Dan Pujdak: By failing to stand against antisemitism, our leaders have shown they stand for nothing

A year ago, Canadians got their first glimpse of where our country could be headed. On Oct. 7, 2023, a designated terrorist group whose charter calls for the slaughter of Jews massacred 1,200 innocent people in Israel, including eight Canadians. Babies were burnt alive in their cribs and young adults were massacred at a music festival.

Shortly after, revellers and anti-Israel protesters took to the streets in Canada. In the following weeks and months, as their rhetoric grew more antisemitic and their calls for “peace” came with cheers for violence against Jews and Israelis, many Canadian leaders stood silent.

Since October 7, too many Canadian cities and university campuses have resembled the 2017 white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Va., where protesters yelled “Jews will not replace us.” The chants in Canada are now nearly the same.

Our moral compass has been scrambled, producing shocking new precedents and challenging previously well-established moral norms. Somehow, explicit discrimination and calls for violence against a religious community have been normalized and accepted.

Should a Canadian community be targeted and held collectively responsible for a war overseas? Yes, according to law enforcement officials who have failed to prosecute repeated incidents of harassment and threats against Jewish communities. Yes, according to elected leaders who have failed to forcefully denounce hate in Canada’s streets, tacitly sanctioning a policy of “collective responsibility” against minority groups when it’s politically expedient.

According to the logic of some, the rise of antisemitism and hate in Canada just isn’t a big deal when compared to the plight facing Palestinians. Somehow, a war on the other side of the world has made some Canadians feel justified in protesting outside synagogues and Jewish events with hateful speech reminiscent of the old Westboro Baptist Church crew, who are best remembered for picketing funerals.

Is there a political cost to being associated with hate? No, it turns out, as members of Parliament like Jenica Atwin and Ahmed Hussen continue to sit as senior members of the diversity-championing Liberal caucus despite being involved in antisemitic controversies.

Should Canada fund organizations that plausibly aid terrorist activities? Yes, according to our government, which restored financial support to UNRWA despite evidence that some of the organization’s employees participated in the October 7 massacre.

Should we prioritize our relationships with our democratic allies? No, according to Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly, whose policy approach has alienated not only Israel, but now the United States, which has been told it cannot share Canadian-manufactured military hardware with Israel, despite a longstanding defence agreement. Her decision aggravates an increasingly tenuous defence relationship with Canada’s closest ally.

Should cabinet even be truthful about international affairs? No, according to Minister Joly, who has posted public statements that appear to repeat Hamas propaganda, such as blaming Israel for tragic events like the explosion at the Al-Ahli Arab Hospital that was ultimately determined to be the fault of others.

Should communities experiencing hate stand together in solidarity? No, according to Pride movements that alienated Jewish LGBTQ+ community members by turning their parades into anti-Israel marches instead of focusing on combating hate against queer communities and their ethnically and religiously diverse members.

Is anti-western and antisemitic fanaticism a threat that Canada must guard itself against? No, according to immigration officials who have let ISIS members and terrorist plotters settle in our country, where they have planned attacks against Jews.

Antisemitism is the canary in the coalmine for other forms of hatred and xenophobia, warned former United Nations special rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief Ahmed Shaheed in 2019. Or, as the late Rabbi Jonathan Sacks warned, when society comes for the Jews, it never ends there.

The warning signs are flashing, yet Canada still has not taken the threat antisemitism poses to its core values seriously. If truth and the rule of law can be tossed aside instead of being used to protect Jews, what does that mean for our society?

What does Canada stand for if not for freedom, human rights and the protection of minorities? Who is next?

National Post

Dan Pujdak is a senior fellow at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute and chief strategy officer at Blackbird Strategies. He previously served as the director of policy to the minister of Crown-Indigenous relations and northern affairs Canada.