Police in Canada are investigating who scrawled a swastika on the side of a synagogue in Montreal, they said Monday.
The investigation began after a leader of the Temple Emanu-El-Beth Sholom said on social media that the symbols were painted sometime before its discovery on Saturday.
Police spokesperson Florence Stafford told The Canadian Press that security camera footage was being reviewed to identify the perpetrators, none of whom have been arrested.
Mayor Valerie Plante called the vandalism an antisemitic attack on X.
Expressions of antisemitic sentiment have proliferated in Canada, as they have throughout much of the Western hemisphere, following the outbreak of war between Israel and Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023, when the Palestinian terror group murdered some 1,200 people in Israel and abducted another 251.
In Canada, critics blamed the left-wing government of outgoing Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for emboldening perpetrators with their criticism of Israel’s defensive war.
Many incidents took place on college campuses, including one in which University of Montreal Professor Yanise Arab was filmed telling Jewish Concordia students to “go back to Poland, sharmuta,” using the Arabic language for prostitute.
Federation Combined Jewish Appeal and the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs in November released a joint statement saying that “Campuses across Quebec are facing threats from local demonstrators inspired by calls from the U.S.-based organization, Students for Justice in Palestine—a group with alleged ties to Hamas—to strike and shut down academic institutions.”
The statement was in response to the temporary closure of Dawson College in Montreal due to anti-Israel campus actions.
