Rabbi Elan Mazer, the CEO of Mizrachi Canada, spoke with Arutz Sheva - Israel National News about the outbreak of antisemitism that followed the October 7 massacre and the recent wave of antisemitic incidents in Canada in particular.
"From October 7th and before October 7th [has been a] total transformation. The presence of antisemitism before October 7th was almost nonexistent," Rabbi Mazer said. "There were some events, here and there people were antisemitic. But in terms of a continuous presence in people's lives, something that was on people's minds, something that they had to deal with on an almost-daily basis, something that's in the news on a consistent basis, people walking around in masks and yelling antisemitic slogans within the Jewish communities, consistent, almost every week, events of shootings or Molotov Cocktails or assaults or things that happen or large rallies in front of community buildings, schools, shuls. It was not something that people ever imagined would be their daily lives in Canada."
He noted that antisemitism has become a fact of daily life for Jews in Canada. "It is something that people are constantly aware of [in] the way that they plan events, the type of events they plan, the type of ways that they publicize events, the ways that they know that when they do something the amount of security that's necessary in order to have a safe event within the community, it is something that people think about much, much more and even consistently in their daily lives and in organizational life as well."
Rabbi Mazer said that "security has been a focus in how to deal with the situation," adding that "Canada is meant to be a safe place. That is one of the most fundamental elements of Canada as a country is that it's meant to be safe for everyone who wants to live there and we live and let live. That's the mindset. And so, to move to a mindset where we expect that there are those who are looking to harm us - and they're looking to harm us in many different ways, whether or not it's physically, whether or not it's in terms of our comfortability of living, whether or not it's in terms of legally going against us, going attack us in lawfare as we've seen in many places across the world. They're trying to make it uncomfortable to be a Jew in Canada."
However, "the fact is that the Jewish community is still strong. We're very strong and we're very proud of being Jewish. And we're not lowering our head. But the security as well as the relationships with the authorities in order to try to get some kind of support for dealing with these situations is something that is on the forefront of everybody's minds."
"The authorities are good friends," he said. "At the end of the day, they have the right intentions and they want the Jewish community to be safe. They want Jews to be safe. They want people to be able to live in Canada and safety is utmost. What we're demanding is on two fronts. One is a sense of standing behind us and calling out antisemitism when it is clearly and blatantly antisemitism. There's a mindset of, 'We're gonna understand their narrative and we're going to be ok with certain statements being said, and we're going to allow certain things to happen, as long as we can keep the peace, as long as things are contained."
"I think that what we've seen around the world is that containing just fuels the fire. Those who want to harm us, when they see a response that is not a strong response in confrontation with them but just to keep the peace, they respond with, 'Well, if we can get away with this, we can get away with more," Rabbi Mazer warned. "Things are escalating. De-escalation, in the long run, seems to cause more escalation."
This is unacceptable to the Jewish community. "We do not want just de-escalation. We want these things to end. We do not want to have to go down our streets and see people yelling antisemitic slogans at us. We do not want to see demonization. We want the leadership of Canada to call things out as opposed to taking the side of the narrative and the blood libels that are being shoved against us. We want people to call it out and say, 'These are blood libels against the Jewish people and you cannot allow this kind of hate to happen within the streets.'"
He stated that one result of the wave of antisemitism has been the strengthening of Jewish identity in Canada. "That is the biggest mistake our enemies have always had about us, which is when they attack, they think it weakens us. It's always the other way around. Jews always respond to evil, they always respond to hate, and they always respond to events like this, by being more resilient, stronger, and more united, and that's what happened both in Israel as well as in the community in Canada. There's a resurgence of people looking for identity, for connection to the community. People come out from all over in ways that we've never seen before."
"The way that the Canadian Jewish community has stood up is exemplary," he said, calling their response "a model for the way that Jews should stand up. It's a testimony to the education, the schools, the institutions, that for the past 50 years have been in a certain way preparing for this, where [the question becomes], 'What do we do when it, unfortunately, our turn to be on the side of 'B'chol dor v'dor omdim aleinu l'chaloteinu' (in every generation they rise up against us to destroy us)? How will we? We have come together, and I think that a big part of it is our relationship with the State of Israel. It's a very Zionist community," he said.
"We take cues from the Jewish community here, from the State of Israel)" he added. "Am Yisrael (the people of Israel) in Israel has responded in the most valiant and courageous and incredible way anyone could have ever imagined. And that courage rubs off on communities around the world."
"'Never again' is not a call against us. It's not 'Never Again' to us. It's 'Never Again' that we're going to give up on it," Rabbi Mazer declared. "People aren't hiding themselves. We're still walking around with kippahs. We still wave Israeli flags. We still have our shuls out there. We're still proud, and we're still gonna say what we're gonna say and be proud of it. And they're not gonna deter us anymore. That's not going to be the way that we respond to it. We are gonna be more secure. We are gonna fight back. We are going to protest [for] our rights to live as Jews and believe in the things that we've believed in for the past 3,000, 4,000 years, but we're not gonna capitulate. And that's because of the strength of Am Yisrael here, and we thank you for that strength. Because without it, the rest of the world would not know what to do with themselves."