya and Lebanon funded assaults against Israeli citizens instead of funding basic medical, educational and housing needs of Palestinian refugee families.

In 1967, Israel inherited the Palestinian refugee problem through a defensive war. When Israel tried to build housing for the refugees in Gaza, Arab states led votes against it in United Nations resolutions, because absorption would change the status of the refugees. But wasn’t that the moral objective?

Israel went on to give more money to the Palestinian refugees than all but three of the Arab states combined, prior to transferring responsibility of the territories to the Palestinian Authority in the mid-1990s. Israel built hospitals and educational institutions for Palestinians in the territories. Israel trained the Palestinian police force. And yet, the 22 Arab states dominate both the land and the wealth of the region. So, who is responsible for creating Palestinian desperation?

Tragically, the Arab propaganda war against Israel has been a brilliant success, laying on Israel all the blame for the Palestinian refugee problem. By refusing to hold Arab states accountable for their own actions, by feeling sympathy for Palestinian terrorists instead of outrage at the Arab propaganda creating this phenomenon, the so-called “progressive” movement continues to feed the never-ending cycle of violence in the Middle East.

Loolwa Khazzoom (khazzoom.com) is the frontwoman for the band Iraqis in Pajamas (iraqisinpajamas.com) and editor of The Flying Camel: Essays on Identity by Women of North African and Middle Eastern Jewish Heritage (theflyingcamelbook.com). She has been a pioneering Jewish multicultural educator since 1990, and her writing has been featured in the Washington Post, Marie Claire, Rolling Stone and other top media worldwide. This article was originally published in the Times of Israel.

Grief is overwhelming

The Jewish community worldwide is experiencing pain and despair. Feelings of grief for the murdered, empathy for the injured, rage at the perpetrators and anguish and terror for the kidnapped are overwhelming. The deep heartbreak is palpable.

While events in the past have harmed Israelis’ sense of security and hopes for peace, these attacks seem to have shattered them. The invasion of Jewish homes, the seizing of Jewish people, young and old, reaching for their loves ones as they are dragged away – these are images hauntingly redolent of a stateless past, without a government capable of preventing large-scale, coordinated assaults on the dignity, human rights, freedom and lives of Jews. The magnitude of this terror, with the heart-rending images and videos that illustrate the dehumanization in a way impossible until recent technological advances, means this moment is uniquely affecting.

Israeli politicians and military strategists have largely aimed to “manage” the conflict. Now, there will be calls for a lasting resolution. Israelis will not tolerate a second experience like this. After a decade and a half of successive skirmishes and wars with Hamas, many, including top military officials, are warning this will be the last.

A resolution to the status quo is something everyone – even Hamas terrorists – agree on. What that resolution will look like is where differences emerge. The approach Israel takes will affect not only the reality there but, secondarily, the world’s attitudes and approaches to Israel … and to Jews, as is often the case. There is fear and anger and understandable calls for retribution – actions that, at press time, were partly being tempered by the presence in Gaza of an estimated hundred-plus hostages from Israeli villages and towns.

History has shown one thing to be sure of, and to brace for – the window of empathy for Israeli victims will inevitably close. The author Dara Horn wrote that “people love dead Jews.” What the world seems to welcome far less enthusiastically are Jews, and a Jewish state, that are very much alive, with agency in the world. As Israel’s response rolls out, we can expect much of the nascent public sympathy to evaporate.

We cannot predict the mayhem and pain that seems imminent for both Israelis and Palestinians in the coming days, weeks, months and possibly years as a result of this radically changed circumstance. However, the temptation to assert that “this changes everything” is almost certainly false. Some things will remain the same.

There is a core of intolerance and hatred at the heart of opposition to the Jewish presence in the region and to Jewish national self-determination. Peace has rarely seemed further away.

Not incidentally, some of the central values of Israeli society – providing affected individuals and families with support and resources in times of crisis – have been left to individuals and various networks of mutual aid. The governmental and political failure goes beyond not having been prepared for the terrorist attacks but extends to the aftermath. Families have been left by their government with little communication or intelligence on their lost, possibly dead, loved ones. Among all the sacred things left in ruins today, this may prove to be one of the most shattering remnants from this time. That, at least, was something that Israelis could rely on – and even that has been ripped away.

