North Star with Ellin Bessner

The CJN Podcasts
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Newsmaker conversations from The Canadian Jewish News, hosted by Ellin Bessner, a veteran broadcaster, writer and journalist.

  1. 1D AGO

    “I Just Want to Go to the Bus Stop..and Not Have to See This Hate”: Jewish Vancouver residents fight anti-Israel chalker

    Jewish residents and organizations in Vancouver say a relentless anti-Israel campaign of “chalking”—writing hateful slogans with sidewalk chalk in public, accompanied by and waving a large Palestinian flag outside a hospital in their neighbourhood—has reshaped daily life in Vancouver’s historically Jewish neighbourhood. For over two years, anti-Israel graffiti and stickers have appeared daily on sidewalks, bus stops, street signs and other public spaces along the Oak Street corridor, near major synagogues, in the Douglas Park area. Two Jewish residents of this neighbourhood began documenting the messages by the lone perpetrator, whose identity they know. They’ve amassed proof of at least 2,000 incidents and have asked him to stop. The duo have had real late-night runs-in with the activist, who they say lives and works near them, and who has, on social media, described his devotion to the Palestinian cause as living in “the belly of the beast”—a popular term in anti-Israel circles describing carrying out activism from within areas that support Israel and Western values. The two Jewish men bought cleaning gear to wash the tags away, if the rain doesn’t do it first. But it’s become a war of attrition. Vancouver police say they take hate speech and harassment seriously, but the one-man protest has not abated. On today’s episode of The CJN’s North Star podcast, we’re joined by the two Jewish residents who are fighting back, Joshua and Steven, who have asked that their family names not be published for safety reasons. Related links British Columbia passed legislation on April 16 to establish safe “bubble zones” for synagogues, places of worship in order to curb harassing protests, in The CJN . Vancouver police arrested Samidoun’s Canadian leader Charlotte Kates after she was accused of making hateful comments during an anti-Israel protest in 2024, in The CJN . Why a recently-elected city councillor in Vancouver has an anti-Israel problem, in The CJN. Credits Host and writer: Ellin Bessner ( @ebessner ) Production team: Zachary Kauffman (senior producer), Izzie Helenchilde (producer), Michael Fraiman (executive producer), Alicia Richler (editorial director) Music: Bret Higgins Support our show Subscribe to The CJN newsletter Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt) Subscribe to North Star (Not sure how? Click here ) Watch our podcasts on YouTube. Help others find this podcast by leaving us a review for “North Star” on Apple Podcasts via your iPhone or iPad device, or with your Android. (Spotify allows only starred ratings but you can do that, too!)

    27 min

  2. 3D AGO

    Why no hate charges? Ottawa Jewish leader reacts to sentencing of his antisemitic attacker

    A little over two years ago, on April 15, 2024, David Sachs of Ottawa’s Jewish Federation was leaving an interfaith iftar event near Parliament Hill. He was wearing a kippah. Outside the government building, anti-Israel protesters were waiting. In his victim impact statement earlier this week, Sachs told the court he feared for his life during those “absolutely horrific” moments when he was swarmed, hit on the head, screamed at with anti-Israel insults, then followed for four blocks as he tried to escape, all while a dangerously loud electronic whistle was blasted near his ears. Everyone in the crowd wore masks except well-known Ottawa protester Deana Sherif, who wore a keffiyeh and brandished the whistle. Ottawa police later arrested Sherif and charged her with eight offences, including resisting a police officer and two hate-motivated charges. Some stemmed from another confrontation that same day involving Conservative MP Brad Vis of British Columbia, who was trying to go the gym. Her trial ended in February. Sherif was convicted on two of the original charges. The Crown did not concentrate on the hate-motivated allegations at trial, even though the judge agreed some of the shouted insults were antisemitic, but found Sherif herself was not the person making them. On May 6, the judge sentenced her to the 17 months she had already spent in custody, plus one year probation, a peace bond, and a decade-long ban on using the loud whistle or possessing other weapons. On this episode of The CJN’s “North Star” podcast, David Sachs explains why he believes the convictions were significant — but also why he feels the outcome fell short without hate-related findings. We also hear from University of Ottawa antisemitism adviser Jonathan Calof, who warns anti-Jewish hatred in Canada is no longer confined to street protests, but is becoming institutionalized. Related links How twice-convicted Ottawa protester Deana Sherif played a role in organizing and promoting the 2026 Al-Quds Day parade and rally in Toronto, in The CJN . Learn more about Prof. Jonathan Calof, the special advisor on antisemitism appointed by Ottawa University in early 2025, Read David Sachs' comments after an Ottawa man pleaded guilty in Feb. 2025 to sending hateful messages to local physician Dr. Nili Kaplan-Myrth in Feb. 2025, in The CJN. **** Credits Host and writer: Ellin Bessner ( @ebessner ) Production team: Zachary Kauffman (senior producer), Izzie Helenchilde (producer), Michael Fraiman (executive producer), Alicia Richler (editorial director) Music: Bret Higgins Support our show Subscribe to The CJN newsletter Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt) Subscribe to North Star (Not sure how? Click here ) Watch our podcasts on YouTube. Help others find this podcast by leaving us a review for “North Star” on Apple Podcasts via your iPhone or iPad device, or with your Android. (Spotify allows only starred ratings but you can do that, too!)

