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O’Canada!
‘51st state’ no haven for Jews
Jews who might think of trading antisemitism and chaos in the United States for peace and tranquility in the Great White North (in what President Trump has dubbed America’s 51st state) might want to reconsider. Backgrounder by Jerry Grafstein Former Canadian Senator ews first landed in Canada in the 1740s, along with the earliest French and English soldiers and émigrés, settling in the Maritime provinces, according to Sheldon Godfrey, Canada’s pre-eminent scholar of Canadian Jewish history.
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A Canadian at a rally for hostage release, in Toronto last Nov. 12.
Flash90
Jews continued to immigrate to Britishruled Lower Canada (to the southern portion of present-day Quebec and to the Labrador region), especially to Quebec City and Montreal. They came decades before the ancestors of Canadian leaders like Louis St. Laurent, Justin Trudeau or Jean Chrétien. Among the Jews who arrived with British troops in 1760 was Aaron Hart, who settled in Trois Rivières (Three Rivers). His son, Ezekiel Hart, was elected by the people of Three Rivers to the Assembly of Lower Canada in 1807 — only
to be barred because he was Jewish. He was re-elected again in 1809 — only to be barred again. Although he never sat in the Assembly, he was the first Jew elected in the British Empire. Finally, in 1832, the Quebec Assembly, led by Joseph Louis Papineau, passed the Emancipation Act allowing Jews to hold public office. In the 1880s, Jews began to move across western Canada, establishing several Jewish agricultural settlements in See Canada’s Jewish on page 2
Space lasers and plague: GOP kills pro-Israel bill By Andrew Bernard, JNS Republican House leaders axed a planned vote on Monday for a bill intended to protect Israel from boycotts, amid a backlash from some conservatives over free speech concerns. Former Republican Rep. Matt Gaetz of Florida compared provisions in the legislation to the tenth plague of Egypt — the death of the firstborn. “If this bill becomes law, how many Israeli
products do I need in my home to avoid fines or prison?” Gaetz asked. “If I leave an Israeli-made product outside my home, is it the 2025 version of lamb’s blood that keeps my family safe?” The bipartisan bill, titled the International Governmental Organizations Anti-Boycott Act, would extend existing anti-boycott legislation that bars Americans from complying with bans imposed by foreign countries to also forbid compliance with
boycotts imposed by such international governmental organizations as the United Nations. While the legislation does not mention Israel explicitly, the Jewish state has long been the target of international boycott efforts. GOP Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, Anna Paulina Luna of Florida and Thomas Massie of Kentucky were among the Republicans to speak out against the bill.
Celebration caps first Shabbos L’Maalah at DRS
DRS talmidim participated in an inaugural Shabbos L’Maalah, a spiritually uplifting Shabbaton that began with tefillah and a Seudas Shabbos filled with divrei Torah and zemiros, continued with a chaburah delivered by Rabbi Akiva Willig in the Beis Medrash of Woodmere and a tisch joined by Rabbi Yaakov Trump, mara d’asra of YILC. On Shabbos afteroon, Rav Moshe Weinberger offered divrei chizzuk at Aish Kodesh and a shiur was offered by Rabbi Aryeh Lebowitz. The Shabbos L’Maalah culminated in a Shalosh Seudos at Rabbi Farber’s house and a post-Shabbat photo op. News supplied by DRS.
In a post on X, Greene wrote: “It is my job to defend American’s rights to buy or boycott whomever they choose without the government harshly firing them or imprisoning them.” Greene famously speculated in 2018 that the Rothschilds might have caused wildfires in California by “beaming the sun’s energy back to earth.” Luna wrote that “Americans have the right to boycott, and penalizing this risks free speech.” A spokesman for Democratic Rep. Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey, a co-sponsor of the bill, said “it’s beyond outrageous and offensive that House leadership bowed to extreme-right forces and pulled this commonsense, bipartisan bill that makes antisemitic and hate-driven boycotts illegal.” “Who was behind this effort?” Tony Wen, Gottheimer’s communications director, told JNS, referring to Greene. “None other than a member of Congress who once claimed that Jews have space lasers, and another who refused to condemn Hamas. Reps. Marjorie Taylor Greene and Thomas Massie should be ashamed of themselves.” Republican Rep. Mike Lawler of New York, a bill sponsor, defended the legislation on the grounds that it simply enhanced the underlying anti-boycott act President Trump signed in 2018. “When did you become a defender of the United Nations?” Lawler snapped at Greene. Legal challenges arguing that similar statelevel anti-boycott legislation violates the First Amendment have fared poorly in court. In 2023, in separate cases, the Fifth, Eighth and 11th Circuit Courts of Appeals each upheld state laws designed to counter BDS (the anti-Israel boycott, divestment and sanctions movement). The Supreme Court has declined to consider appeals to those rulings. The Jewish Star contributed to this report.
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