McGill

SFU students vote BDS

On April 20, the Simon Fraser Student Society (SFSS) voted in favour of boycott, divestment and sanctions (BDS) against Israel. The motion is in support of Palestinian liberation, which it defines as resistance against Israeli “settler-colonialism” and the occupation of historic Palestine – including the West Bank, Gaza and the present-day state of Israel.

The Hillel chapter at SFU issued a statement on April 20 denouncing the motion.

“Evidently, this motion, and the student council standing in support of it are not concerned with the safety of Jewish students on SFU campus,” reads the statement. “The adoption of the policy, which passed unanimously this evening, and which violates SFU, provincial and federal law, sets a dangerous precedent for Jewish safety, freedom of association and political mobilization on campus.”

The day after the SFSS vote, another campus group also voted on a motion related to debates over Israel.

On April 21, more than 60% of the Queen’s University Faculty Association (QUFA) voted in favour of a motion that opposed the adoption of the working definition of antisemitism from the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA).

The IHRA working definition of antisemitism was adopted in May 2016, and states that antisemitism is “a certain perception of Jews, which may be expressed as hatred toward Jews. Rhetorical and physical manifestations of antisemitism are directed toward Jewish or non-Jewish individuals and/or their property, toward Jewish community institutions and religious facilities.”

The document also lists many examples that could fall into the broader definition of antisemitism. Among the examples are statements about Jewish people and Israel, including “denying the Jewish people their right to self-determination, e.g., by claiming that the existence of a state of Israel is a racist endeavour.”

According to the QUFA motion, this definition threatens academic freedom and intersectional anti-racist and decolonial initiatives.

“The IHRA deﬁnition of antisemitism misconstrues antisemitism to include a broad range of criticism of the state of Israel, particularly targeting

decolonial and anti-racist critiques of the policies, structures and practices of Israel,” the motion reads. “Such targeted attacks, which primarily impact racialized faculty and students, will have a negative effect on the academic freedom of our members in the classroom, in their research and in campus politics more broadly.”

Jordan Morelli, QUFA president, said in an email that the motion was brought forward by individual members of the association, as is their right according to the association’s democratic processes. He also said the vote itself was preceded by a balanced discussion in which everybody who wanted to speak was given the opportunity to do so. Morelli further added that Queen’s recently revised policy on harassment and discrimination defines antisemitism in a manner consistent with the Ontario Human Rights Code policies, and that other faculty organizations at other schools, as well as at federal and provincial levels, have expressed similar concerns with the IHRA definition of antisemitism.

Before the vote, Queen’s Hillel published an open letter signed by more than 1,600 people – current Jewish and non-Jewish students, alumni, family members and community members – asking the faculty to vote against the motion.

“This statement contributes to the erasure of Jewish history, religiosity and values. To exclude the Jewish community from impacted ‘racialized faculty and students’ does harm to multi-racial, long-established Jewish communities. It overwrites our lived reality of centuries of constant displacement, colonization, conquest and migration,” the letter reads.

The letter also says that the fears about restricting criticism of Israel and academic freedom do not follow from a “fair” reading of the definition, as Israel is not mentioned in the definition itself, but only in the follow-up examples of what may constitute antisemitism. The letter also questioned why it does not fall to Jewish groups to define their own oppression.

“It is our understanding that a fundamental principle of anti-oppression work is allowing affected communities to define their own oppression,” reads the letter. “It is not the place of any organization external to our community…. It is the Jewish community, and the Jewish community alone, who get to decide this. This double-standard is antisemitic.”

The Hillel letter did note that some of the faculty who proposed the motion are Jewish, but said their views are out-of-sync with the vast majority of Canadian Jews.

After the motion passed, Queen’s Hillel published a statement that said they were “deeply saddened,” called the vote “an utter disgrace,” especially because no actionable steps were suggested in the motion to combat growing antisemitism on campus. However, the statement also said they were “immensely proud” of the support shown across the community.

At McGill, a similar motion in support of Palestinian solidarity that was passed by more than 70% of the Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) was not ratified by SSMU’s board of governors. In a statement published on April 22, the board said they could not adopt the policy because it contravened numerous SSMU governing documents, including its constitution, equity policy and Quebec law.

The original version of this article was published by The CJN. For more national Jewish news, visit thecjn.ca.

CIJA calls on feds to act now

Signs shown at a recent rally in support of Palestine. (screenshot from cija.ca)

The Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs is calling on the federal government to expand supports for Jewish communal security after a surge of antisemitic violence and vandalism in Canada, and to launch an emergency summit on antisemitism.

