It’s hard to say with any certainty what motivated Canada’s arms embargo—anti-Semitism, or simple moral confusion, or something else—and in any case the question is largely academic. But something else happened in Canada just a little earlier this month: the country’s two largest kosher-certification agencies filed suit against the national government, claiming that recent regulations on kosher slaughter amount to a de-facto ban on the practice, which is crucial to Jewish life and religious observance. And it is especially damning that, unlike similar regulations in several European countries, these don’t affect the production of halal meat—only kosher meat.
Eric Grossman observes:
The new regulations . . . are, ostensibly, being put forward as a measure protecting animal welfare; however, selectively singling out Jewish slaughter as an odious treatment of animals has a long and ugly history, intimately intermingled with . . . anti-Semitism. As Jews, it is difficult not to feel targeted when governments go to great lengths to rationalize brutal practices of other groups but determine Jewish [observances] to be barbaric.
For instance, Grossman writes, seal clubbing is entirely legal in Canada—a practice that claims the lives of tens of thousands of Canadian pups every year. He adds:
As noted by Professor Dan Michman, head of the International Institute for Holocaust Research, “The Nazis perceived ritual slaughter not as a religious matter but, . . . as a manifestation of Jews’ cruel nature.” One hardly needs to highlight the bitter irony that the Nazis banned Jewish slaughter at the same time as they were preparing their slaughter of the Jews.
While I doubt many Canadian parliamentarians would make statements about the cruel nature of the Jews, the case against Israel ultimately rests on the assertion, or implication, that there is something especially cruel in the manner in which it defends itself. And it’s not as if anti-Semitism is unknown in Canada, as Grossman points out:
Among the many incidents that occurred last week alone, anti-Israel protestors descended upon Jewish neighborhoods in Toronto and Montreal, and angry mobs intimidated attendees of synagogues in both cities. Demonstrators surrounded the Jewish Federation building in Montreal and blocked participants attending a pro-Israel event from getting in or out for hours; . . . pro-Palestinian protestors in Ontario shouted, “Go back to Europe.”
Read more on Times of Israel: https://www.timesofisrael.com/canadian-jewish-agencies-sue-government-over-rules-they-say-curb-kosher-meat-industry/