Round-Up: Antisemitism Heats Up Across Eastern Canada

As a member of the faculty association, Prof. Louis Florence had approached his cohorts to consider recommending the University adopt the IHRA definition of antisemitism. A meeting ensued where 20 anti-IHRA speakers were recruited yet “hundreds of Jewish faculty … who had no knowledge of this meeting and no opportunity to participate and express their support for the IHRA definition… For me, sadly, it’s just clear that the faculty association which should be an ally will not act to support the Jewish community – faculty, students, administrative staff and so on, in the larger U of T community.”

In light of the University ignoring a 30 page B’nai Brith report filed last year detailing antisemitic incidents, the panel called on the entire Jewish community to seek recourse by contacting the University’s administration and demand the University begin enforcing its own by-laws and policies to protect Jewish students on campus, and that the University adopt the IHRA Definition of Antisemitism.

In an unrelated matter involving the U of T, on March 30 B’nai Brith welcomed an Independent Review by the Honourable Thomas A. Cromwell concluding that the decision to forgo hiring Dr. Valentina Azarova was not based on outside pressure or influence by a prominent Jewish donor, tax court Judge David Spiro.

Azarova was one of 140 candidates for director of the human rights program last summer. Cromwell determined that her uncertain immigration status had resulted in the hiring committee turning away and towards other candidates. ““As far as I can tell, this is a situation in which advanced negotiations were abruptly halted, not a situation in which an accepted offer was rescinded… my conclusion is that (Spiro) simply shared the view that the appointment would be controversial with the Jewish community and cause reputational harm to the University.” Mostyn did express disappointment that Cromwell did not assess Azerova’s suitability for the position.

“We maintain that Dr. Azarova would have been an entirely unsuitable appointment. The director of an international human rights program at a law faculty should not be exclusively and relentlessly advocating on one side of a complex controversy. Her appointment would have alienated Jewish law students and professors, or anyone who in any way supported Israel, and contributed to a discriminatory and unsafe environment at the law school. The problematic academic record and activism of Dr. Azarova needed to be considered by the faculty.”

University of Ottawa

In a scene that seems to have formed the playbook for a similar attempted stunt at the University of Manitoba, the University of Ottawa faculty union executive passed a resolution to reject the IHRA definition without any consultation with the members.  The Association of Professors of the University of Ottawa (APUO) cited “academic freedom” – but a group of professors  is fighting back and has sent a letter disputing the view of the IHRA protocol to the executive.

In their letter, the professors say that the definition is being dangerously misinterpreted by bad actors who use the shield of “academic freedom” to preserve their ability to cloak their antisemitism as legitimate political opinion about Israel. They state that adoption of the IHRA definition of antisemitism can help foster tolerance towards the Jewish students they teach.

One of the signatories is Professor Jan Grabowski. A highly regarded historian of Jewish-Polish relations and the Holocaust, he has been subjected to a defamation lawsuit in Poland against his Holocaust research, but the APUO has taken no action to support him.

Jewish students tell Canadian campuses to back IHRA   

(JNS) More than 140 Jewish students have signed an open letter calling on Canadian post-secondary institutions to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) definition of anti-Semitism. It would “help administrators better identify and meaningfully combat” anti-Semitism on campus, reads the letter, listing incidents at the University of Toronto, McGill University and Queen’s University. 

Student signatories to the letter hail from across the country, with 25-plus academic institutions represented, including the University of New Brunswick, Concordia University, the University of Toronto, the University of British Columbia and Wilfrid Laurier University. It was co-written by Tiphaera Ziner-Cohen, a University of Windsor law student, along with UBC student Sagiv Fadid, University of Ottawa law student Ysabella Hazan and others.

“We started this letter so victims of anti-Semitism on campus know they are not alone,” said Ziner-Cohen. “University administrators continue to avoid incidents of anti-Semitism on campus because they clearly do not have the tools to respond. By adopting the IHRA definition, they would be able to both identify and condemn anti-Jewish bigotry wherever and whenever it rears its ugly head.”