Should Canada’s Jews be Arming Themselves?

Prior to October 7^th, few Canadians had serious reason to fear for their personal safety in the land of Peace, Order and Good Government. While the crime rate had risen above the overall US rate, the homicide rate remained much lower and sensational mass casualty events were much more infrequent. Protests, generally sporadic and directed towards domestic issues, remained policed, and where protests descended into lawlessness, protestors could expect to be arrested, including by officers in riot gear and on horseback. Terror attacks were thankfully rare while public displays of support for the Taliban or its ideological siblings Hamas and Hezbollah was virtually unheard of.

Objectively, Canada’s Jews were well integrated into the fabric of society, with a number serving in Parliament and other members finding success in business. Collectively, Canada’s Jews availed themselves of academic opportunities, pursuing degrees in medicine, law and accounting at three times the rate of the population at large. Despite this, Canada’s Jews remained subject to several thousand antisemitic incidents per year, which number had doubled over the preceding decade. While the majority of such incidents involved online harassment, Jews were also targeted for both violence and vandalism. However, where such incidents were reported to police, it was expected they would be dealt with in the same manner as other reported crimes.

Post October 7^th, Canada has changed. Our major cities now host omnipresent terror rallies (and riots) where attendees, some dressed as insurgents sporting faux suicide vests chant “death to Canada“, death to America” and “death to Israel” along with cries to ‘globalize the intifada.’ For those new to the Palestinian Israeli conflict, the second intifada (similar to the October 7^th attack in that it primarily involved attacks on non-combatants) consisted primarily of a series of suicide bombings on busses and in public forums that apparently, Canada to date has been ‘missing out on’. Not surprisingly, overall antisemitic incidents in Canada have since doubled, while incidents of violence against Jews have tripled. Jewish buildings including elementary schools have been marked with red triangles (denoting a target to be struck) attacked with Molotov cocktails, set on fire and sprayed with gunfire.

Problems have been especially pronounced in academia, even outside of Montreal. The student union at York wholeheartedly endorsed Hamas’ pogrom (while also endorsing resistance/violence in Turtle Island, i.e. Canada). The University of Victoria recently found itself in hot water after the Muslim Student’s Association invited a Taliban supporting hate preacher (who has called for the annihilation of Jews) to speak, to offer up his ‘insights’ that Canadian society was evil and filthy, before having to cancel the event space.  Additionally, Carleton employs a convicted synagogue bomber as a lecturer while a volunteer safety patrol was deemed necessary to keep Jewish students safe at the University of Toronto. Meanwhile at primary institutions, Jewish students have been physically assaulted and in one case in Toronto, required a community escort to reach school safely.

In addition to allowing lawlessness to take root in our cities and educational institutions, our government has also tolerated Jews being targeted in their homes and neighborhoods by Hamas supporters. This began when protestors were allowed to shut down an overpass to a predominantly Jewish neighborhood, to which the Toronto police responded by delivering coffee. Though that practice (and blockade) was ended due to public backlash (as shutting the overpass inconvenienced many others as well), the police have not stopped masked protestors from marching through residential Jewish neighborhoods while yelling that the residents were ‘baby killers’  and ‘filthy Zionist rats,’ and instead offered them safe escort. It remains highly unlikely that such conduct would be tolerated by the Klan marching similarly through predominantly black neighborhoods. Conversely, Jewish reporters who approach Hamas supporters too closely in public are arrested for breaching the peace.

Despite public anger, our elected politicians have proven shockingly ineffective. A number of high-profile Liberals, including the Prime Minister and his special representative Amira Elghawaby have repeatedly identified the root cause of the above noted problems to be . . . Islamophobia. Canadians it turns out, who are unhappy with the disruption to their daily lives caused by the lawlessness of the pro Palestinian protestors, are racists, prejudiced by their irrational fear and hatred of Muslims, including specifically those Muslims (and others) publicly supporting officially designated terrorist organizations such as Hamas, decrying Canadian society as evil and filthy or calling for ‘resistance’ (i.e. violence) in Canada. Meanwhile, members of the NDP have gone ‘all in’ with their support, appropriating Palestinian dress, slogans and symbols.

As threats against Canada’s Jews steadily escalate, a number are beginning to ask “when will we know’ that it’s time to leave? Already there are reports of Jews relocating within Canada to more heavily Jewish areas or even emigrating but is that really the answer to antisemitism? A similar question was faced in a German POW camp near the end of World War 2, when German forces instructed all Jewish prisoners to step forward. The American officer in charge of the prisoners had all men step forward, replied that ‘we are all Jews’ and told the Nazi pointing a gun at his head that he would have to shoot the lot of them, after which the Nazi would be tried for war crimes. Canada currently has no such leaders in positions of power.

With our government demonstrating itself willing to share its monopoly on violence with the pro-Hamas mob, Canada’s Jews are left to pick their poison in an effort to avoid further victimization. Specifically, they can keep their heads down, try to hide their identity and hope it will all ‘blow over.’ Alternately, they can take reasonable steps to protect their persons and property, including by applying for a firearms license and learning how to shoot (though if forced to do so, may find themselves subject to our capricious legal process). Like with an insurance policy, it would be best if such tool were never required, but in the face of escalating violence and prolonged government inaction, it’s probably the smart move in the circumstances. As said by the Greeks millennia ago, “God helps those who help themselves” and unfortunately Canada’s Jews are in need of help.