‘Canada Is Not a Safe Place’: Jewish Family Plans Move to Israel After Rise in Antisemitism in Canada

Montreal-born Moshe Appel says he has over the years seen members of the Jewish community leave the city for a safer life in Israel or the U.S.

Police investigate the Yeshiva Gedolah school for clues after shots were fired at two Jewish schools in Montreal on Nov. 9, 2023. The Canadian Press/Ryan Remiorz

For one Jewish family, the rise in antisemitism in Canada has motivated them to move to Israel where they say they will feel safer.

Moshe Appel said he grew up in Canada and lived in various places, including Montreal, British Columbia, and Atlantic Canada, but he’s watched as antisemitism in the country has grown.

“It occurs to me and to my family that it’s no longer a safe place to raise our family,” he said, adding the family has plans to move in a few weeks.

Mr. Appel’s decision comes after two Jewish schools in Montreal were shot at twice in one week, and two firebombings caused minor damage to a synagogue and office belonging to the Jewish advocacy group Federation CJA.

As well, Jewish businesses have been targets of vandalism, while Jewish students have been targeted in universities. At Montreal’s Concordia University on Nov. 8, confrontations broke out between Jewish and pro-Palestine students, with a video showing pro-Palestine students shouting obscenities at Jewish students. 

“Being a Jew in Canada over the course of my entire life, I’ve watched the city [Montreal] that I was born in and had a thriving Jewish community essentially either go to Israel or leave for some other part of the country, or leave to the States, because Canada is not a safe place for Jews.”

He said he’s always thought of moving, but since Hamas’s surprise attack in Israel on Oct. 7 and the anti-Israel marches in Canada and around the world, the decision has been easier to make.

Just shortly after the attack, rallies were held in some cities in Canada celebrating the killings. Since then, after Israel declared war on Hamas in Gaza, many large scale anti-Israel rallies have been held.

“In the wake of 9/11, the major cities in the world—New York, London, Paris, Montreal, Vancouver, Toronto—didn’t have these massive rallies celebrating al-Qaeda and the Taliban,“ Mr. Appel said. ”But in the wake of Oct. 7, the streets of London and New York and Toronto and Montreal were flooded with people celebrating what Hamas did to over [1,200] Israelis, children, women, disabled people.”

Pro-Palestine protesters were seen holding banners as they marched along Bay Street in downtown Toronto on Oct. 9, 2023. Andrew Chen/The Epoch Times