    28 min

  3. 6D AGO

    Five Years of The CJN’s North Star: From Lockdown to Oct. 7 and Beyond

    The CJN’s flagship news podcast, North Star, first aired five years ago this week, on May 3, 2021. Originally called The CJN Daily, it filled a gap in the COVID-era news ecosystem, airing new episodes uniquely focused on the Canadian Jewish community every morning from Monday to Friday. But from its very first episode, breaking news changed the plan. The Lag b’Omer stampede at Israel’s Mount Meron, and a subsequent eleven-day war with Hamas, had the team scrambling to bring expert analysis and eyewitness testimony to The CJN’s front page. Five years later, having published 800 episodes and interviewed at least 1,000 newsmakers, North Star has been heard, watched and downloaded more than 1.7 million times across all our platforms. It’s been a journey of discovery into the Jewish community here, exploring how Canadian Jews are connected to global events that few could have imagined when the show launched. On this special anniversary episode, host Ellin Bessner and senior podcast producer Zachary Kauffman reflect on the lessons they’ve learned from helming the show. They discuss their most impactful stories and the ramifications they’ve had—even when those ramifications were controversial—and walk through how the show has evolved through a pandemic, personal grief, spiking antisemitism and a changing outlook for Jewish Canada. Related links: Hear the bite-sized episodes from the first week of The CJN’s North Star podcast, from May 2021. Read and listen to The CJN's stories on JNF Canada’s charitable status being revoked, from 2024. Learn more about The CJN's Benjamin’s consumer complaint stories, from 2022. Credits Host and writer: Ellin Bessner ( @ebessner ) Production team: Zachary Kauffman (senior producer), Izzie Helenchilde (producer), Michael Fraiman (executive producer), Alicia Richler (editorial director) Music: Bret Higgins Support our show Subscribe to The CJN newsletter Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt) Subscribe to North Star (Not sure how? Click here ) Watch our podcasts on YouTube. Help others find this podcast by leaving us a review for “North Star” on Apple Podcasts via your iPhone or iPad device, or with your Android. (Spotify allows only starred ratings but you can do that, too!)

    30 min

  4. MAY 6

    A snapshot of Canada’s Jews today: more newcomers, more intermarriage, aging

    Canada’s Jewish community is growing—but also becoming more diverse, more intermarried and older. As the 2026 census gets underway this month, Canadian sociologist Rachel Margolis explains why filling it out—especially the long form questionnaire—matters, and what it will reveal about Jewish life in Canada today. The census gathers data on religion, ethnic origin, languages spoken at home and household composition—information researchers use to track key demographic shifts. According to Margolis, a sociology professor at Western University in London, the most recent census shows 83 per cent of Canadian Jews identify religiously as Jewish, down from 89 per cent two decades ago, while the share identifying as Jewish by ethnic origin only has risen to 17 per cent (from 11 per cent). She also finds that 50 per cent of couples in households with at least one Jewish partner are now interfaith—up from about 40 per cent 20 years ago. Margolis expects the next census to show an even more diverse community, shaped in part by recent immigration from Israel following Oct. 7, as well as from Ukraine and Latin America. On this episode of The CJN’s flagship North Star podcast, Margolis joins to talk up the new census and reveal more of her fresh data about what Jewish life looks like now. Related links Learn more about Rachel Margolis’ research into the Jewish demographics of her adopted home in London, Ont. The 2021 Census showed Jewish population growing slightly but costly housing prices were pushing young families out of Toronto, in The CJN. Robert Brym analyzed what he learned about Canada’s Jewish community in the 2021 census, in The CJN . Credits Host and writer: Ellin Bessner ( @ebessner ) Production team: Zachary Kauffman (senior producer), Izzy Helenchilde (producer), Michael Fraiman (executive producer), Alicia Richler (editorial director) Music: Bret Higgins Support our show Subscribe to The CJN newsletter Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt) Subscribe to North Star (Not sure how? Click here ) Watch our podcasts on YouTube. Help others find this podcast by leaving us a review for “North Star” on Apple Podcasts via your iPhone or iPad device, or with your Android. (Spotify allows only starred ratings but you can do that, too!)

