THE STANDING SENATE COMMITTEE ON HUMAN RIGHTS
EVIDENCE
OTTAWA, Monday, October 27, 2025
The Standing Senate Committee on Human Rights met with videoconference this day at 4:03 p.m. [ET] to examine and report on anti-Semitism in Canada; and, in camera, to examine and report on aging out of foster care.
Senator Paulette Senior (Chair) in the chair.
[English]
The Chair: Good afternoon, everyone.
I would like to begin by acknowledging that the land on which we gather is the traditional, ancestral and unceded Territory of the Anishinaabe Algonquin Nation.
My name is Paulette Senior, a senator from Ontario and chair of this committee. I will invite my honourable colleagues to introduce themselves.
Senator McPhedran: Marilou McPhedran, independent senator for Manitoba.
Senator Coyle: Mary Coyle, Antigonish, Nova Scotia.
Senator Karetak-Lindell: Nancy Karetak-Lindell, senator for Nunavut.
Senator Arnot: David Arnot, Saskatchewan.
Senator K. Wells: Kristopher Wells, Alberta, Treaty 6 Territory.
Senator Housakos: Leo Housakos, Montreal, Quebec.
The Chair: Welcome to all senators, and welcome to all who are following our deliberations.
Before we welcome our witnesses, I would like to provide a content warning for this meeting. The sensitive topics covered today may be triggering for people in the room with us, as well as for those watching and listening to this broadcast. Mental health support for all Canadians is available by phone and text at 988. Senators and parliamentary employees are also reminded that the Senate’s Employee and Family Assistance Program is available to them and offers short-term counselling for both personal and work-related concerns, as well as crisis counselling.
Today, this committee is meeting under its order of reference to examine and report on anti-Semitism in Canada. This afternoon, we have two panels. In each panel, we will hear from the witnesses and then the senators around this table will ask questions of the witnesses.
I will now introduce our first witnesses, who have been asked to make a five-minute opening statement each. With us at the table, from Public Safety Canada, we have Mr. Greg Kenney, Assistant Deputy Minister, Programs; and Chad Westmacott, Director General, Community Safety, Corrections and Criminal Justice. I understand that Mr. Westmacott will be making the opening remarks on behalf of Public Safety Canada.
From the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, we have David Janzen, Executive Director, Strategic Oversight and Integration; and Denis Beaudoin, Chief Superintendent, National Security, Federal Policing. I understand that Mr. Janzen will be making the opening remarks on behalf of the RCMP.
Welcome to you all. I now invite Mr. Westmacott to make his presentation.
Chad Westmacott, Director General, Community Safety, Corrections and Criminal Justice: Madam Chair and members of the committee, thank you for the opportunity to speak today on Public Safety Canada’s actions to combat anti‑Semitism and hate.
I recognize and acknowledge that we are on the traditional Territory of the Algonquin Anishinaabe People.
Anti-Semitism and hate in any form are unacceptable and have no place in this country. Public Safety is aware that the number of police-reported hate crimes, generally, and those targeting religions have more than doubled since 2019. Reported anti‑Semitic crimes have increased even faster, tripling in that period, with the Jewish community being targeted in 69% of religious‑based hate crimes. Those include anti-Semitic graffiti, shootings at Jewish schools, violent attacks on individuals, and fire bombings at synagogues and community buildings.
Recognizing the severity of the situation, in March 2025, the government hosted the National Forum on Combatting Antisemitism, bringing together Jewish community organizations; federal, provincial and municipal leaders; law enforcement; and prosecutors to identify challenges and to develop strategies to combat anti-Semitism, including through strengthening collective action. Many attendees endorsed a statement of intent, affirming the collective responsibility to combat anti-Semitism and all forms of hate crimes through decisive, coordinated and specific actions. At that forum, the government also committed to a number of actions, including improving data, working with Jewish security networks, improving the Criminal Code and increased funding to support community interventions to tackle hate.