For Jewish Canadians, this conflict is at once so far away and so close and, for some of us – like the family and friends of Ben Mizrachi, the young Vancouver man murdered Saturday – so very close. Wherever we are, we must be there for one another, across all lines of geography, affiliation, background and, yes, politics. Right now, a resolution forced by military might be the preference of the most vocal people. The middle of a war can be a hard time to talk about peace. A moment of agony and outrage is a difficult moment to encourage reflection and restraint. And yet, lasting peace and justice depends on what happens next and how our institutions react. We cannot control the actions of others, as psychiatrist and Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankel suggested, we can only control our responses to these events. This is the choice each of us makes as we assimilate the inhumanity around us and reflect on our deeply held values.

CIJA takes campaign public

I love the High Holidays and the opportunity they present to get together with extended family, to visit with friends and to reach out to colleagues. In addition to the special foods of the season, it’s a time to remember what is important, and what we need to acknowledge and reject from the past year. It’s also a chance to pause to consider how to find the path we really want to follow, to figure out what we need to make our lives safer, calmer, more balanced. To make our lives – and our families’ lives – better.

photo - Judy Zelikovitz says CIJA’s Oct. 16-17 conference will be its “biggest effort ever to respond to antisemitism”
Judy Zelikovitz says CIJA’s Oct. 16-17 conference will be its “biggest effort ever to respond to antisemitism.” (photo from CIJA)

Whether we are part of large Jewish communities in Israel, the United States, Canada  or Europe, or part of small pockets of Jews anywhere around the world, our connections one to another have never been more important. Our support for our community’s values, for their protection, is strengthened by our connections to one another, and it is together that we will be effective in the vital fight against Jew-hatred, a scourge that’s grown significantly in Canada and around the world over the past few years.

In Israel, we’ve seen a shocking spike in 5783 in lone-wolf assaults against Israeli Jews, along with vile rhetoric and attacks by terrorist groups against the Jewish people. In Canada, still among the safest places anywhere, we are nevertheless living through a growth in online hate, threats to Jews and their neighbourhoods, and an alarming statistical rise in hate crime of all kinds against Jewish Canadians.

This growth in Jew-hatred has been the focus of much of the advocacy CIJA has undertaken in recent years and, this year, we are taking our national campaign public. On Oct. 16-17 in Ottawa, CIJA and the federations across Canada will host Antisemitism: Face It, Fight It, a two-day conference where we will confront the issue head-on.

We will “Face It.” We will learn from international and local experts about how they have addressed Jew-hatred and how we can advocate for legislation and other changes that will make our community safer. The second day, we will “Fight It,” speaking directly to our elected officials, ensuring they know the impact of antisemitism on our community, the effects of hate on all minorities, and its toxic effect on all Canadians. We will unite – with one another and with our partners – to fight antisemitism, and we will leave the conference better educated and better prepared to get this done.

Speakers will include Jews and non-Jews whose careers have been dedicated to combating antisemitism. We will hear what has worked, what has not, how to advocate for effective legislation, and how to equip our students and young leaders to take on this fight on campuses across Canada.

We will leave the conference secure in the knowledge that we are embarking on our biggest effort ever to respond to antisemitism. We will ensure Ottawa and other governments hear our call. We will amplify our voices, speaking as a united community and as one supported by allies across Canada.

Now is the time for us to show up, to speak up and to step up. Register now at fightit.ca.

I hope to see you in Ottawa and, in the meantime, over these High Holidays, I wish you a sweet, healthy and happy 5784. L’shana tova!

Judy Zelikovitz is vice-president, university and local partner services, at the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs.

Bud Lando’s island donated

The Lando family donated to the federal government the islet that is now West Grebe Islet Marine Park. The park will be held in perpetuity for wildlife conservation and is off limits to people. (photo from Barbara Schloss)

Barbara Schloss remembers the day in the 1970s when her father came home and announced, “Guess what I did? I just bought an island.”

Her father, Esmond Lando, was a familiar face in Vancouver’s Jewish community, known to everyone as Bud. Snapping up an island may have been a little out of the ordinary for most dads, but Bud Lando had a finger in all sorts of pies, his daughter recalls.

Neither the father nor, until recently, the rest of the family, though, had any idea of the value of the island – “islet,” to use the precise terminology – he had bought. And, while the tiny West Grebe Islet is located just off West Vancouver’s Lighthouse Park – and, therefore, a short kayak ride from some of the world’s priciest real estate – the value isn’t so much in dollars as in ecological biodiversity. So rich in bird and animal species is the one-third-hectare (about 0.8 acres) island that the federal government was delighted to accept the rocky outcrop from the Lando family through Canada’s Ecological Gifts Program.

