The Jewish situation in Canada in the year just ended is described in the following article, another of a series reviewing events in the foremost countries.
In a resume of its activities during 5694, Canadian Jewry can point proudly to the Canadian Jewish Congress as the crowning achievement of the year.
The Canadian Jewish Congress at Toronto brought together representatives of all parts of the Dominion. Orthodox and radical, Zionists and non-Zionists joined hands and hearts to create the mouthpiece of Canadian Jewry and clothed it with powers to solve national, cultural and economic problems affecting and pertaining to Jewry in the Dominion and to Jews all over the world. The Congress can boast of trojan efforts in combatting anti-Semitism and in the organization of Jewish communal life and is now preparing machinery for a relief campaign to aid stricken European Jewry.
The western division of the Canadian Jewish Congress has also entered the economic sphere of activities by establishing a colony of unemployed families, in the vicinity of Winnipeg.
FUND DONORS DOUBLED
Another pride of Canadian Jewish life is its warm response towards the funds for the up building of the Jewish national home in Palestine. The United Palestine Appeal during the past year exceeded all expectations. The number of contributors was doubled and in many communities the quotas were almost doubled. The fact that Premier Richard Bennett of Canada had delivered the opening address of the campaign through a nation-wide broadcast may be considered an important factor contributing its success.
In a world full of strife and Jew-hatred it could not be expected that Canada should have been spared from the anti-Jewish venom. Hitlerism found its agents in the Dominion and anti-Semitism became a factor. The Jewish member of parliament, S. W. Jacobs, found it necessary to draw the attention of the government to the propagandist activities of the Nazi Consul General in Montreal. The latter was quickly forced to disavow further activities.
SCORES AGITATION
An open condemnation of anti-Semitic agitation was twice heard in the Federal Parliament at Ottawa. The voice was that of Henri Bourassa. He condemned the Jew-baiters in the very same parliament which still harbors the arch – anti – Semite Armand Lavergne, who has openly proclaimed his belief in the blood-ritual through articles in the press of the notorious Quebec racketeering pamphleteers—the Arcand-Menard clique.
And the Goglu clique still holds sway in the Province of Quebec. Its anti-Semitic incitement found its culmination point with the strike of the anti-Semitic internes in a number of the French Canadian Hospitals in the city of Montreal. The young doctors deserted their posts because the Jew, Dr. Sam Rabinowitz, was appointed interne in the Notre Dame Hospital. Although the authorities sided with the Jewish physician the anti-Semitic internes stuck to their guns, refusing to return to their humanitarian tasks, unless Dr. Rabinowitz was dismissed. The latter’s beau geste, voluntary resignation saved the situation. The actions of the internes, however, were roundly condemned by many newspapers, by a greater part of public opinion, but bigotry won the day.
STREET BRAWLS IN TORONTO
Toronto witnessed street fights between Jews and hooligans who now and again unfurled the swastika flag in public places. Signs of discrimination appeared on the surface on many an occasion and only recently Jewish War Veterans found it necessary to remove by force signs in a park bearing the legend, “For Gentiles Only.” Anti-Semitic activities in Western Canada were mainly carried on by Hitlerist agents and their followers. Groups of “Friends of New Germany” are to be found in various Canadian cities and towns, but the Brown Shirt army of the notorious Chalifoux in Montreal has been replaced by Steel Helmets who acted as cohorts of the anti-Semitic mayoralty candidate in the recent municipal elections.
Jewish representation in the political life of Canada is proportionately smaller than that in the other Dominions. During the year, the Jewish representation in the Montreal City Council was decreased from three to two. Ontario boasts of two Jewish members in the Provincial Legislature, one of them, Mayor David Croll of Windsor, having the distinction of being the first Jew to serve as cabinet minister in Ontario. Winnipeg has retained its Jewish representation in the municipality and the Federal Parliament still harbors its three Jews—Jacobs, Heaps and Factor.
BIAS IN INDUSTRY
The depression and economic crisis have also left their mark on the Jewish communities. Discrimination against Jews in so-called Jewish industries is rampant. The needle-trades have suffered heavily through the flow of factories to the country which greatly contributed to the increase of the number of families on relief. The crisis finds its reflection in the situation of the educational institutions. The Hebrew Educational Institute in Montreal, the pride of many Jews, is on the verge of bankruptcy. Unfavorable reports are seeping in about the condition of the various other Jewish school systems in other parts of the country.
Enterprising Canadian Jewry would not lose ground, no matter what difficulties lay before them, were the doors of the country open to a larger influx of Jewish immigrants, unfortunately, the doors are now heavily bolted and it is problematical when they may be loosened somewhat. The number of Jews entering the country is very small. The enemies of the immigrant have seen to it that the cry of the German refugee should not be heard by the Canadian authorities.
YOUTH EDUCATION NEEDED
Canadian Jewry needs to strengthen itself by calling upon its own forces and resources. Such is the task taken upon itself by the Canadian Jewish Congress and such is also the burden placed on the shoulders of the Zionist and kindred organizations. Theirs is the duty to provide adequate education for the Canadian Jewish Youth. Such was the call of the conference of the Western Canada Zionist Region and the Young Judaea Conventions held in various cities of the Dominion.
Among the losses suffered by Canadian Jewry during the year were the deaths of Chaim Kruger, Talmudic scholar and contributor to the Jewish Daily Eagle, and Mrs. Felix Harris, pioneer Zionist worker and the first secretary of the Hadassah Organization of Canada.
Mrs. Harris was one of the first Jewish women to join the ranks of the Zionist Organization and attended the First Zionist Congress called by Dr. Theodore Herzl, founder of modern Zionism, at Basle in 1897. From that date, she was an ardent worker in the movement, first in Manchester, England, and later in Canada, especially in Montreal, where she made her home for the last twenty-five years.
During the year Mrs. A. J. Freiman, O.B.E. president of Canadian Hadassah, was the recipient of the Order British Empire in the King’s New Year’s honors, the title serving as the highest recognition of her philanthropic and communal activities for Jewish and non-Jewish causes.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
