Very early on Saturday March 7, gunshots were fired at the Shaarei Shamayim synagogue in Toronto. That same morning, shots were also fired at the BAYT synagogue in a heavily Jewish suburb just north of Toronto. Earlier that week, a third Toronto synagogue – tucked away on a quiet street in an affluent neighbourhood – was also shot up in the middle of the night.
To date, no arrests have been made. No information regarding any investigation has been shared with the public. We are to accept the thoughts and prayers of Toronto Chief of Police Myron Demkiw and the political leadership up and down the food chain. “This is not who we are,” they are fond of saying. “Enough is enough.” “Hatred has no place in Canada.”
Except that it clearly does. Hatred has a very safe and protected place in Canadian society.
When it comes to the safety and protection of Canadian Jews, law enforcement, the justice system and every level of government simply disappear. They do nothing. Or, they openly facilitate the pro-Islamist and “progressive” protest groups that have done as they have pleased in Toronto since October 7, 2023.
Rather than confronting the violence and incitement on Toronto’s streets, police treat the very regular hate-fests as a spectator sport. Every Sunday, vicious antisemites gather at a specific intersection of a residential neighbourhood where many Jewish Torontonians live. They blast – often through megaphones and speakers – the usual slogans about globalising the intifada and that all Zionists are baby killers. One week they staged Yahya Sinwar’s final moments, with a masked man cosplaying the former Hamas leader, sitting in an easy chair throwing wooden sticks at Israeli drones.
Toronto police officers are convivial with the pro-Hamas regulars. “We’re just keeping the peace,” they are fond of saying. In reality, that means that they censure, rebuke and restrict the movement of Jewish people in their neighbourhood while allowing the “protesters” free rein.
On Sunday March 15, two days after the synagogue shootings, the Hamas crowd held aloft signs that would put the most grotesque propaganda from the 1930s to shame; large placards depicting Jews as rodents and other inhuman life forms. Toronto police took almost three weeks to “investigate” this event before laying charges for public incitement of hatred against Muhammad Anas Sial, of Toronto.
Following negative, international attention after the spate of synagogue shootings, Toronto Police told the Jewish community that the protesters would no longer be permitted to take their hate marches through residential streets in the targeted Jewish neighbourhood. But on Sunday March 29, that is exactly what happened again.
“We were just following orders” is what the police spokesperson has said, explaining this permissive approach to law enforcement. Several months ago, marching Hamas supporters aggressively accosted a mother outside her home, as her children stood nearby. The police did nothing. Well. That’s not entirely true. They allowed the protesters to carry on as they pleased.
Standard police enforcement now involves officers shouting at Jewish residents. “I’ve had enough of this. Just let them (the protestors) pass!” Or, “We’re just trying to keep the peace.”
Um, ok, replied a Jewish resident and leader of a counter-protest recently. But why then, he asked politely, are you shooing us off the sidewalk and rolling out the red carpet for these “protesters?”
A response was not forthcoming.
The three recent synagogue shootings are by no means the first nor the only ones. Schools, businesses, community centres – all have absorbed the violence which the Toronto police have taken to characterising as “peaceful protest.” Their other buzzwords of choice are that the demonstrators are exercising their “constitutional rights to freedom of expression and assembly.”
Every Canadian who has been educated past grade six knows that this is a load of poppycock. Hate speech and violence are not protected by the constitution or any law in Canada. Quite the opposite – there are many criminal and civil laws that should have been invoked to police the mayhem that has unfolded on Toronto streets since October 7.
In the days following the recent shootings there was a brief international spotlight on Toronto and Canada. The federal government, led for a year by Prime Minister Mark Carney, squirmed, a teeny bit. On March 11, the government announced that $10-million in federal funding would be allocated to enhance security measures for Jewish community institutions.
A few comments on that: 1) the program under which financial support is made available is done retroactively on a “matching” basis. In practice this means that a Jewish institution must incur the expense before any reimbursement is made. This highly bureaucratic process can often takes months; 2) “Security” personnel at Jewish institutions in Canada have not, historically, been armed. That appears to be changing in Toronto where police will now carry weapons when guarding Jewish institutions. Their level of training and any “orders” they are given – based on Toronto Police conduct to date – raise serious concerns. Furthermore, it is unclear whether other Canadian cities will allow armed personnel to secure Jewish sites; and 3) Jews neither want nor require money for security. What we – and all of Canada – need is for all levels of government and law enforcement to do their jobs. Uphold the law. Charge and arrest. Prosecute and sentence.
We cannot and should not be told by our government to build ever higher walls around our community centres, homes, schools, and synagogues. It is absurd, obscene and reminiscent of an era I would prefer not to invoke.
Canada’s organised Jewish community has always preferred a quiet approach to dealing with authorities. Even after the synagogue shootings, mainstream organisations were counselling cautious trust as we move forward. Perhaps this time, they said, the authorities and leadership will step up.
Days after the most recent attacks, Prime Minister Carney chose to spend time at an Iftar dinner in Ottawa, having a jolly old time working the room. He quite noticeably (and, one assumes, intentionally) has not met with any Jewish leaders since the shootings. He certainly has not been photographed glad-handing in rooms full of Canadian Jews. That omission is not an oversight.
Since being elected PM with a strong minority government on April 28, 2025 (as a result of a spate of “floor crossings” in the House and recent by-elections he now commands a parliamentary majority), Carney has not spoken with his Israeli counterpart, Benjamin Netanyahu. He has, however, been a reliably harsh and frequent critic of Israeli policy and Netanyahu himself. Among his more notable remarks was one made during an interview with Bloomberg News in October, 2025. When asked if he would honour the more than dubious ICC warrant issued for Netanyahu’s arrest (should he set foot on Canadian soil), Carney unhesitatingly responded in the affirmative.
And he went further, gratuitously criticising Netanyahu, claiming that “the actions of Netanyahu’s government were explicitly designed to end any possibility of a Palestinian state in violation of the UN Charter and going against Canadian government policy of any political stripe since 1947.”
Carney could have easily ducked or finessed his response. Instead, he chose – deliberately – to lash out. He is, of course, entitled to criticise Israeli policy. What he appears not to grasp is that doing so with such zeal stokes and legitimises violent antisemitism in Canada.
The message to Canada’s Jews is not subtle – and nor are its implications.
Vivian Bercovici served as Canada’s Ambassador to Israel from 2014-16. She publishes articles and AV podcasts at stateoftelaviv.com and writes a regular column for the National Post (Canada)
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