By Joseph Marshall
Something has shifted in Canada. You can feel it in the air, in the silence that follows when someone mentions Israel, in the way people lower their voices when saying they’re Jewish. This country once prided itself on tolerance, but tolerance means nothing when the target is the Jew.
Every week brings another headline. A synagogue defaced. A Jewish school threatened. A child taunted for being Israeli. Politicians pretend to be shocked, yet the rot is everywhere. The same MPs who claim to fight hate now give credibility to those who spread it. Liberal MP Sameer Zuberi sat in a parliamentary committee and asked whether Canada should be screening Israelis for war crimes. That’s not curiosity, that’s hostility dressed up as due diligence. It tells every Jew that the assumption is guilt until proven otherwise.
And while the government shrugs, the so-called progressive press is busy doing its part. The Maple, a fringe outlet that pretends to be independent, published a list of Canadians who served in the Israel Defense Forces. It claimed to expose “war criminals.” What it really did was publish a digital hit list. These are Canadians, some dual citizens, many Jewish, whose only crime was defending Israel from terrorists. The editors who built that list knew exactly what they were doing. In a country where antisemitic threats are multiplying, publishing names is an act of malice, not journalism.
Then there’s Mark Carney. His government chose this exact moment, when Jews are being attacked in the streets and Israelis are fighting for survival, to recognize a Palestinian state. He framed it as a diplomatic step toward peace. In reality, it was a political calculation made on the backs of Jewish lives. Recognizing a Palestinian state while Israel is still burying its dead sends one message: Canada no longer stands with the Jewish people, and it’s proud of it.
The combination is toxic. A government that equivocates. A media class that publishes lists. Lawmakers who question whether Jews in uniform should be treated like criminals. It creates permission, permission for hate to breathe freely again.
Jews in Canada are watching the country change and wondering when the line will be crossed completely. It’s not hysteria. It’s memory. Jews have seen this pattern before. It always starts with words, with lists, with polite questions about loyalty. It always ends with random attacks and genocide on the Jewish people.
The truth is simple. Jews are being singled out. Israelis are being treated as pariahs. And the people who should know better are either too cowardly or too comfortable to speak up. This isn’t the Canada we thought we lived in. But it’s the one we’re living in now.