Delivering upon one of these federal commitments, Public Safety has since worked closely with governments and police services across the country to develop a set of forward-looking actions to help combat anti-Semitism. These national commitments will be published by the end of the year and will provide transparency and support follow-up reporting, holding us all accountable.
In addition, last month, as committed to at the form, the Government of Canada introduced Bill C-9, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (hate propaganda, hate crime and access to religious or cultural places), or the “combatting hate act.” This is an important piece of legislation to help address hate. Prior, the federal government has also renewed Canada’s Anti-Racism Strategy and released Canada’s Action Plan on Combatting Hate, with an investment in Budget 2024 of $273.6 million over six years, and with $29.3 million ongoing, to advance this plan. Part of the action plan is Public Safety’s updated Canada Community Security Program. This program provides financial assistance to not-for-profit organizations that serve communities at risk of being targeted by hate-motivated crime. Funding is provided to enhance the security of their community gathering spaces, helping to deter minor and violent attacks.
Responding to communities, the program is now more accessible and better able to support communities at risk. Among other changes, eligible expenses now include security equipment, minor renovations, security and emergency assessments, training and — the newest part — time-limited security personnel. To respond quickly to urgent needs, organizations can now apply at any time during the year.
Funding has significantly increased as well, going from $1.2 million in 2011-12, to $5.8 million in 2022-23, to $20.5 million for 2025-26. Next fiscal year, this funding will stabilize at $15.7 million ongoing. Over the last two years, 54% of funding was allocated to Jewish communities. Since October 1, 2024, $4.5 million has been allocated to 100 Jewish organizations.
Public Safety is also investing $26.8 million to improve access to hate crimes training for provincial and municipal police, improving the capacity of police to respond effectively to hate‑motivated incidents.
Further, through its Community Resilience Fund, Public Safety’s Canada Centre for Community Engagement and Prevention of Violence supports grassroots prevention efforts and research to address and better understand radicalization to violence in Canada. This month, the government announced $36 million through this fund to support 19 organizations across Canada and internationally.
These continued actions by Public Safety are helping to address anti-Semitism and create safer and more inclusive communities across Canada. Thank you.
David Janzen, Executive Director, Strategic Oversight and Integration, Royal Canadian Mounted Police: Good afternoon, Madam Chair and honourable members of the committee. My name is David Janzen, and I’m the Executive Director responsible for the Hate Crimes Policy Unit at the RCMP.
[Translation]
I am joined by Chief Superintendent Denis Beaudoin, National Security, Federal Policing, at the RCMP.
[English]
We are honoured to speak to you today from the traditional territory of the Algonquin Anishinaabeg people.
[Translation]
Anti-Semitism has always been present, but over the past several years, there has been a dramatic increase in the visibility and severity of this hate. I will speak to you today about how we are working to respond to anti-Semitism, but first, I wanted to provide an overview of the threat and operational context.
[English]
Primarily, our response to anti-Semitism is in the hate crime space, crimes that are motivated by prejudice or bias against an identifiable group in the communities where we have jurisdiction. According to Statistics Canada, there has been a 153% increase in police-reported hate crimes targeting religion from 2020 to 2024. I emphasize “police reported” here because, as we all know, many of these incidents go unreported.
[Translation]
Within that, there has been a 180% increase in anti-Semitic hate crimes. These numbers are deeply troubling, but I regret to say they do not paint the entire picture of the depth of anti‑Semitism in Canada. Tragically, we have also seen an increase in terrorist activity targeting the Jewish community.
[English]
That is why my colleague is joining me today. For you to understand the scope of our concern, we need to speak about our counterterrorism efforts as well.
Over the past several years, the RCMP has worked with key domestic and international partners to disrupt a number of terrorist threats targeting the Jewish community. In many cases, these have been youth fuelled by online echo chambers where anti-Semitic and other hate-based views are initiated and reinforced.
