The Honest Report HonestReporting Canada

If you're reading the headlines, or the chatter on social media, it would be easy to conclude that for Jews in the Diaspora, it's little different than 1930s Germany: Brownshirts are on the move, and antisemites under every rock.

But fortunately, that's not the truth at all, at least in Canada, according to a new study which examined recent data around antisemitism, and found - perhaps surprisingly - very positive results.

While there has been a marked increase in antisemitic incidents, primarily graffiti and the like, the attitudes of Canadians towards Jews remains almost unchanged since October 7, with only a miniscule percentage of Canadians expressing anti-Jewish views.

In this week's podcast, we sit down with Professor Robert Brym, one of Canada's leading sociologists and demographers studying the Canadian Jewish community, to discuss his new study which evaluated Canadian attitudes towards Jews and Israel, finding that anti-Jewish incidents emanate from a tiny proportion of society, and that overwhelmingly, Canadians do not embrace such hatred.

Brym's study does not preclude the need to combat anti-Jewish hatred in society, but as he explains in the podcast, it should help to focus the Jewish community's energies.

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It is hardly an exaggeration to say that over the last eight months, there has been a marked increase in the amount of anti-Israel activism in the news media, on university campuses, and in many other fronts, much of it organized by pro-Hamas gangs.

What about the efforts to combat those insidious hate campaigns, particularly on a grassroots level?

In this week's podcast, we sit down with someone who didn't just see a problem and complain about it, he took charge and created what is possibly the largest ongoing pro-Israel rally outside of Israel since October 7.

Guidy Mamann is an immigration lawyer in Toronto by day and an active Israel advocate, serving as the president of the Toronto Zionist Council. Days after the October Hamas attacks, when the terrorist group declared a day of rage across the world, Mamann and a group of others launched a weekly pro-Israel rally in uptown Toronto, which has continued now for nearly 40 weekends in a row without interruption.

Guidy joins us as a guest to explain not just his initiative, but how it can serve as an inspiration for others to take responsibility, too.

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While it rarely makes headlines in the Canadian news media, Israel is facing an onslaught from multiple terrorist groups at once. Not just Hamas, Yemen's Houthi movement, and Islamist groups in Iraq.

But without question, the most capable of the terrorist groups is Lebanon-based Hezbollah, which, like the others, receives extensive training, weapons and funds from the Islamic Republic of Iran.

Hezbollah, like Hamas, is a genocidal Islamic terrorist group. But it is far more powerful, and is deeply embedded within the Lebanese government. Since October 7, it has fired thousands of rockets into Israel, and has forced upwards of 60,000 Israelis from their homes for more than eight months, with no end in sight.

To help us understand the Hezbollah threat, and Israel's options, we are joined by Sarit Zehavi. Sarit is the President and Founder of the Alma Research Center, a nonprofit and an independent research and education center specialized in Israel’s security challenges on its northern border.


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The Islamic Republic may be a theocratic totalitarian regime which executes homosexuals, persecutes women, and attempts to destroy Israel, but those fanatical ideologies are not shared by a large majority of Iranians, either in Iran, or in Canada, home to one of the world's largest Iranian diaspora communities.

Contrary to the fanaticism of the Islamic Republic's leaders, most Iranians oppose the regime's existence, as well as its dangerous murderous support for terrorist organizations.

In this week's podcast, we sit down with Negar Mojtahedi, a Vancouver-based journalist with Iran International, to offer her insights into the mood on the street among Iranians in Iran, and here in Canada.


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How quickly the world has forgotten October 7. Not just the brutality and bloodthirsty massacres of the Hamas terrorist attacks, but the significance of them: unmasking the Palestinian terrorist group for all to see, not as a party that can be reasoned or negotiated with, but as a party with whom there can be no compromise because it seeks nothing less than the total destruction of Israel.

In early May, I visited Israel alongside a group of Canadian journalists in a weeklong program organized by the Exigent Foundation.

While there, we were able to get a first-hand look at the Israeli communities massacred on October 7, which remains closed to the general public, as well as visit Israel's north, battered by attacks from Hezbollah, the Lebanese terrorist organization which fires rockets into Israel on a daily basis.

In this week's episode, rather than a guest, I reflect on the lessons gleaned from our visit to Israel, seeing what too many news media outlets have chosen to forget.


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The facts are as undeniable as they are unreported by the news media: that Israel has done more to protect civilians in war, particularly in an urban warfare setting, than any other military in the history of warfare.

Despite a widespread and well-funded disinformation campaign, from actors ranging from South Africa to the Islamic Republic of Iran to professional protesters, Israel is not only definitively not guilty of the crimes it is accused of, but it has taken extraordinary steps to protect civilians in Gaza, going far beyond what is required by international law.

Israel has paid for this care dearly, losing more than 270 soldiers fighting Hamas terrorists in close combat, rather than - doing as virtually any other country would do - minimizing risk to soldiers and simply using overwhelming aerial firepower.

To help us understand Israel's extensive protections of civilians in Gaza, we are joined by John Spencer, Chair of Urban Warfare Studies at the Modern War Institute at West Point, and one of the world's top experts in urban warfare.

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