The islet is known to some West Van locals as “Seal Rock,” due to the prevalence of the sea mammals hanging about on or around the place. But, according to North Shore News reporter Brent Richter, who wrote about it last year, birders have identified 89 different bird species that either inhabit West Grebe or drop in during migration, including black oyster catchers, turnstones, marbled murrelets and one of the highest densities of surf scoters in the region. A pair of eagles are routinely spotted on the Coast Guard light beacon.

Schloss, who is a longtime resident of Montreal, says she didn’t know the ecological richness of the place when she contacted the feds on behalf of her siblings and the family to offer it to the federal government. Now that she knows, she likes to think her late father had an inkling of the gem he rescued and preserved from development. The family will celebrate their father’s foresight this weekend at a dedication ceremony where a plaque will be unveiled acknowledging Esmond Lando’s contribution to preserving West Grebe.

But, there is a larger story.

The Landos lived in Shaughnessy – Schloss’s sister, Roberta Beiser, still lives in the family home – but Bud had a special connection with West Vancouver. That connection is a tale of discrimination and civil rights in British Columbia.

Jews were not welcome on golf courses anywhere in Metro Vancouver when the nine-hole Gleneagles Golf Course came on the market in 1951. It had been developed two decades earlier and named after the legendary links in Scotland.

Bud Lando and pal Dave Sears snapped up the golf course – and opened it to Jewish players. Golf courses would become a sideline for Lando, but only one of many.

“He really was like a Renaissance man,” said Schloss. “He loved creating, he was very creative. He painted, he sculpted – this was all on the side. At home, we had a kiln. He decided he was going to make wine, so he got a whole bunch of grapes somewhere and went to a distillery somewhere and made sure that that wine had ‘Esmond Lando’ on it. It was just another passion of his.”

photo - Esmond “Bud” Lando
Esmond “Bud” Lando (photo from Barbara Schloss)

Lando was a successful practising lawyer, and he partnered with friends in a vast range of entrepreneurial pursuits.

“If anyone would suggest something, he would look it over and, if it looked like a possibility, he was in it,” Schloss said of her father.

With a couple of friends, he launched Queen Charlotte Airlines, she recalled, as well as a box company, a lumber mill in Chilliwack and a trucking company. “He was into everything he could possibly find,” she said.

The golf sideline was important – not just because Lando loved to play, but because the discrimination rankled him. Sears and he soon sold Gleneagles so they could construct the full 18-hole course that is now the Richmond Country Club. Lando then developed courses in Delta and Surrey.

“Gleneagles was a very important purchase for my father, who was very plugged into the Jewish community,” said Schloss. “He was part of Canadian Jewish Congress and was very active in the Jewish community. Plus, he was on a council for Christians and Jews. He was very ecumenical, but Jews were very important for him. That’s why he got involved with Gleneagles.”

Bud Lando came by his entrepreneurial spirit and sense of adventure naturally. Bud was born in England and his parents, Lou and Sara Lando, trundled the family of six off to Prince Rupert, B.C., in 1911, when Bud was a tyke.

“That was supposed to be the metropolis,” Schloss said of the northern B.C. port town. “That was going to be where everything was happening.” She added with a laugh: “Didn’t happen.”

The family moved to Vancouver and got into the fur trade. They opened Lando’s Furs, opposite the Canadian Pacific Railways station (now Waterfront station, where Seabus and Skytrain meet).

Bud Lando graduated from law school at the University of Alberta and practised for decades, becoming Queen’s Counsel. He and his wife, Edith Mitchell Lando, originally from Winnipeg, raised four children. In addition to Schloss and Beiser, daughter Juli Hall now lives in Houston, Tex., and son Barry Lando lives in Paris. Barry was a producer for the American TV newsmagazine 60 Minutes. (Mike Wallace, the late longtime cohost of the program, said that, without Lando, “there would have been no 60 Minutes.”)

The four siblings, their children and grandchildren will gather this weekend at Gleneagles Golf Course to dedicate two plaques – one at the course itself and another a short walk away, from where the islet can be viewed.