Shimon Koffler Fogel, CIJA’s chief executive officer, made the request in a meeting with senior staff from the prime minister’s office and Liberal cabinet ministers and members of Parliament May 20. Later that day, he spoke at a virtual event billed as a national Canadian Jewish community briefing, called Learn, Mobilize, Act: Keep the Conflict Out of Canada.

“We are calling on the prime minister to convene an emergency summit on antisemitism that will include the political leadership at both the provincial and municipal levels, a true all-of-government effort, and establish a comprehensive program to combat Jew-hatred, the oldest and most enduring hate the world has ever experienced,” he said.

CIJA also wants a complementary program to the Security Infrastructure Program, “that enhances the capacity of our community to take ownership of our own security.”

He spoke just hours after Israel announced a ceasefire in its most recent battle with Hamas.

“As we express hope for a durable ceasefire to take hold and an end to the conflict there, we are painfully aware that the battle has moved to our country, to our communities from coast to coast,” Fogel said. “It’s been frightening but we dare not cower and hide. It’s been disturbing, but we dare not be intimidated from asserting our identity, who we are and what we are, and in doing so with pride…. Our adversaries seek not only to erase our ties to the land and history of Israel, they seek to erase the presence of Jews altogether.”

He lauded the additional attention to racial justice that has emerged in recent years. “But, along with the good of that movement has come a contaminated strain that reduces everything to a simple equation of the oppressed and the oppressor, and Jews have been declared the poster child of the oppressors, so they must be rejected and vilified,” said Fogel.

Joel Reitman, co-chair of CIJA, opened the event.

“Over the past two weeks, we have watched with shock as our fellow Jews in Israel have been subjected to attack at the hands of Hamas, a terrorist organization bent on the destruction and the obliteration of the Jewish state of Israel and the murder of Israelis,” said Reitman. “Our sorrow and compassion is extended also to Hamas victims in Gaza, where Hamas has embedded its terrorist infrastructure within densely populated areas, deliberately putting the people of Gaza in harm’s way and where one-third of Hamas missiles have fallen, taking many innocent lives.

“Our outrage has deepened as the violence on our television screens has spilled over into violence and threats of violence directed against the Jews in our streets, in our communities, online and in our places of business, our schools and our houses of worship,” continued Reitman. “Never has it been more clear that Jewish people, whether we live in Canada or in Israel, must stand as one. Never has it been more clear that the ancient hatred of antisemitism does not distinguish between a Jew in Tel Aviv at or a Jew in Toronto. We are all targets…. We will not be intimidated. We will not be discouraged. We will call out the perpetrators of violence and we will call on our many friends to stand with us and we will act together. Together with our fellow Canadians right across this country, we say, enough. We know where antisemitism leads if left unchecked. We know what must be done to stop it. And, together, stop it we will.”

Naomi Rosenfeld, executive director of the Atlantic Jewish Council, said it has been a scary few weeks to be a Jew.

“With all this hatred and fear,” she said, “I hope that we all remember three things. One, it has never been more apparent why we need Israel and why we need a strong Jewish state. Two, if any of you have been going through any of the things that I’ve mentioned, please know that you are not alone. We stand together, a community here to support one another through each of these events. And, finally, as a national Canadian Jewish community, we must remain strong and resilient. We will not cower to fear and we will not hide our true identities and who we are.”

Dr. Gil Troy, professor of history at McGill University and an author of several books on Zionism, spoke of being a parent of two members of the Israel Defence Forces and the betrayal he felt to read a letter signed by 180 rabbinical students comparing the racial reckoning in the United States in recent years directly to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

“We’re told again and again, especially by my friends in the United States, too many of my Jewish friends in the United States, that this is a racial issue between the white Israelis, the white privileged Israelis, and the brown Palestinians,” said Troy. “And we are told that the cause of this latest conflict is Israeli provocations.… We all know that the underlying cause of this is the refusal of Hamas, the refusal of Islamic Jihad, the refusal of the so-called moderate Palestinian Authority to accept the fact, 73 years after the establishment of the state of Israel, that the state of Israel exists.”

Jeff Rosenthal, the other co-chair of CIJA, asserted that “Jews and only Jews have the right to define what constitutes antisemitism.” He said, “We’ve always known that there is no distinction between anti-Zionism and antisemitism. Our lived experiences and the experiences of our forefathers and ancestors confer a unique alertness to this threat.”