    27 min

  5. MAY 4

    ‘Not Optimistic’: Idsinga Skeptical of Toronto Police Chief’s Vow to Probe Antisemitism on the Force

    Retired Toronto homicide inspector Hank Idsinga’s new memoir about the systemic problems inside Canada’s largest police force contains disturbing allegations about the force’s persistent in-house discrimination and racism, including antisemitism. He also spells out for the first time his own family’s Jewish and Holocaust roots – a history he’s kept private for decades, while he oversaw some of the most high profile and gruesome murder cases in recent Canadian history. Idsinga insists he did speak up about his encounters with anti-Jewish bigots while he was still carrying a badge, long before he left the force in the fall of 2023, but to no avail. That’s why despite Toronto’s police chief and other officials now vowing to investigate his evidence, Idsinga holds out little hope of seeing changes anytime soon, be it about antisemitism, anti-Black racism or other problems. And despite recent public examples of the force’s efforts to show solidarity with Jewish employees, including holding Hanukkah candle lighting ceremonies in the lobby of police headquarters, designing a regulation police kippah, appointing a new Jewish chaplain and a Jewish liaison committee, Idsinga calls all that “window dressing”. The veteran detective also draws a link between a unnamed senior staff member who he personally heard using antisemitic slurs, more than once, to the force’s tepid response to the violence and hate crimes targeting Canada’s largest Jewish community since Oct. 7, 2023. In today’s wide-ranging interview with The CJN’s North Star podcast host Ellin Bessner, Idsinga shares his own family’s Holocaust trauma that saw his grandfather murdered in a gas chamber and his mother and her siblings hidden in convents. He reveals why he wanted to be a Nazi hunter before he decided to go into policing. Related stories Learn more about retired police inspector Hank Idsinga’s book The High Road , published this week by Simon and Schuster Canada. Read Hank Idsinga’s interviews about the 2017 Honey and Barry Sherman murders, in The CJN archives . Will the Sherman murders ever be solved? Watch our conversation from 2023 with reporter Kevin Donovan who wrote a book on the investigation which Idsinga’s division was in charge of. Credits Host and writer: Ellin Bessner ( @ebessner ) Production team: Zachary Kauffman (senior producer), Michael Fraiman (executive producer), Alicia Richler (editorial director) Music: Bret Higgins Support our show Subscribe to The CJN newsletter Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt) Subscribe to North Star (Not sure how? Click here ) Watch our podcasts on YouTube. Help others find this podcast by leaving us a review for “North Star” on Apple Podcasts via your iPhone or iPad device, or with your Android. (Spotify allows only starred ratings but you can do that, too!)

    37 min

  6. MAY 1

    What Everyone Gets Wrong About Orthodox Jewish Women’s Hair: new Canadian "sheitel" film

    A new documentary is challenging assumptions about one of the most visible—and most misunderstood—traditions in Orthodox Jewish life. Sheitel: Beauty in the Hidden, by Halifax-native director Lynda Medjuck Suissa, explores why many Orthodox Jewish women cover their hair after marriage—and why many say it reflects not oppression, but identity, faith and choice. (And, yes, also a more genuine relationship with their husbands in the bedroom.) Medjuck Suissa is Modern Orthodox herself. She snagged interviews with 30 well-known Orthodox women from Canada, the U.S. and Israel, including “The Challah Mom” Anat Ishai; rebbetizins Nechama Dubrawsky of Toronto’s Yorkville Jewish Centre, Faygie Kaplan of Chabad of Flamingo, and Rivky Gansburg of Chabad on Bayview; Mindy Pollak, a former Montreal city councillor; and Toronto educator Adrienne Gold Davis of the organization Momentum. On today’s episode of The CJN’s North Star podcast, director Lynda Medjuck Suissa joins to explain why her late sister inspired the new film, and how she hopes it will lead to understanding and tolerance. Related stories Learn more about “Sheitel” the documentary and find upcoming screenings in Vancouver May 6, Manhattan May 11, Winnipeg May 15, and Toronto June 15 and 22. Read about Orthodox Jewish female singers performing “For Women Only” concerts, in The CJN. https://thecjn.ca/arts-culture/jessica-roda/ The CJN’s Phoebe Maltz Body on Jewish Orthodox fashion dilemmas, in The CJN . Credits Host and writer: Ellin Bessner ( @ebessner ) Production team: Zachary Kauffman (senior producer), Michael Fraiman (executive producer), Alicia Richler (editorial director) Music: Bret Higgins Support our show Subscribe to The CJN newsletter Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt) Subscribe to North Star (Not sure how? Click here ) Watch our podcasts on YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/@TheCJN Help others find this podcast by leaving us a review for “North Star” on Apple Podcasts via your iPhone or iPad device, or with your Android. (Spotify allows only starred ratings but you can do that, too!)