“When my father passed away, we each took on part of the heritage of my father, whatever he left behind we divvied up and decided who would be in charge of what,” said Schloss. “I got Grebe. That was one of the things that I was involved with.”

It was Barry Lando who told her about the federal program and that the government might be interested in the property. Indeed, they were. The island was formally transferred to the federal government last year, but under an agreement with the District of West Vancouver, it will be cared for by the municipality and was officially designated as West Grebe Islet Marine Park earlier this year.

The islet will be held in perpetuity for wildlife conservation and is now off limits to bipeds in order to conserve its ecological value. Barry Lando and some of his family members are, therefore, among the few people to have set foot on the place. They once approached by boat and then swam up to the islet but its geography meant it was never a welcoming spot for casual visitors.

“My father would be so pleased and proud to know that he had the foresight to recognize a treasure and to save it from development,” said Schloss, adding that he would be happy knowing that his legacy and the island is preserved forever. “I think it would mean a lot to him to know this.”

Talking about antisemitism

The administration of U.S. President Joe Biden released its National Strategy to Counter Antisemitism recently. Unveiled by First Gentleman Doug Emhoff, Jewish husband of Vice-President Kamala Harris, the strategy rests on four main pillars: to increase awareness and understanding of antisemitism, including its threat to America, and broadening appreciation of Jewish American heritage; to improve safety and security for Jewish communities; to reverse the normalization of antisemitism and counter antisemitic discrimination; and to build cross-community solidarity and collective action to counter hate.

Canadian officials at the federal and provincial levels have also convened summits on the subject and introduced a range of strategies and programs to confront the problem. This recognition at the highest levels is crucial. As antisemitism has increased in North America and Western Europe, elected officials have overwhelmingly, with some notable exceptions, said and done the right things.

In his remarks at the launch of the U.S. strategy, Emhoff called for a “whole-of-society” approach to the problem. And this short reference is vital. Governments have been grappling with the rising problem of antisemitism and some other allies, organizations, antiracism activists and commentators have addressed it, but there is not a larger societal conversation about it.

We have not seen much discussion of antisemitism beyond the Jewish community the way we have seen contemporary popular engagement with, for example, anti-Black racism, as witnessed through the Black Lives Matter movement; women’s equality, as addressed through many approaches, including #MeToo; and Indigenous issues, most recently in Canada with the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.

The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice, as Martin Luther King Jr. said. There has been hard-won progress in the six decades since the milestones of the Black Civil Rights Movement. But, sadly, most white people only became more engaged in recent years, as outrage over police-involved shootings and similar injustices became top stories. These spurred conversations at dinner tables, in work lunchrooms, boardrooms and among friends.

We have seen similar leaps forward in awareness and discussion around issues faced by Indigenous peoples in Canada, and those exchanges have likewise taken place at the person-to-person level, involving Indigenous and non-Indigenous people, but also as importantly, between non-Indigenous people themselves.

The #MeToo movement and a greater openness to talking about violence against women and gender equality are other cornerstones of social change in the past few generations.

Perhaps no single example of progress is more stunning than attitudes toward LGBTQ+ people, which has gone from literal criminal prohibition to a level of social acceptance in less than a single average lifetime. This, too, is a result of connecting at the personal level. Legislation and leadership from elected officials, clergy, journalists and commentators and other thought leaders have been important. But the thing that has the most power to change hearts and minds is hearing personal stories from people affected and hashing out moral questions among friends.

While other forms of discrimination and bias have been confronted to varying degrees, antisemitism is on a precarious upswing, but the public dialogue has yet to begin.

There is no single explanation for why this is so, but one undeniable characteristic of antisemitism is the trope of “Jewish power.” In the simplest formulation, if Jews are powerful, why would activists and antiracism advocates devote resources to this cause? This is especially true in the context of the larger discussion on race currently taking place, which emphasizes power versus powerlessness.

There are other reasons. Canada’s Jewish community is comparatively tiny and overwhelmingly concentrated in Toronto and Montreal. People in other parts of the country might not know many Jews – and knowing members of a minority community has been shown to be the likeliest prerequisite to overcoming prejudice (though it is by no means foolproof, of course).

