Not in the Name of the Canadian Jewish Community
To Canada’s Jewish community leaders, legacy organizations, federation leaders, synagogue leadership, Jewish MPs, donors, and public representatives:

You do not speak for us when you stand beside a failed government response and treat symbolism as protection.

Canadian Jews are under attack.

Our schools have been shot at. Our synagogues need guards. Our students are harassed on campus. Our businesses are targeted. Our children are growing up behind security glass and locked doors. Our elderly recognize things they hoped they would never see again.

This is not normal.

This is not a public relations problem.

This is a war on Jewish life in Canada.

And yet, for more than two and a half years, too much of our official Jewish leadership has answered this crisis with statements, access meetings, donor-room diplomacy, polite gratitude, and carefully managed outrage.

That is not leadership.

That is maintenance of the institution.

When Prime Minister Mark Carney appeared at Holy Blossom Temple and announced a broad Ministerial Advisory Council on Rights, Equality, and Inclusion, Jewish leaders and public representatives had a choice.

They could have said: no.

They could have said: Canadian Jews do not need another general inclusion council.

They could have said: antisemitism is specific, ancient, adaptive, and lethal.

They could have said: antizionism is now one of the central public languages of antisemitism.

They could have said: no council has legitimacy if its members cannot command the confidence of the Jewish community it claims to protect.

They could have said: no photo-op will be accepted as protection.

Too many did not.

Too many stood beside the performance.

Too many lent it credibility.

Too many allowed the government to wrap itself in Jewish scenery while offering another process, another committee, another promise, another delay.

We reject that.

We reject any Jewish organization, leader, donor, MP, or public figure who treats access to government as more important than truth.

We reject any claim that legacy organizations automatically speak for Canadian Jews.

We reject any response that folds antisemitism into vague language about “hate in all its forms” while Jewish life in Canada is being targeted in specific, visible, escalating ways.

We reject any council, committee, or advisory body that does not begin with the full moral reality of October 7, the release of the hostages, the terrorist nature of Hamas and Hezbollah, the danger of imported Jew hatred, the role of antizionism, and the failure of Canadian institutions to protect Jews.

We are not asking our leaders to be polite.

We are asking them to be useful.

We call on Canada’s Jewish legacy organizations and public Jewish representatives to do the following immediately:

Publicly state whether they support or reject the current Ministerial Advisory Council structure.
Publicly state whether they believe this Council has legitimacy with Canadian Jews.
Name the standards by which any member of an antisemitism body should be judged.
Demand a dedicated national antisemitism body, not a diluted rights-and-inclusion council.
Demand full enforcement of existing laws against intimidation, glorification of terrorism, harassment, threats, and attacks on Jewish institutions.
Demand public investigations into antisemitism in universities, unions, public schools, media, immigration systems, and government-funded institutions.
Stop thanking politicians for symbolic gestures while Jewish Canadians remain exposed.
Hold open community meetings where ordinary Canadian Jews can speak directly, without filtering by donors, insiders, or approved organizations.
This petition is a public withdrawal of consent.

No one gets to use the Canadian Jewish community as a backdrop.

No one gets to launder failure through our synagogues.

No one gets to appear beside power and call that protection.

Not in our name.

Not with our silence.

Not anymore.