Illustrative: Hundreds of anti-Israel protesters, primarily university students, rally at Toronto’s Nathan Phillips Square on Oct. 28, 2023. Photo by Sayed Najafizada/NurPhoto

Protesters in Toronto this past weekend demonized the Jewish state through provocations such as chanting accusations of terrorism outside of a synagogue and destroying an effigy of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu with a noose around his neck.

Israel’s Consul General to Toronto and Western Canada, Idit Shamir, blasted Toronto police, charging they had failed to follow a recent pledge to prevent demonstrations outside of Jewish institutions.

“One week ago, Toronto Police banned pro-Palestinian protests at Bathurst and Sheppard, the heart of Toronto’s suburban Jewish community, after two years of documented harassment and antisemitic displays targeting the people who live, pray, and send their children to school there,” Shamir wrote on X. “Today, one week later, police escorted a pro-Palestinian protest through that same intersection.”

Shamir described how the anti-Israel advocates marched “past Darchei Noam Synagogue. Past the Toronto Heschel School. Past the L’Chaim Seniors Residence. Masked demonstrators chanted that Zionists are racists and terrorists.” She added that “small groups broke off onto side streets to reach Jewish residents more directly. No arrests. The ban held exactly as long as the gap between demonstrations.”

In making her statement, Shamir shared a video posting from lawyer Caryma Sa’d, a journalist and self-described satirist running a “Protest Mania” website whose footage vividly documented the events. The video features Simon Wolle, B’nai Brith Canada’s Chief Executive Officer, saying to Toronto police, “You gotta start enforcing the law. I don’t know who gives you your mandate, but start enforcing the law.”

Concluding her statement, Shamir wrote: “In Hebrew, there is a word for this: hefker. הפקר
 Ownerless. Abandoned. Beyond protection. Every generation of Jews has known a city where that word became real.
 I did not expect Toronto to be mine.”

In analyzing the event, the Combat Antisemitism Movement said that “Toronto Police have not explained why the march proceeded along this route. The gap between policy and enforcement remains clear — and so do the questions about whether Jewish residents are being protected in practice.”

In further videos shared by Sa’d, demonstrators and pro-Israel counter-protestors exchanged profane insults on Sunday with accusations of “Rape supporters!” and vulgarities like “Dirty c—t! F—k you, f—king losers!” A video of activists on Saturday shows one man who calls a yellow-jacketed police officer a “dumb f—k.”

The Canadian Antisemitism Education Foundation (CAEF) stated that “Toronto Police would not tolerate a white supremacist parade up and down Jane St. between Finch and Steeles. So why are Toronto’s Jews required to tolerate a hate parade in the part of the city where we make our homes and community?”

Toronto’s law enforcement defended the decision to sanction the protestors’ route. “Officers ensured the group did not enter residential streets, and no arrests were made,” a police spokesperson said.

The spokesperson explained that the ban “does not apply to lawful demonstrations at the main intersection and along major roadways. Demonstrations have taken place at this intersection for several years. They can be tiring, disruptive, and distressing – but that does not make them illegal. Demonstrations are protected under Canadian law, and enforcement action is taken when there are reasonable grounds to believe a criminal offence has occurred.”

Another report of a Toronto protest over the weekend said that demonstrators burned Israeli and American flags. One individual took an effigy of a noosed Netanyahu and spit on its head before stomping the symbol of Israel’s leader.

According to Israel National News, demonstrators proclaimed, “We will sacrifice our souls and our blood for Al-Aqsa and Palestine.” Other chants asserted that “resistance is justified when a people lives under occupation” and declared that “the only solution is intifada.”

According to A Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic, the word “intifada” translates as “to be shaken off, be dusted off; to shake; to shudder, shiver, tremble; to shake off from oneself; to wake up, come to consciousness.”

Since the 1980s, the term came to refer to two distinct efforts by Palestinian terrorists to murder Israelis and destroy the Jewish state, with the first period starting in 1987 and the second in 2000. Anti-Israel activists today now regularly demand that supporters of the Palestinians seek to “globalize the intifada,” meaning engage in violence and terrorist acts everywhere. In an interview with cable host Al Sharpton on Sept. 7, then-New York City mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani said he would “discourage” use of the phrase. He had previously refused.

Mirroring trends around the planet, Canada has seen a surge in recent years of antisemitic hate crimes, pro-terror advocacy, and vulgar street demonstrations with Toronto as the epicenter.

On March 10, Toronto Police Deputy Chief Frank Barredo said that according to witnesses, two men drove up to the US consulate in a white SUV and fired a handgun at the building before fleeing in the vehicle.

Royal Canadian Mounted Police Chief Superintendent Chris Leather announced an increased security presence at the US and Israeli consulates in response, saying at a press conference that “these consulates deserve a heightened amount of vigilance and security at this time in the hopes that we can bring the temperature down in the coming days and weeks.” Vandals in Toronto have previously shot bullets at a Jewish-owned restaurant and at a local synagogue.

B’nai Brith has documented the rise of antisemitism in Canada, with the organization’s 2024 audit finding a 7.4 percent increase from 2023, reaching 6,219 for the highest total ever recorded since tracking began in 1982.

On Sept. 21, 2025, Canada joined with its Anglosphere allies the United Kingdom and Australia in choosing to recognize a Palestinian state.

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney asserted at the time that “this in no way legitimizes terrorism, nor is it any reward for it.”