Another factor is that, even for non-Jews who know Jewish people, those Jews may not be comfortable opening up about discrimination and oppression they have faced. Too often, Jews have been told, implicitly or explicitly, that they are not disadvantaged but privileged, that the Jewish people’s time as the victim du jour is passed. Complicating the discussion is the chasm of miscommunication and misunderstanding between Jewish and non-Jewish Canadians on issues relating to Israel and the centrality of the cradle of Jewish peoplehood in the hearts of nearly all Jews, regardless of affiliation, ideology or other differences.

As is the case with other minority groups, it should not be left to Jewish people to fight the discrimination against them and its associated manifestations. But it is, for the most part. Jews need to be prepared to start these conversations, and this involves educating ourselves, so that we can better articulate what are often painful and vulnerable personal relationships with discrimination.

Governments and Jewish agencies are doing what they can to confront antisemitism. Ordinary people, chatting with friends and colleagues, need to help bring this work to an interpersonal level. In an environment where Jewish experiences with discrimination are often actively mocked, this is a tall order. But it is even more reason we need to share our experiences and ideas more broadly – to start more discussions.

Deep, dangerous bias

The sale by George Soros of a (comparatively) modest holding in Elon Musk’s Tesla car company seems to have sent Musk into a Twitter tirade last week.

“He wants to erode the very fabric of civilization,” Musk tweeted in a reckles overreaction. “Soros hates humanity.”

The context of the smear is worth a moment of consideration. A man who sinks a chunk of his estimated $185 billion US pile into a space flight hobby says that a man who has donated (at a minimum) $32 billion US into building civil society in the former Soviet bloc and other countries “hates humanity.”

Beyond this context is a whole lot of subtext.

There is nothing essentially wrong with a public figure criticizing another public figure. If the target feels he has been libeled, there are legal recourses available. That’s not really the issue here.

As one of the world’s foremost funders of liberal causes, Soros draws criticism from plenty of people who don’t agree with his politics. Fair enough. But “Soros” has become a shorthand. Generations of people have used the name “Rothschild” to invoke a conspiracy of Jewish wealth and power. “Soros” is a 21st-century update of that conspiracy.

This is a bit dicey. It is fair to criticize someone who dumps billions of dollars into causes you disagree with. If the person happens to be Jewish, that doesn’t make you antisemitic. If you use that person’s name as a stand-in for a complex of ideas about Jews more generally manipulating events with wealth and the manipulative force that can come with it, that is antisemitic. But, of course, getting into the head of a suspected bigot is impossible. One person can accuse another of racism, the accused can deny it and neither is any further ahead. Sometimes the accused may not even be conscious of what they have done.

But Musk tipped his hand. He launched his outburst with: “Soros reminds me of Magneto.”

Magneto is a villain in the Marvel Comics franchise X-Men. Like Soros, Magneto is a Jewish survivor of the Holocaust.

The idea that Soros “hates humanity” is an especially laden accusation. It seems like a peculiar assertion – unless one is familiar with centuries of slander against Jewish people, which has posited that Jews are the embodiment of Satan, the enemy of all things good. In Christian theology, including official Catholic doctrine until the mid-1960s, Jews were accused of deicide, of literal God-killing, of destroying what is most sacred to humanity. To accuse a Jew in 2023 of hating humanity – and all that implies in the context of funding social change movements – is to invoke (intentionally or not) millennia of deadly ideas about Jewish evil-doing. To also invoke a (Jewish) cartoon villain in the process makes Musk’s playing to pervasive tropes about Soros, money, Jews and power seem more deliberate.

This is what is so confounding about racism and bigotry in general, and antisemitism in particular: it so often manifests not as outright intolerance and hatred but as unconscious or barely conscious bias that motivates our beliefs and actions without us knowing it. In some ways, this is the more frightening prospect. It is easy to identify and condemn the most overt acts of racism or hatred. Parsing and reproving harmful, unconscious ideas is much more challenging.

We are not all in a position (thankfully!) to have our Tweets or other late-night brainwaves analyzed by millions. Musk hosts a powerful platform and his speech can move financial markets and mobilize followers. Ideally, he may take time to reflect on whether he carries unconscious biases that need examining.

For us, there are at least two lessons. First, we are reminded that confronting antisemitism is not as easy as condemning those who exhibit the most obvious signs. Second, while we are critical of one of the most prominent people in the world letting slip what appear to be deep-seated conspiratorial ideas that project onto a single individual a host of negative characteristics attributed to the group to which he belongs, we would do well to consider how we use the platforms we each have in our daily lives in the service of justice, anti-racism and truth.