If I paint a picture that is alarming, it’s intentional, and sadly, it’s not limited to anti-Semitism but hate against other identifiable groups as well. That is why the RCMP has been taking concrete action.
We have and continue to update our hate crime operational policy in response to feedback and best practices and have developed guidebooks for investigators and front-line officers. This is critical, as while specialized hate crime units are experts, any officer could be the first on the scene of an incident, and the initial response is critical.
Our policy and training emphasize the need to build relationships with communities, to solicit feedback and to ensure the connections are there for ongoing support for those who are victimized. We are actively engaging with Jewish communities across Canada to hear concerns, encourage reporting and to listen to how we can improve in our responses.
As a concrete example, following the recent Public Safety-led anti-Semitism summit, we met and engaged with officials from the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs to better understand where CIJA felt police improvements could be made. These conversations will lead to future improvements at the RCMP, including our efforts to incorporate the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s definition of anti-Semitism into RCMP policy.
We would be remiss as well if we did not mention that the national security program also actively collaborates with community on efforts aimed at disrupting and preventing the radicalization.
[Translation]
We are also playing a leadership role by bringing together police leaders to discuss hate crimes. Of import, the commissioner hosts a biweekly dialogue with chiefs from across the country, sharing information, identifying gaps, challenges or barriers, and discussing best practices.
[English]
Discussions routinely include information-sharing efforts regarding offences targeting the Jewish community.
We are also building broader networks with academia and advocacy groups to improve our responses. This includes our strong partnership with the Canadian Race Relations Foundation, which led to the initial establishment of a task force. It was struck to build awareness on hate crimes and improve police responses and community collaboration. Successes include a working definition of hate crimes and the development of tools to support police operations.
We are also working closely with our partners at Public Safety Canada, including participating at the anti-Semitism summit, and we are advancing efforts under Canada’s Action Plan on Combatting Hate.
In closing, I want to stress how concerned the RCMP is with the rise in anti-Semitism.
[Translation]
While I have outlined some of our efforts, I do not want to suggest that we are satisfied with our progress. We recognize that additional efforts are needed to ensure that all Canadians feel safe, and we are committed to this mission.
[English]
I’m happy to provide this committee with any information you require and look forward to the results to further help us improve our responses to anti-Semitism.
We look forward to your questions and the forthcoming discussion.
The Chair: Thank you for your statements. We will now proceed to questions from senators. Dear colleagues, please note that you have five minutes for your question, and that includes the answer.
I would like to sincerely thank you for agreeing to participate in this important study. I will now go to questions. We will start with Senator Bernard. Welcome. You didn’t get a chance to introduce yourself, so you may want to do that as well.
Senator Bernard: Thank you. My apologies for being late. We’ll blame it on the airline. I missed part of your presentation at the beginning, I guess, but I’m grateful to be here. I thank you for being here with us and for the evidence you’ve provided.
Is the government doing all it can do to effectively address anti-Semitism and other forms of hate in Canada? Are we doing the best that we can do?
Mr. Westmacott: Thank you very much for that question.
We can always do better. I think there are always actions that we can be doing more of, and I think it’s beholden on the government to do as much as they possibly can, as well as civil society. I think the measures that we are taking at this stage of the game are well thought out, well focused, and we are taking steps forward. We do expect that to continue.
I mentioned in my opening comments the national commitments document that we are in the process of developing. We’re developing this with provinces and territories, municipalities and law enforcement across the country. It is a set of forward-looking actions that all jurisdictions across the country can individually take and, in some cases, collectively to try and address anti-Semitism and other forms of hate.
Mr. Janzen: Thank you for the question. I agree completely with my colleague from Public Safety. There is always something more that we can be doing. That’s why the RCMP is engaging with communities and listening to their feedback. The moment that we start to believe that we have everything handled from an RCMP standpoint, we inevitably don’t. We need to constantly take that feedback, have that feedback loop with the communities and make sure we’re improving our operational policies and providing engagement.