He called on viewers to mobilize and directed people to the Action Centre on the website cija.ca.

What is anti-Zionism?

Last year, the Students’ Society of McGill University, in Montreal, barred the reelection of three Jewish members of the board of directors. The issue, according to a report undertaken on behalf of the university, was not the students’ Jewishness, but their Zionism. It was, the report concluded, a political issue, not one of discrimination against Jews. There is a great deal to unpack in this story.

B’nai Brith Canada has launched a petition calling for a comprehensive investigation into antisemitism on the campus, noting that the SSMU incident was far from the only concerning episode in recent years.

Sometimes, antisemitism is unequivocal. Swastika graffiti and statements that overtly target Jews for condemnation or murder are uncontestable. But, in many cases, unwitting perpetrators are so unaware of the history of antisemitism and its associated symbols and tropes that they employ antisemitic concepts without consciously knowing it. For example, many images and much of the language of the anti-Zionist movement dovetails with traditional images of scheming Jews merely recast as scheming Zionists or Israelis. Note the term “Israel lobby,” which does not imply a legitimate political position but rather suspect coercion.

With the McGill situation, part of the problem is that “anti-Zionism is not antisemitism” is often stated as a self-evident truth. A more accurate statement would be “anti-Zionism is not necessarily antisemitism.” Because, sometimes it is. For example, the most casual perusal of online discussions about Israel turns up volumes of images evoking blood libels of the Middle Ages. And the equation of Zionism with Nazism, which can plausibly be denied as explicitly antisemitic, intentionally rubs salt in the most painful of Jewish historical memories. Label such comments as one will, they have the very deliberate effect of inflicting pain on Jews.

And this is the important point here. People can defend their positions by saying that their criticisms are of Israel, not of Jews; that their positions are political, not based on ethnicity or religion. But, as we have said in this space before, outcome matters as well as intent. Israel may be the intended target but Jews feel the effects.

It doesn’t matter that not all Jews are Zionists. It would not matter even if most Jews opposed Zionism. The fact is that opposition to the existence of a Jewish state – which is the definition of “anti-Zionism” – is arguably de facto antisemitic. There are all sorts of defences, of course. Some people claim to oppose all forms of nationalism, yet the practical application of their ideology is to start by boycotting the Jewish state rather than, say, the Mexican, Malaysian or Dutch nations. As well, opposing Zionism, while knowing the historical impacts of Jewish statelessness, including history that took place in the memory of living generations, could be viewed as such disregard for Jewish individual and collective security as to be antisemitic.

Others claim they support Israel’s right to exist, but then take positions that defy these words, such as denying Israel’s right to defend itself, which in effect is a denial of, if not statehood outright, the right of Israeli citizens to live free from terrorist murder and missiles. What name should we give that?

When Jews say they feel singled out because of their Jewish identity or because of their support for a Jewish state, they are met with responses ranging from outright denial of the legitimacy of their experiences to accusations that they are fabricating their concerns as a political weapon. The idea that anti-Zionism is not rife with antisemitism would be more believable if its purveyors acknowledged that such a thing does exist, and condemned it.

Sadikov resigns SSMU post

Igor Sadikov, the McGill University student under fire for his “punch a Zionist today” tweet more than a month ago, resigned his remaining student government post, thereby preempting a vote by his peers on his removal.

On March 8, Sadikov stepped down from his position as arts representative on the Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) legislative council, a day before that body was set to debate a motion to impeach him. The action was “for impropriety and for violation of the provisions of the [SSMU] constitution” related to the tweet.

Sadikov cited “personal reasons related to mental health” for his decision to go. On Feb. 23, when the council motion was tabled, the third-year mathematics and political science student resigned from the SSMU board of directors, claiming pressure was being exerted by the university administration. He has not elaborated on his departure, and even the McGill Daily, of which he is a former news editor and frequent contributor, could not reach him for comment. He also didn’t comment about the resignation on his social media accounts.

It was on his personal Twitter account on Feb. 6 that Sadikov posted the infamous tweet, for which he apologized, calling it an ill-considered joke. While he is anti-Zionist, Sadikov described himself as Jewish and noted that his parents are Zionists, and he vowed to gain a better understanding of differing views on the political philosophy.

Nevertheless, pro-Israel groups on and off campus continued to call for his ouster, decrying the tweet as hateful and an incitement to violence, and they were unconvinced Sadikov had shown true remorse.