Hate crimes down a bit

The number of antisemitic hate crimes in Canada declined a fraction last year, according to the B’nai Brith Canada League for Human Rights Annual Audit of Antisemitic Incidents 2022. The decline, though, is from 2021, which saw the highest number of incidents since the audit began 40 years ago so, despite the marginally good news, 2022 remains the second-worst year on record. In all, 2022 saw 2,769 incidents, down 1.1% from the 2,799 incidents reported in 2021.

“When viewed from a historical perspective … the numbers are less reassuring,” Marvin Rotrand, national director of the League for Human Rights, writes in the report. “In 2012, the Jewish community sounded the alarm when that audit noted 1,345 antisemitic incidents, the highest ever since we first began auditing in 1982. Ten years later, the number is an alarming 105.9% higher than that reported in 2012, and the second-highest total since we started tracking 41 years ago.”

Aron Csaplaros, British Columbia regional manager for B’nai Brith Canada, noted the most significant finding is that the majority of hate incidents are online.

“The audit says that 74% of hate is now online and that violent incidents are down,” he told the Jewish Independent. Violent incidents across Canada dropped to 25 last year from 75 the year previous. “But incidents have been moving online in the past decade or so and it’s kind of equally, if not more, dangerous when hate is online because it’s much easier to spread, more people read it,” he said. “It’s about context. It’s obviously different than a violent incident but it is equally as dangerous.”

Csaplaros does not have a clear explanation on why violent incidents saw such a drop. It may have to do with the fact that 2022 saw slightly less incendiary conflict in Israel and Palestine, overseas problems that invariably have repercussions worldwide.

“Obviously, we’re happy that violent incidents have gone down,” he said. “Hopefully, the reason for that is that certain provinces have adopted, for example, the IHRA [International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance] definition of antisemitism, and that might have filtered down into education for police forces and how they respond and deal with these situations. But we don’t really have a theory on why the violent incidents have gone down.”

In British Columbia, the number of violent crimes declined from two in 2021 to a single incident in 2022: a threat against Victoria’s Jewish Community Centre during the annual Jewish film festival in the capital city. Other B.C. instances include 51 cases of vandalism, 53 cases of harassment and 137 cases of online hate.

Csaplaros acknowledged that it is difficult to place a number on online antisemitic incidents.

“There are, unfortunately, probably thousands, millions of anti-Israel and antisemitic comments online and, obviously, just because of the sheer number of them, we don’t catch all of them,” he said.

The criteria B’nai Brith uses to measure hate online includes the question, “Is it antisemitic in that it targets Jews as a people and attribute negative things to them? For example, that they caused COVID, or do they use antisemitic stereotypes like Jews control the banks and so on and so forth,” explained Csaplaros. “With a lot of these comments, they are clearly antisemitic.”

B’nai Brith, he said, uses the “three Ds” measure created by Natan Sharansky: delegitimization, demonization, and applying double standards to the state of Israel.

While 74% of incidents were online, 15% involved vandalism, 10% in-person harassment and 1% were violent incidents.

In British Columbia overall, incidents declined more than 40%, to 242, compared with 409 the previous year. (For the purposes of the report, British Columbia and Yukon are reported together.) Examples of B.C. incidents included in the B’nai Brith report are the Simon Fraser University student society’s passing of a resolution referring to Israeli “war crimes and apartheid” and a Tweet accusing Jews of Satan worship and seeking world domination.

“At the end of the day, hate is hate,” said Csaplaros. “It’s important to have a record of how many antisemitic incidents occurred, regardless of whether it was a Laith Marouf-type thing or a violent incident or a swastika drawn on the sidewalk. Hate and antisemitism is hate … and it’s important to record all of that.”

Laith Marouf is a Montreal activist whose Community Media Advocacy Centre received more than $133,000 in federal government consulting fees before his antisemitic social media postings became widely known, including one in which he called Jewish people “loud mouthed bags of human feces.”

Csaplaros called on the province of British Columbia to join half of Canada’s other provinces in adopting the IHRA definition of antisemitism and to follow Ontario’s lead by introducing Holocaust education into the elementary school curriculum. The core curriculum in British Columbia does not mandate any Holocaust education, Csaplaros said. Students can learn about the Holocaust in elective courses and may learn about it in core courses, depending on the teacher’s choices.

The full annual audit is online at bnaibrith.ca.