I will note as well that this is a whole-of-society issue. We do depend on communities to help encourage reporting and to help support their community members who have been victimized and impacted. It truly is something that we need to do in partnership with our community members in the places where we police across the country.
Senator Bernard: I think I neglected to introduce myself.
The Chair: You did.
Senator Bernard: Let me introduce myself. I’m Senator Wanda Bernard from Nova Scotia, Mi’kma’ki. We know that many hate crimes go unreported. There are various reasons for not reporting. One of the reasons is it’s clear that people feel reporting won’t matter or make a difference.
What needs to be done to encourage more reporting in very difficult circumstances?
Mr. Westmacott: One of the things that we’ve heard a lot in communities — exactly like you pointed out — is that people feel that they don’t report because they don’t feel it matters. Part of that comes down to whether the police in the jurisdiction know what a hate crime is. Do they know what to do and what steps to take?
So one of the things that has happened over the past number of years and is to focus on hate crime training for police jurisdictions. Mr. Janzen, my colleague, can speak to what the RCMP is doing. But one thing we are working on — and to respond to a lot of the comments in the communities — is to support the municipalities, support the provincial police forces and those police services on training on hate crimes, providing effective training, recognizing that those police on a daily basis are faced with so many challenges. So help give them the tools and the awareness of the legal framework that exists to be able to help them to respond to those hate crimes and instances, and that hopefully will lead to individuals feeling like more is being done.
Mr. Janzen: One issue is trusting police. Many communities that are impacted by hate crimes traditionally have not had the level of trust in policing to be able to go to report, so re‑establishing that trust, working with communities. Your previous testimony in this session, you heard a lot on intersectionality. Police need to be part of that so we can start building the trust. That is essential.
But I agree with my colleague. The front-line officer is also very important. Hate crime-specialized units are top of their game, super experts in this. But a member or officer responding to that call perhaps with 15 other calls that day, they don’t get that initial kind of response or have the right information down. It immediately destroys the trust with that community. So a lot of our focus has been how we provide a front-line member access to training and tools that they can jump back on and get some advice on how to respond to that initial call right off the get-go.
Senator Bernard: Follow-up.
The Chair: Second round.
Senator K. Wells: Welcome, thank you for being here. My question is to Mr. Janzen. Hate crimes are often called message crimes, like you described, because they don’t just target an individual but put fear and terror into an entire community.
We are particularly concerned about some of our major centres, I’m from Edmonton. We have had a specialized hate crimes unit that was funded as a pilot project from Public Safety Canada in the early 2000s and continues to this day. We know that urban municipalities are paying perhaps greater attention to this issue, but particularly rural communities where the RCMP is mostly policing —
You spoke to the need for specialization. Can you speak about hate crime-specific officers in provinces and territories? I know Alberta has one officer that unfortunately is only part time for hate crimes for the entire province. So I’m just wondering if you can speak to what the RCMP is doing in terms of the number of the FTEs or part times in provinces and territories to really be that focal point to train members and work with communities and address this really complex need.
Mr. Janzen: Madam Chair, thank you for the question. Kudos to the Edmonton Police Service Hate Crimes Unit. They are top of their game. They are an excellent unit. We work very closely with them.
Alberta RCMP and Alberta are increasing their hate crime capacity right now with dedicated training and adding more specialized folks to the capacity to respond to hate crimes. Right now it’s largely handled out of the major crimes section, which is some of our most experienced police officers within Alberta. They are fantastic officers. It is our requirement now to help provide them with the training to be able to help respond on that.
As you can appreciate, we’re a contract partner. The province needs to create dedicated units, and some of the funding does need to come from the provincial government. We have seen that in British Columbia where there’s been a significant enhancement where we have a dedicated hate crimes unit. We’re certainly working within that confine right now to ensure that we have officers who have the ability to respond to these crimes.
In terms of specific FTE counts, I would have to return that answer to you in writing. We have to deconflict it in terms of major case officers and the percentage of their time. But I’m happy to return that to the committee.