Both the Daily and another student newspaper, the McGill Tribune, reported that Sadikov’s March 8 resignation came days after allegations that he had been psychologically abusive in a relationship with another McGill student.

The day following his resignation, SSMU president Ben Ger resigned, citing personal reasons. Two other directors have also left. At press time, the SSMU was in the midst of executive elections.

On Feb. 22, the Arts Undergraduate Society voted not to oust Sadikov, while, nine days prior, the board of directors defeated an impeachment motion, but did formally censure Sadikov. On Feb. 15, following a meeting convened by McGill principal Suzanne Fortier, the SSMU executive “recommended” that Sadikov stand down.

Meanwhile, names continue to be added to an online petition demanding that Sadikov be expelled from McGill for incitement to violence. It was launched last month by Montrealer Murray Levine, who identifies himself as an activist and fundraiser who attended McGill.

By March 10, there were more than 2,000 signatures. The majority appear to be from outside the McGill community. Levine said that, when 3,000 names are collected, the petition will be presented to Fortier.

– For more national Jewish news, visit cjnews.com

Inciting violence

On Feb. 6, Igor Sadikov, an elected student representative at McGill University, tweeted “punch a zionist today” (sic). The statement stirred some reaction, though not the universal revulsion that should greet incitement to political violence in Canada. The Student Society of McGill University (SSMU), on which Sadikov serves as an elected representative, has declined to condemn him or remove him from his position.

Instead, the brunt of vitriol appears to have been reserved for another member of the SSMU – one who is Jewish. At a public meeting where the violence-inciting statement of a councilor should have been the top agenda item, the tables turned and, instead, Jasmine Segal, a fellow councilor, who told the audience she is a Zionist, was singled out for condemnation.

The McGill Daily, a student-run newspaper that has an explicit policy of refusing to publish anything perceived as pro-Israel, has been a voice on campus emboldening voices like Sadikov’s. In writing about the SSMU meeting – under a header boldly declaring the article “News,” as opposed to commentary or opinion – the paper “reported” that “many at McGill and in the wider world are portraying it as an incitement to antisemitic violence.”

For the education of readers, the author of the piece explained: “This interpretation rests on the conflation of Zionism with Jewishness which, while widely believed, is in fact a misconception; many Jewish people do not identify with the settler-colonial ideology of Zionism or the goals and actions of the state of Israel.”

One member of the audience at the meeting said he felt personally threatened by Sadikov’s tweet, in response to which a student who identified herself as Palestinian declared that she felt unsafe because there is a self-avowed Zionist on council.

“Since SSMU has a social justice mandate,” she asked, according to the Daily account, “why does it allow Zionist councilors on council, when Zionist ideology is inherently [linked to] ethnically cleansing Palestinians?”

On a Facebook post after the meeting, Segal wrote about being targeted by the audience and abandoned by her colleagues on council.

“I was left isolated and alone to respond,” she wrote, in a statement that has been widely shared. “My fellow representatives sat in silence and permitted this malicious, prejudicial and unjustified attack to continue. Instead of rising to state that this abusive conduct would not be tolerated at this meeting and at McGill at large, I was left alone to answer prejudicial questions that should not have had such a platform. I was under attack and did the best I could to try and redirect to the issues of the meeting and … bring down the rising temperature in the room.”

The fact that most of Sadikov’s colleagues on the student society stood by him and that it has been Segal who has been made to feel like the wrongful party is not surprising. It is reflective of a general lack of compassion and listening, including among those who claim to be stewards of social justice and intercultural understanding.

Time was critics would specify that they are condemning policies of the Israeli government, not Israel’s right to exist. Now, the journalistic voice of students at McGill University just declares that the movement for Jewish self-determination has nothing at all to do with Jews, and a student considers themself “unsafe” in the mere presence of an individual who believes the Jewish people have a right to a homeland. Worst of all, even when someone literally calls for violence against fellow human beings, the overall reaction is not to condemn such incitement, but to turn against the Jew in the room.

Examining the cosmos

Prof. Victoria Kaspi, winner of the 2016 Gerhard Herzberg Canada Gold Medal for Science and Engineering. (photo from McGill University)

McGill University Prof. Victoria Kaspi – the first woman to win the Gerhard Herzberg Canada Gold Medal for Science and Engineering – says that her Jewish background and her parents’ support have had a lot to do with how much she has accomplished.

