Top expert explains rise in Jew hate, and it's not about Gaza

There’s been a lot of attention focused on the unprecedented rise in antisemitism in Canada these past few months. Never before have things been so bad that a Parliamentary committee had to be convened to find out why Jewish students felt unsafe at their universities. Turns out it’s because of those anti-genocide encampments that have sprung up over the past month or two. We can’t call them that, obviously. That would make the counter-protesters “pro-genocide,” and we can’t go there. So instead, we call them “pro-Palestinian,” or “pro-Hamas,” or ‘“anti-Israel.” I’m no expert, but my hunch is the spike in antisemitism is due largely to what the world has watched unfold in Gaza since last October. In the aftermath of the Hamas attack on 7 October, which claimed the lives of 1,200 Israelis and saw another 250 taken hostage, Israel had the sympathy of the entire world. But, as the weeks and months of Israel’s counterattack dragged on, and the death toll among Gaza civilians climbed into the tens of thousands, mostly women and children, that sympathy soon enough gave way to outrage over the excesses of the IDF. South Africa petitioned the International Court of Justice claiming Israel was committing genocide. I think there’s a connection between all that and the unprecedented rise in antisemitism. So I was looking forward to hearing the thoughts of a bona fide antisemitism expert on CBC’s Sunday Magazine this morning. Piya Chattopadhyay had Bernie Farber on, and Bernie’s got a nose for hate of all stripes. He’s made a career of sniffing it out and snuffing it out. I was quite surprised, therefore, that Bernie was unable or unwilling to make a connection between Gaza and the uptick in antisemitism. In her intro, Piya had mentioned something she called the “Israel-Hamas war,” but Mr Farber didn’t bring it up at all. Nor did he mention Gaza, 7 October, 35,000 dead civilians, the ICC request for war crimes charges against Netanyahu and Gallant, or the genocide proceedings at the ICJ. No! None of that has anything to do with the climate around anti-genocide encampments and a spike in antisemitism. Jew hate is the oldest hate in the world, and its ebb and flow has something to do with the arc of history. No connection to anything going on in Gaza today. In fact, he explicitly detached events in the Middle East from antisemitism in Canada by reminding us we can’t expect to solve the “problems” in the Middle East because they’ve been going on for 5,000 years, and will likely go on for another 5,000. There you have it! Antisemitism ebbs and flows with the arc of history. Nothing to see in Gaza… move along!