Senator K. Wells: That would be appreciated and helpful. You talked about training with RCMP in particular. Can you talk a bit about the training in hate crimes that is provided to new recruits at the Depot?
Mr. Janzen: Sure. Right now at Depot, there is a briefer on hate crimes. I wouldn’t say it is in-depth. We are actively looking at how to increase the training offered to personnel. They do get a primer. Right now, we have specialized hate crimes training on Agora, that is our online training platform at the RCMP. There is also training available through the CPKN — apologies I’m in an acronym-based organization. The Canadian Police Knowledge Network. That is supported for police officers across the country.
We have also dedicated hate crime manuals and have a frontline investigator’s manual as well as a hate crime’s investigators manual. They are specifically different. Getting back to the more complex investigation that an investigator would need to follow-up on, in addition to the front-line officer doing the initial response. Those are publicly available on the website right now and that is purposely done so we can provide this training elsewhere to other police jurisdictions across the country.
Senator K. Wells: For Public Safety, our premise here is reducing red tape across government and improving the efficiency of government, so certainly seeing your security infrastructure program being perhaps oversubscribed.
I’m wondering if you have taken initiatives to reduce some of the complexity of application — and from the time somebody is applying it is because an incident already happened — with the need to get the resources out on the ground to keep communities safe. We heard from the Jewish community that sometimes their costs for security have grown exponentially, and that they have had to cancel events because they can’t provide the proper security.
I’m wondering if you can speak to the application process, streamlining and getting the funding out on the ground to communities. What does that look like?
Mr. Westmacott: Thank you for the question. When we created the CCSP, the Canada Community Security Program, which was the program that came after the Security Infrastructure Program, there was a lot of efficiency built into it including the ability to apply it at any time throughout the year. There were administrative changes made as well, including reductions on the elements that needed to be provided, so that was hoping to provide a more accessible program for the community so that they could have more efficient access to the programming.
The Chair: Thank you, and if you have a follow-up, second round.
Senator Arnot: Thank you, witnesses. Mr. Kenney, concerning the Canada Community Security Program, the CCSP you mentioned, what is the rough application to install a timeline for security measures? And what types of measures are generally taken? What’s the most popular one?
Mr. Kenney: Thank you for the question. I’ll ask my colleague, Doug May, who is a bit more involved in the daily decisions, so he is best positioned to respond to that question.
Douglas May, Acting Director General, Emergency Management and Programs Branch, Public Safety Canada: With respect to the timelines, we give ourselves a four‑month service standard from the time we receive an application to the time that we look to get an agreement in place and full funding for those initiatives. With respect to specificity on the most requested types of equipment, it’s predominantly cameras for video surveillance, et cetera. Another one is fencing, which is a means to reduce traffic and other things along those lines.
Senator Arnot: For organizations that can’t front the capital expenditure, does public safety pilot direct pay to vendors or is there a federal purchasing vehicle so that small synagogues aren’t cash flow constrained?
Mr. May: The way the program works is that we have to flow dollars through the recipient, which, in your example, is a synagogue.
However, under certain circumstances we allow pre-execution, which allows an organization to start a project before an agreement is signed if there is an urgent need for that.
Mr. Westmacott: The other thing is that when the Canada Community Security Program was created, we expanded the cost share of the federal government from 50% up to 70% to recognize that some communities were more cash strapped, if I could put it that way.
The other thing we did is that we allowed for other jurisdictions — other levels of government — to be able to lend support. Previously, it had to be only the federal government. Now we can allow up to 100% of the total project cost to be covered by governments, including provinces or municipalities.
Senator Arnot: We have heard quite a bit about the power of education and the need to educate, particularly in the grades K to 12. How much of the new money available through the Community Resilience Fund would be earmarked for school-age prevention, addressing anti-Semitic narratives? I’m thinking of the grades K to 12 in the provinces and territories. Also, is there a consideration for professional development programs for existing teachers in those grades K to 12 in Canada?
