The League for Human Rights of B’nai B’rith in Canada just released a report on antisemitism, and the results are disturbing.
While antisemitism had remained fairly constant between the years 2010 and 2013, it spiked to an all-time high in 2014, with a 28 percent increase over 2013.
There were 1627 reported incidents of antisemitism in Canada in 2014. Here are a few examples provided in the executive summary of the report:
In Laurentians, Canada, several Chassidic homes were vandalized, and one was completely destroyed by arson.
In Penticton, Canada, a mattress was set on fire, with the words ‘burnt Jew’ written across the top.
In Montreal, there was an arson attack against Jews. Also, two cars were vandalized and spray painted with swastikas. Also in Montreal, a Chassidic woman sitting on a park bench was slapped in the face by a man on a bicycle riding past.
In Calgary and Toronto, multiple Jews were attacked and injured at Palestinian and Israel support rallies. At these rallies, chants of “kill the Jews” and “Hitler was right” were also reported.
Also in Toronto, dog feces was rubbed on the door of a synagogue. According to the Toronto Police Service annual Hate Crime Report, in 2014, Toronto’s Jewish community was the single most victimized group. In nearly one in every three reported hate crime incidents in Toronto, Jews were the victims, with similar results seen in other Canadian cities.
So why the huge increase in such incidents in Canada in 2014? Actually, the increase is consistent with the rise of reported antisemitism globally, especially in Europe, where some countries reported a doubling of anti-Semitism.
The B’nai B’rith conclusion points to anti-Zionism being treated as a legitimate source of political debate, with attacks on the Jewish State quickly oozing into raw Jew hatred.
On college and university campuses across Canada, on the streets in protests and in the media, one drum-beat is being pounded again and again: Jews, via the state of Israel, are responsible for some of the worst types of human rights violations and the genocide of the Palestinian people. Criticism of Israeli policy has become a condemnation of the Jewish people as a whole,
What is said about the Canadian campuses is equally true for American, British and European campuses.
Those organizations working so earnestly to “love Israel” into being “better” appear to be primarily responsible for the huge increase in anti-Zionism, which is, as the Pope recently noted, another term for antisemitism.