Ottawa
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A man has been charged for allegedly making antisemitic threats against an Ottawa, Ontario doctor who is Jewish.

Ottawa police issued an arrest warrant for the man who lives in Windsor, Ontario after the threats were uttered against Dr. Nili Kaplan-Myrth, a family doctor who is also running in a local municipal election for school board trustee, CTV News reported.

“We received a phone call at my office this morning from a man calling me a ‘f***ing Jew K***’ for speaking on The Agenda [TVO talk show] as a family doctor about the importance of masks and other COVID19 public health measures. I’ve reported to police as a hate crime. This is NOT civil society,” Kaplan-Myrth wrote on Twitter.

“The Ottawa police suggested I change my office phone number. Yeah, no. They’ve never heard of Bill C-3 to protect physicians from harassment. We have some work to do to teach Canadians what we mean by zero tolerance of harassment, let alone hate crimes.”

Kaplan-Myrth told the news outlet that she has been targeted with antisemitic messages and death threats for promoting COVID-19 vaccinations and speaking publicly in favour of public health measures during the pandemic.

After appearing on TVO’s The Agenda in September wearing a mask while speaking on TV from her medical clinic in Ottawa, Kaplan-Myrth said that the suspect called her office and made an antisemitic remark.

Kaplan-Myrth has been vocal about her support for COVID-19 protections, including masks and vaccination throughout the pandemic, which she spoke about during her recent television appearance on The Agenda. She has also run several “Jabapalooza” clinics, which have administered thousands of doses of COVID-19 vaccines to residents.

The doctor told CTV News that charges should be brought against those who harass doctors and journalists.

“I worry about my colleagues because I know that particularly women and women of colour in journalism, and in other fields, are also subjected to this kind of horrible, horrible harassment, and we should really be charging everybody in every instance and saying we will not tolerate it,” she said.

Ottawa police said in a statement that they had issued an arrest warrant for Louis Mertzelos, 58, of Windsor. Mertzelos was charged with hate-motivated harassing communications, harassment by repeated communication, mischief, and intimidation of the health service in connection with multiple threats made by phone.

(Israel National News' North American desk is keeping you updated until the start of Shabbat in New York. The time posted automatically on all Israel National News articles, however, is Israeli time.)