Mr. May: Through the Community Resilience Fund there is no pre-allocation, but certainly as a result of some recent initiatives — I believe my colleague Mr. Westmacott mentioned the anti-Semitism forum back in March 2025 — $10 million was announced for initiatives associated with anti-Semitism, which included that very initiative in terms of training and education for certain organizations. There was no preset allocation to anything that you had mentioned along those lines.
Mr. Westmacott: I would like to add that the government just recently announced — as I mentioned — $36 million in new programming. For example, I was just looking at the Students Commission of Canada, which is funding that goes to work in schools, communities and online to counter-hate, polarization and violent extremism. It includes things like school networks, et cetera.
There are a number of examples of funding through the Community Resilience Fund that supports schools, but there’s not an amount set aside, per se.
Senator Coyle: I’m trying to get a handle on the escalation, the numbers. You have talked about baseline years, which are actually quite a few years ago. I’m curious what’s happened in the last two years. Do we have numbers on what’s happened since October 7 and the horrendously violent and vile attack by Hamas in Israel, and then the reaction that came from Israel against Hamas in Gaza? I would like to know what those numbers actually look like.
Mr. Westmacott: Thank you very much. We do have numbers on that. You’re right that we choose a different scope on the years depending on what it is, but StatCan, coming out of the concern of the rising hate crimes, have started publishing quarterly data, quarterly numbers. From 2024 onward, they are now publishing quarterly data, so you can see the rise and impact therein.
We have seen clearly that there was a significant increase in hate crimes over the 2022-2023 period and the 2023-2024 period as well. Yes, there was a significant increase post-October 7, 2023, across the board — in the Jewish community for sure, and other communities as well have seen that.
In 2018 we see an upcurve in hate crimes generally across categories.
Mr. Janzen: If I could add to that, in 2023 and 2024, crimes against the Jewish faith were 18% of all hate crimes, and that remained consistent in 2023-2024. That is a significant increase, but I would be remiss if I didn’t pitch again that this is reported hate crimes. This is another challenge for us: particularly, in some communities in the country we do not have confidence that all incidents in hate crimes are being reported, so that continues to be a significant gap.
Senator Coyle: Thank you. Maybe we could get the numbers submitted at another time. It’s important for us to know what those are.
My next question relates to prevention. I know that cameras and fences are prevention, but we’ve also talked about the work that both the RCMP and Public Safety Canada are doing to look at the online world. I’m interested to know about that in a little bit more detail. Mr. Westmacott, you talked about understanding radicalization. I would like to know a little bit more about that and where that is going, and I also believe, Mr. Janzen, you talked about the work in anti-terrorism.
Mr. Janzen: I will let my colleague Denis Beaudoin speak to that.
Denis Beaudoin, Chief Superintendent, National Security, Federal Policing, Royal Canadian Mounted Police: There is no doubt that the online space plays a large part of radicalization in Canada. Since we will never be able to monitor all the online forums, the RCMP is dealing a lot with our national and international partners. Everybody is involved, and through those collaborations we can identify threats.
At the same time, it’s a whole-of-society phenomenon that everyone needs to be aware of, so we are doing a lot of outreach. We have provided public advisory for parents, teachers and others to recognize when there is a change in behaviour in youth, and we provide in this advisory regarding certain types of behaviours that have been identified by professionals as being more problematic so that they recognize this and they either call the schools, the authorities, the local police or the RCMP so that we can catch this. Then through the radicalization systems, we can address this before it becomes violent extremism.
In the online space, we’re finding that the hate is not siloed. We are finding now that if the youth hate Jewish people, they will hate Black people, the LGBTQ community and many others.
Maybe a long time ago there was a single piece of frustration or hate that they had, but now it’s widespread, and their intentions go across a multitude of communities, so it’s not just siloed.
It may be that the online space has put people with hate in these forums, and then it gets cultivated, and that’s what the end result is.