    27 min

  7. APR 29

    22 Recommendations, No Time to Wait: Senator David Arnot on Canada’s New Antisemitism Report

    During the Senate’s year-long study on antisemitism, released a week ago on April 21, Senator David Arnot admits to becoming deeply upset when learning some Canadian Jews want to leave the country because they no longer feel safe. The study began in Dec. 2024. During the year, Arnot and his colleagues on the Standing Senate Committee on Human Rights heard 44 witnesses over seven meetings. They also received 36 written briefs. It wasn’t nearly as extensive a study as one done two years ago on Islamophobia, and the committee had until the end of 2026 to release its findings, but Arnot and his colleagues felt the “clear and present danger” of antisemitism was so serious, they wanted their recommendations for action to come out immediately. “We’re not asking for the government to sort of dither around and think about it. There’s nothing more to think about. There’s a blueprint right now. Implement that blueprint with immediacy,” he says. Aside from asking Canada to restore the now-cancelled position of the special envoy on antisemitism, and create a federal task force on antisemitism, Arnot—a former provincial court judge and longtime Chief of Saskatchewan’s Human Rights Commission—believes our education system has failed to produce informed citizens. As a result, he believes young people are more susceptible to misinformation they find online. On today’s episode of The CJN’s North Star podcast, Arnot joins host Ellin Bessner to explain why he is convinced there’s no more time to waste to fix “this black mark on Canadian society.” Related links Read the report’s findings and get Canadian Jewish leaders’ reactions, in The CJN . Watch the news conference where the Senators share their report’s findings, on April 21. Hear why Senator Leo Housakos was unhappy that fringe anti-Israel and anti-Zionist groups and witnesses were permitted to testify during the hearings, on The CJN’s “North Star” podcast from Jan. 2026. Credits Host and writer: Ellin Bessner ( @ebessner ) Production team: Zachary Kauffman (senior producer), Michael Fraiman (executive producer), Alicia Richler (editorial director) Music: Bret Higgins Support our show Subscribe to The CJN newsletter Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt) Subscribe to North Star (Not sure how? Click here ) Watch our podcasts on YouTube. Help others find this podcast by leaving us a review for “North Star” on Apple Podcasts via your iPhone or iPad device, or with your Android. (Spotify allows only starred ratings but you can do that, too!)

    25 min

  8. APR 27

    One Year of Mark Carney and a Critical Week for Jewish Canadians

    As federal Liberals celebrate their newfound majority government—aided by floor crossings and three recent by-election victories—Canadian Jews are no so elated. On Monday, April 27, B’nai Brith Canada releases its annual audit of antisemitic incidents; community members expect the numbers will break new records, as they have in many recent years. Earlier this month, Jewish leaders asked for $100 million in federal support following a series of attacks on synagogues and institutions. This past weekend underscored the need, as a suspect attempted to enter a synagogue in Thornhill during services, and wound up assaulting a congregant on the sidewalk outside after being barred from the building. While police have made some arrests and some courts have handed down long sentences in hate crime cases, frequent protests—some moving through Jewish neighbourhoods—continue unimpeded. On the one year anniversary of Mark Carney’s election win, the question remains: are Jewish Canadians any safer than they were before? On today’s "North Star" episode, The CJN’s political panel weighs in. We’re joined by Dan Mader, a Toronto-based Conservative strategist with Loyalist Public Affairs; David Birnbaum, a former Liberal MNA in Quebec’s national assembly for the Montreal area; and Noah Tepperman, a former NDP riding president in Windsor. Related links What our CJN Political insiders predicted for 2026, on The CJN’s Jan 5 North Star edition. Why NDP leader elect Avi Lewis is bad for Canada’s Jewish community, on The CJN’s North Star with guest Noah Tepperman, NDP insider. Is Canada’s new Bill C-9 Combatting Hate Act going to make things safer for the Jewish community? We break it down with MPs Roman Baber and Anthony Housefather in The CJN. Credits Host and writer: Ellin Bessner ( @ebessner ) Production team: Zachary Kauffman (senior producer), Michael Fraiman (executive producer), Alicia Richler (editorial director) Music: Bret Higgins Support our show Subscribe to The CJN newsletter Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt) Subscribe to North Star (Not sure how? Click here ) Watch our podcasts on YouTube. Help others find this podcast by leaving us a review for “North Star” on Apple Podcasts via your iPhone or iPad device, or with your Android. (Spotify allows only starred ratings but you can do that, too!)

    33 min
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Newsmaker conversations from The Canadian Jewish News, hosted by Ellin Bessner, a veteran broadcaster, writer and journalist.

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