“Questioning is so inherently Jewish,” she told the Independent. “I think this builds personality, skill, and derived pleasure from talking and thinking. Jews are very studious, loving the books. For some people, it’s the Torah; for others, it’s different types of books … just really enjoying the process of studying, thinking and analyzing. I think that’s what my Jewish background has brought to my work.”

Neither of her parents were scientists. “I just really like it,” she said. “I grew up loving math. My parents were pretty hands off and they certainly never discouraged me. I was sort of an oblivious kind of kid, so if there were cultural signals that I shouldn’t go into science, I must have missed them.

“I think my parents built up my confidence. They never questioned my decisions. When I said I want to go into science, they never asked why I’d want to do that. They used to buy me lots of math toys and puzzles as a kid. Probably my mom encouraged me. She used to play lots of games with me.

“I’m sure I had encouragement from teachers along the way and family as well,” she added. Describing science as “always a great love,” she said it was neither forced on her or strongly encouraged as a study or career path. But Kaspi is aware of the societal pressures on women to not go into science, especially now, with her own daughters.

“They are sometimes subtle and pointing them out can be petty, but when you notice them as an overall trend – where there’s lots of little, tiny subtle signals that, in the end, register very large – I think that needs some work,” said Kaspi of the pressures. “Why I didn’t suffer from that? I’m not sure. I’m hoping that this will improve with time.”

Kaspi uses radio and X-ray telescopes to examine the behavior of neutron stars, using the cosmos as a lab to study the nature of matter in extreme environments.

“The sort of work I’ve done has involved different types of neutron stars,” said Kaspi. “One, in particular, that I’ve done is magnetars, which are neutron stars with very high magnetic fields. They sometimes explode randomly and are just really interesting to study. But there are other things, too.”

photo - A satellite picture of the island of Montreal with an illustration of a neutron star for comparison. While relatively small, neutron stars are so dense that just one teaspoon would weigh about a billion tons — A satellite picture of the island of Montreal with an illustration of a neutron star for comparison. While relatively small, neutron stars are so dense that just one teaspoon would weigh about a billion tons. *(photo from NASA)*

Neutron stars are stars that have collapsed and are very dense. A black hole is a star that has collapsed onto itself, due to gravity being so strong that nothing can escape from the surface, not even light; hence, the name, black hole. Neutrons are close cousins of black holes, but some light does escape from them.

“The typical neutron star has as much matter in it as half a million planet earths, but is crushed down to the size of a city,” said Kaspi. “We think a typical diameter of a neutron star is something like 20 kilometres.

“If you’ve crushed all that matter into the size of a small city, you have matter that is extremely dense. If you went up to a neutron star with a teaspoon and you took a teaspoon of the matter, it would weigh something like a billion tons.”

Kaspi said, “We don’t understand the physics of it very well, and that’s one of the things we are hoping to learn by studying them. When studying these objects, we use very powerful computers and algorithms, digital signal processing, there’s a lot of hard work and managing of big data.

“People who study pulsars are snapped up by software companies, because they are really good at developing algorithms, thinking out of the box and finding creative solutions to big data problems.”

Pulsars are rapidly spinning neutron stars and emit a bright beam of light. They are observed through their flashes. If you wanted to go flying around the galaxy and needed a useful, simple way to know where you are, you could use a pulsar. “They all pulse very regularly,” said Kaspi. “You can use that to know where you are in the galaxy and which direction you want to go.”

Kaspi’s research group has used neutron stars to confirm Albert Einstein’s theory of general relativity.

“As scientists, we don’t believe just because a theory is beautiful, it has to be right,” she said. “You have to test it with experiments. These neutron stars allow you to do phenomenal tests of general relativity. Was Einstein right or not? There are other theories of gravity and we can test those, too.”

One of the biggest projects Kaspi is currently working on in Canada is the building of the Chime Telescope in Penticton. She is also looking into “fast radio bursts.”

Of this phenomenon, Kaspi said, “It’s something that’s a big mystery right now that we don’t understand. Astronomers are pretty puzzled over these things. They are very short, a few milliseconds, bursts of radio waves, little blips in the sky that go off randomly but frequently. We think a few thousand go off across the whole sky every day. The first one was discovered a decade ago. Until now, only about 20 have been recorded.”

Kaspi has earned international recognition and numerous awards for her work over the years. As for receiving the Herzberg medal, she said she feels honored, and added, “I may be the first [woman] for this prize, but I won’t be the last. There will be many more women in the future.”

Rebeca Kuropatwa is a Winnipeg freelance writer.