Canadians not protesting Jews, but genocide

For Jews in Canada, every day feels like Al-Quds Day, April 10

Michael Levitt makes a critical error in his column. Canadians are not protesting Jews; they are protesting support — any support — for the genocide in Gaza. As a Jew myself, it is no secret — in fact they advertise this to Jews like me — that many prominent Jewish orgs support the genocide in Gaza. Sure, there are antisemites everywhere — I had a florist that was antisemitic — but that doesn’t mean that the majority of protesters are, and that does not mean the protests in and of themselves are. Plus, this ignores the significant number of Jews attending these protests in support of ending the genocide in Gaza. Israelis also protest the war, by the thousands, and that isn’t antisemitism, either.

Levitt does get it right in that protests increased after Oct. 7, but therein lies precisely where your article is wrong. If this was pure antisemitism (hating Jews for no reason) this increase in protests would have occurred before Oct. 7. The reason they did not is because of what the International Court of Justice, the United Nations, and other credible groups have called a genocide. And it is. I should know; I was Holocaust survivor co-ordinator and my family fled two genocides (Armenian and Jewish). The protesters are protesting the war and the individuals (not the ethnicity of those) who support it. Anyone who conflates religion with a territorial war is wrong: Jewish groups, Arab groups — doesn’t matter.

No one should support mass murder. It does not matter who is doing it. That’s my position. It is contrary to Jewish values to support genocide.

Jonathan Ely Cass, Burlington