Blacklock’s Reporter
Thursday, May 21, 2026
https://www.blacklocks.ca/warned-it-may-happen-here/
Federal agencies have warned a mass attack targeting Canadian Jews may occur in coming months, the Senate human rights committee was told yesterday. Senators did not question the testimony.
“Our biggest fear is seeing the Jewish community attacked here as has happened in the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia,” said Richard Marceau, senior vice-president of the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs. “This is not theoretical. Canadian security agencies have told us a violent attack targeting the Jewish community may occur in upcoming months.”
Marceau did not elaborate on the nature of the threat or source of the warning. “What was once confined to the fringes of society is now visible in our streets, on campus, online and in Jewish neighbourhoods,” he said.
Warnings preceded the Hanukkah murders of 15 people including two rabbis and a schoolgirl at Australia’s Bondi Beach last December 14. An Australian Royal Commission on Anti-Semitism disclosed April 30 that prior to the killings, a local Jewish Community Security Group warned “a terrorist attack against the New South Wales Jewish community is likely” and identified one of the gunmen by name as a security risk.
Marceau yesterday said Canadians have witnessed a “normalization of support for terrorism” here. “Jewish Canadians have endured schools shot at, synagogues firebombed and vandalized, violent assaults and stabbings including at a grocery store here in Ottawa, coordinated intimidation campaigns targeting community institutions, open glorification of listed terror entities and multiple terror plots targeting Jewish communities here in Canada,” he said.
The testimony followed the April 22 conviction of an unidentified minor in Ottawa on charges of conspiring to kill Jews. On April 8 a Pakistani foreign student in Montréal, Muhammad Shahzeb Khana, pled guilty to conspiring to kill Jews in Brooklyn. And trials are pending for two Egyptian nationals Ahmed and Mostafa Eldidi of Scarborough, Ont., a father and son arrested in 2024 for plotting a “serious, violent attack” at an undisclosed Toronto location.
Richard Robertson, research director for B’nai Brith Canada, yesterday said Parliament must address a “worsening crisis of anti-Semitism.” Jewish groups endorsed Bill C-9 An Act To Amend The Criminal Code that would prohibit hate-motivated “obstruction” outside any school or religious assembly. “This would include, for example, blocking doors, driveways or roads that are used to get to religious or cultural centres,” according to a 2025 Department of Justice Backgrounder.
“The proposed offence does not prevent protests or lawful assemblies, nor will it unduly infringe on any Charter-protected rights,” said B’nai Brith’s Robertson. “It only criminalizes intimidating or obstructing conduct.”
By Staff 