On February 12, the Toronto District School Board Planning and Priorities Committee (“the TDSB Committee”) heard deputations on whether it should receive the Staff Report entitled, “Update: Affirming Jewish Identities and Addressing Antisemitism and the Combatting Hate and Racism Strategy.”
Appendix A to the report sets out in some detail the many forms of antisemitism experienced by Jewish students at TDSB and how they have been adversely impacted as a result. It correlates those experiences with the records of such events reported to TDSB.
It recognizes how anti-Zionism has emerged for many community members as the most significant contemporary form of antisemitism, and that demonization of Israel, Israelis and Zionists has been normalized, exacerbated by social media platforms. It sets out a number of action and priority items identified by the community to address the high levels – indeed, unprecedented levels – of antisemitism at TDSB schools.
Rabbi Michael Dolgin and I provided written submissions to TDSB Committee. We requested that the report be received as an important first step in combatting antisemitism at TDSB. We described it as only a first step. Its ultimate success or failure would depend on whether its recommendations are implemented in a timely and robust manner. We also reflected the extraordinarily high levels of community consensus (captured in the report itself) about what contemporary antisemitism is, and how it is being experienced.
Rabbi Dolgin and I fully anticipated (and said so) that the report would be met by opponents with “claims that it immunizes Israel from criticism, suppresses pro-Palestinian speech or caters to the “Zionist or Israeli lobby.” We explained why these claims “distort, and in so doing, invalidate, the lived experience of antisemitism by Jewish students, teachers and other staff.”
As we stated, receiving and acting on the report does not represent taking sides on the issues in the Middle East. We have no interest in TDSB adopting a political position, nor does the report affirm any particular political viewpoint. Instead, we are interested in ensuring that “Jewish students, teachers and staff are no longer marginalized, targeted or demonized for any reason, including because they support the existence of the State of Israel as a Jewish homeland and regard its existence as a Jewish democratic state as part of their core identity."
“Students, teachers and staff should not be compelled to exist in a poisoned environment created when others in TDSB’s community discriminate against them for being Jews who support Israel’s existence or by imposed collective responsibility on Canadian Jews for Israel’s conduct.
Regardless of one’s geopolitical views on the Middle East, no Jewish student, teacher or staff should be excluded, shut out from social groups, alienated, labelled online or in-person because they believe in Israel’s right to exist.” -- Excerpts, Written Submissions
We also anticipated that the report’s opponents would misuse the term “anti-Palestinian racism (APR)” to justify their attacks on those who support the Staff Report. Accordingly, we explained how the term APR has been misused to advance a geopolitical agenda, rather than to address true discrimination.
Sadly, what we anticipated would happen, did happen. And worse. Expressions of hatred directed against all Zionists, including Jewish students. Distortions of fact. Labelling all Zionists as racist. Talk about “Holocaust exceptionalism.” Political diatribes against Israel.
“… There was true harm spoken tonight, there was antisemitism, Jew hatred and I need to apologize for all those who have witnessed this. This is not acceptable. This has caused great harm to many of us who have listened for hours.”
–Trustee Shelley Laskin
The Staff Report and the hate fest that took place corroborated what we already knew – there is an urgent need to protect Jewish students, teachers, and staff at TDSB from pervasive antisemitism. Not a year from now. Or two years from now.
In an earlier editorial, I explain why some universities and colleges, including University of Toronto, are unlikely to adequately address pervasive antisemitism without external intervention through litigation or government action.
The hate fest that took place at the TDSB Planning and Priorities Committee reinforces similar concerns. I acknowledge that the Committee, to its credit, ultimately received the Staff Report. However, it was deeply disturbing that the vote was preceded by an anti-Zionist hate fest without intervention by the Committee Chair. (Indeed, he was one of five trustees who voted against even receiving the report.)
A meeting held simply to receive a report on how Jews at TDSB were experiencing antisemitism descended into victims of antisemitism being revictimized in plain view. The meeting illustrated how deeply ingrained Jew hatred is in the TDSB community and more broadly.
There are people of goodwill within the TDSB who want to do the right thing and we will fully support their efforts to do so. However, this week, there was little evidence that they can succeed without external intervention.
About the Author
Mark Sandler, LL.B., LL.D. (honoris causa), ALCCA’s Chair, is widely recognized as one of Canada’s leading criminal lawyers and pro bono advocates. He has been involved in combatting antisemitism for over 40 years. He has lectured extensively on legal remedies to combat hate and has promoted respectful Muslim-Jewish, Sikh-Jewish and Black-Jewish dialogues. He has appeared before Parliamentary committees and in the Supreme Court of Canada on multiple occasions on issues relating to antisemitism and hate activities. He is a former member of the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal, a three-time elected Bencher of the Law Society of Ontario, and recipient of the criminal profession’s highest honour, the G. Arthur Martin Medal, for his contributions to the administration of criminal justice.