This article originally appeared in the National Post.
By Mohammad Rizwan and Raheel Raza, February 21, 2025
The Toronto District School Board has an antisemitism problem, but those responsible for fixing it seem more interested in engaging in debates over political beliefs rather than coming up with solutions for how to keep children safe.
On Feb. 12, the TDSB’s planning and priorities committee heard deputations on whether it should receive a staff report titled, “Update: Affirming Jewish Identities and Addressing Antisemitism and the Combatting Hate and Racism Strategy.”
After releasing the report’s preliminary recommendations, TDSB trustees heard from stakeholders, including students, parents, community members and non-governmental organizations. We had a hard time believing what happened next.
While some parents and community members condemned the rising tide of hate in schools, we were aghast to find out that there were many who were willing to defend antisemitism — including a number of teachers. Their rationale involved Middle Eastern politics and arguments that have nothing to do with how the children should be educated in Canadian schools.
There were expressions of hatred directed against Zionists, including Jewish students. There were distortions of facts, labelling all Zionists as racists and political tirades against Israel.
Equally mind-boggling was the time spent by delegates on the ideological and philosophical debate about antisemitism and Zionism. This is fine as a purely academic exercise, but what has it got to do with how children should behave at Canadian schools? It’s hard to understand, as such debates only serve to encourage hate, rather than thwart it.
Meanwhile, hatred within TDSB schools is only getting worse. According to a presentation from the Jewish Educators and Families Association of Canada (JEFA), in the 2022-23 school year, 211 incidents of antisemitism were reported in TDSB schools schools. In the half year following Hamas’s October 7 massacre (the latest time period for which data is available), that number tripled.
If the growth in antisemitic incidents continues at this pace, noted JEFA, 90 per cent of Jewish students will be subjected to antisemitic hate throughout their grade-school career. And if you consider that in the 2022-23 school year, only 14 per cent of students involved in antisemitic incidents were suspended, it becomes clear that the board has utterly failed to address this issue.
Any which way you look at it, there is an environment at TDSB schools that encourages Jew-hatred, and it has become highly politicized. This is the core cause of why there is so much hate in TDSB schools. When you allow political narratives and divisions from far off lands to seep into your curriculum and your organizational narratives, you have a never-ending disaster at hand.
Ultimately, the committee adopted the report without amendment, but the damage had already been done. As the hearings wrapped up, a trustee spoke out against all the hateful rhetoric that had been aired during the meeting.
“There was true harm spoken tonight. There was antisemitism, there was Jew-hatred, and I need to apologize for all those who have witnessed this. This is not acceptable. No form of hate within deputations is acceptable,” she said. “This has caused great harm to many of us who have been listening for hours.”
It’s important to note that our Canadian values have governed our communities and our society well for hundreds of years. Now some have decided to let political pollution enter our schools and taint the way we behave and the way we think.
The problem has nothing to do with Canada. Hate is being imported and weaponized in Canadian schools and, regretfully, we are witnessing the capitulation of those who are responsible for fixing the problem.
School is a place where kids should feel safe and get a quality education. It’s not a place for identity politics and definitely not a place where hate should be directed at anyone.
There are enough laws and rules against targeted hate at both the national and organizational levels. They just need to be enforced in a strict, no-nonsense way.
Raheel Raza and Mohammad Rizwan are directors of the Council of Muslims Against Antisemitism.
