It is with sadness and anguish that we write this open letter to our community of Prince George. In the aftermath of the October 7th terrorist attack on Israel by Hamas, we have seen a global rise in the expression of hatred towards Jews. This unfortunately is also occurring in Canada, not only in major cities, but increasingly, here in our own community.
The rise in hate crimes is predominantly in the major centers of Toronto, Vancouver, Montreal and Ottawa. This rise was already dramatic since 2015 but has exponentially worsened since October 7th according to the ADL (Anti-Defamation League) and The Integrated Terrorist Assessment Centre (ITAC).
In our community we daily drive by anti-Israel graffiti, on a neighbour’s fence on 15th Avenue. We have a verified report of a verbal assault on a visibly Jewish person at a local grocery store. Our children are being targeted too, as we have had incidents at local schools where Jewish students were subjected to verbal harassment. The first weekend in March, a local resident was arrested and detained following a report of them vandalizing the downtown office of an elected official with multiple hateful and anti-Israel graffiti slogans.
There are also online forums in which Prince George-based activists organize anti-Israel events being held at UNBC and other more public locations. In these forums local activists spread disinformation, advocate violence, and glorify martyrdom. In one such post a commenter states, ‘we should follow in his footsteps!!!’ referring to Aaron Bushnell, the US Air Force member who immolated himself in front of the Israeli embassy in Washington on February 25th, 2024.
We do not want to live in fear in our own communities. We do not want to hide our identities fearing persecution or acts of violence against us. We do not want to be vilified for who we are as much as any of you reading this would not want the same to happen to you. We have endured persecution for over 2,000 years and will defend ourselves if attacked, but we are a peaceful culture and would prefer toleration and peaceful co-existence. We cherish life and protect life to our fullest ability. We do not seek death or destruction and we have striven to avoid importing an overseas conflict into our peaceful, local community.
As a very small and tight knit community of Jews in Prince George, with many members in law, medical, academic, business, and other professions, we have sought and held meaningful dialogues with local MPs and MLAs, our honourable mayor and city council, and the RCMP. We would now like to publicly reach out to our local Christian, Muslim and other religious and ethnic communities in the hope of pursuing peaceful dialogue, standing against racism of any form, and to support each other, as members of a unified community, through these difficult times.
Asher Chmielnicki, Eli Klasner, Bill Poser, and Evelyn Wolfermann
Prince George