Senator McPhedran: I’m trying to build on a number of the questions that have been posed so far. Let me begin by asking you a question about the length of time working on this file. May I ask if any of the four of you have worked on this file for under two years?
All of you have worked on it for two years or more? Okay, thank you.
Then my question is this: You have mentioned that this is a changing landscape and that responsiveness has to be tailored, but could you identify for us what you see as the biggest change in the last two and a half years. Is there anything that stands out for you?
Mr. Janzen: I remember working on hate crimes, supporting the then Deputy Commissioner Cabana in 2014-2015, so a while ago. At the time, they were more isolated incidents, really. It was people motivated to hate. Forgive my crassness, but if you have a vision of a skinhead or something like that, it was more of that type of work. One of the bigger changes now has been the connection with Mr. Beaudoin’s space: It’s people doing more online; the level of vitriol online has dramatically increased.
That’s the biggest change I’ve seen. It’s no longer isolated; it’s more of a movement, so to speak.
I don’t know if you want to add to that, Mr. Beaudoin.
Mr. Beaudoin: Yes. Two years is a small time-stamp, but the online space has really changed. Before, people had to get out of their houses to cultivate that hate, and it can now be done within their houses. It gets cultivated and made worse and worse. Sometimes, nobody is aware.
So whereas before, you needed to talk to other people in person; now it’s on a telephone in a basement. That’s really problematic.
Senator McPhedran: Thank you.
I need to begin with a short anecdote. For a period of time, I sat on the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal. As it happened, I was present for one of the big anti-Semitism cases that was being tried before the tribunal, but I was not sitting; I was in the audience, essentially. I happened to inadvertently sit in the midst of the hate group and the friends of the person who was under scrutiny.
During the course of conversation, I learned that almost all of them worked online, were technicians and almost all worked for federal government departments.
My question to you is this: Do you have a way of checking and rechecking those who are working in technology or online in your workspaces?
Mr. Janzen: We do have an insider threat program. We do have folks who, if we get information of an employee who is active in these spaces, will follow up with an investigation. The commissioner has been very clear that if you’re not following our code of conduct, there will be follow-up. We have recently updated our code of conduct guide, as well, to make certain activities essentially presumptive dismissal; you will be removed from the organization.
That is an effort internally to try and beef up our ability to ensure that we are responding to these situations and improving the culture of the organization in that regard. Certainly, Mr. Beaudoin, you can add to this, but from an RCMP-employee perspective, there is no desire to be working with folks who don’t reflect the core values of the organization.
Mr. Beaudoin: The only other thing is if that were to be the case, they would be a criminal investigation on top of that, just like any other person in Canada. We certainly take it seriously, and we have a mechanism to identify such.
It’s always a challenge, but just like any other government department, there are security clearances that are validated periodically and different other things. It’s certainly a concern, and we take your experience with us.
Senator McPhedran: I would like a very quick “yes” or “no.” Is that the case across the board for federal departments in our government — the type of vigilance that you described?
Mr. Beaudoin: I can’t speak to other departments.
Mr. Westmacott: Do I have time to respond, Madam Chair?
The Chair: You might on a second round. A second round might be a collective effort.
Senator Housakos: Thank you to our panel for being here today. I am listening quite attentively, and the words I have been hearing from all of you are “engagement,” “consultation,” “collaboration” and so on. These are all nice words that politicians use when we deliberate here in the Senate or over in the House of Commons, but the truth of the matter is — and I represent a significant Jewish community in Montreal that has now had multiple places of faith be shot at and had Molotov cocktails launched at them. We have seen death threats in what are otherwise protests in the streets that are permitted and police are there to make sure it’s supervised and the protests are in peaceful order; yet, people are still being videotaped at these protests, calling for death for a particular faith group.
From your own admission, it’s been year over year now that we’ve been failing. This collaboration, consultation and all the rest of what we’ve heard here today have been monumental failures over the last two or three years, based upon your own admission. I think I can acknowledge that, as well.
