VUONG: Canada drew a line on anti-Asian hate, why not on anti-Jewish violence?
· Toronto Sun
Even at the height of anti-Asian hate during the COVID-19 pandemic, no one drove through Chinatown shooting at small businesses, community centres, or people.
And if they did, it would have been rightly and resolutely condemned by every decent and reasonable Canadian leader and citizen.
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But when it happens to the Jewish community, at a time of the highest anti-Jewish hatred in modern history, the reaction – aside from Jewish leaders and a few select allies– has been little more than a collective shrug.
In two weeks, there have been two incidents of people being shot at because they were Jewish. Most recently, on May 7, three people standing outside a synagogue were shot at with what police described as a suspected pellet gun.
These aren’t acts of mischief. They are meant to terrorize a domestic population of people – Jews – and they are only one step removed from murder.
Where is the fury? Is no one else angry this is happening in our city and country? Let’s be clear: these are acts of domestic terrorism. Why isn’t this wall-to-wall coverage on our television networks? Why isn’t it front page news? Will there be a Royal Commission on Antisemitism , as B’nai Brith Canada has been calling for?
The hate crime data speaks for itself. Even before the horrendous terrorist attack and massacre of Jews on October 7, 2023, over two thirds (69%) of hate crime in 2022 targeted Jews, according to the RCMP. But it becomes even more sobering when you consider that many incidents go unreported and when you put it in perspective of just how small the Jewish population in Canada actually is.
Jews 223 times more likely to be targeted by hate than average Canadian
In 2024, B’nai Brith Canada reported 5,791 incidents of antisemitism in their audit of the previous year. I joined them at the press conference on Parliament Hill announcing these shameful findings.
But what I found most disgraceful was what happened when those numbers were adjusted on a per capita basis against Canada’s tiny Jewish population of roughly 282,000 people – just 0.8% of the country. By that measure, a Jewish person is 223 times more likely to be targeted by hate than the average Canadian.
So what are our authorities doing? The federal government announced $10 million in additional funding for the Jewish community’s security network on May 6. Great, but that’s reactionary. How will it stop the people committing these acts of hatred? And forgive me, but it seems a lot like an admission that they view the situation as getting worse, rather than better.
If Canadians cannot count on their authorities to keep them safe, who are they supposed to rely on?
Latest violence unfolds during Jewish Heritage Month
All of this is happening in the month of May, which is also Jewish Heritage Month. At a time when we should be celebrating the contributions of Jewish Canadians to building Canada, they are literally being shot at and terrorized.
May also happens to be Asian Heritage Month and, as a Canadian of Chinese heritage, I am proud to share this month with our Jewish friends. In fact, there’s a part of shared Chinese and Jewish history in Canada that seems more important than ever to honour.
Back when Chinese discrimination was institutional in Canada, as it increasingly feels like Jewish hate is today, Jews stood in solidarity with the Chinese. One of those leaders was Jewish lawyer Irving Himel, who worked with Canada’s first lawyer of Chinese heritage, Kew Dock Yip, to repeal the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1947, which was official government policy banning immigration to Canada by anyone of Chinese heritage.
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Where are the Irving Himels and Kew Dock Yips of today? Surely every decent Canadian understands that targeting people because of their faith or ethnicity is wrong – never mind shooting at them with a firearm, replica or not.
As our friends in Australia learned from the Bondi Beach massacre , hatred that is tolerated, minimized, or excused does not remain rhetorical forever – i t escalates.
Canadians must draw a line in the sand against antisemitism now, while there is still time to prevent today’s intimidation from becoming tomorrow’s tragedies – before the only lines left to draw are the chalk outlines of those we failed to protect.
– Kevin Vuong is the former Member of Parliament for Spadina-Fort York. The son of refugees, he continues his public service as a senior fellow at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute and as a naval reserve officer.