Clearly, over the last few years, we are dealing with organizations that are well organized, deliberate, systematic and funded very well that are carrying out these activities.
My question is a very pointed question: What is missing in law enforcement’s toolbox that we can provide you to start making a dent in this terrible problem?
Mr. Westmacott: It’s not so much that there were significant elements missing from the toolbox. Part of it was an understanding of what was actually within the toolbox already. There are a number of legal provisions that prohibit things like harassment, et cetera.
Bill C-9, which I mentioned and which is a Department of Justice initiative put forward, is part of trying to address some of the areas that could be improved in terms of the hate-crime legislation. There is the introduction of the new offence to prohibit intimidation of people accessing cultural and religious institutions. There’s a new offence to prohibit obstructing or interfering with being able to access those places. There is a new hate crime offence such that, if there is an offence that is done and the motivation behind it is hate, it is a new offence, so it has new sentencing around that, as well. There is also the notion about hate propaganda offences regarding terrorism symbols or hate symbols.
Bill C-9, recently introduced, addresses some of the concerns that have been raised by the policing community and other communities, like the Jewish community, to actually take action in some of those cases.
However, part of it all comes to the elements that we were talking about earlier, such as training, as well, and the fact that there are a number of provisions that already exist in the legal framework, and, in some cases, it’s just a question of the police of jurisdiction being aware of them and when they can be applied.
Senator Housakos: — a lot more specific, and I’m being specific because, right now, in the Criminal Code, there are hate laws on the books. They are clear and concise. They have obviously worked for a number of years, up until the last few years.
I will ask another question that’s even more pointed: Why aren’t we actually applying the criminal hate laws that are already on the books? Have law enforcement agencies identified organizations in this country that have been deliberately carrying out anti-Semitism — organizations that are well-funded and well organized? Are you surveilling such organizations? Are they being followed and monitored so they don’t continue to fester and grow? That is the first set of questions.
The second question, around which I hope there are some stats you can provide this committee, is this: Over the last 24 months, how many people in Canada who have carried out deliberate anti-Semitic acts have been charged under hate laws? If, as I suspect, there haven’t been very many compared to the number of acts that have been registered in terms of complaints, that bears asking the question: Where has law enforcement failed, and why?
I’ll leave those questions with you.
Mr. Janzen: Those are very complex questions to answer in 10 seconds. My apologies.
There have been a number of groups that are listed under the terrorism-listing provisions of the Government of Canada. In terms of our active operations, we wouldn’t be going into that level of detail for obvious reasons. I would say there is a lot more that law enforcement can be doing in this space for sure. I’m happy to go into this in the next round.
Senator Housakos: How many people have been charged?
The Chair: Perhaps that can be provided in writing.
Mr. Janzen: I can provide stats for the RCMP, but I can’t speak for every police service in the country.
Senator Karetak-Lindell: Thank you for being here. Some of my questions have been answered in part already, but what I’m feeling is that we cannot legislate attitudes. We cannot legislate intolerance. I think most of the work that needs to be done is at the community level before it gets to the crime stage.
I’m wondering how much work there is being done with community programs within schools. We all know that we are born without prejudice and hate and with good attitudes about other people. This is something that kids and young people learn as they mature, depending on who is speaking to them or what actions they have seen. I think a lot of this could be helped by having the right community support groups and the right curriculum at schools, just humans talking to each other about kindness. We can have policies and laws, but you can’t legislate how people think. Then you have to balance what people are saying against freedom of speech, and it’s a delicate balance.
With some of the money that you said was available, how much of it is for community groups and community projects? As you say, I think some people mentioned professional development days for teachers to learn more about how to deal with this stuff at the school level. It’s not just this particular hate crime; a lot of other things are happening in schools. Social media also plays a big part because there are so many influencers out there.
How much community work is being done to nip this in the bud before it gets to the other levels where it becomes hate crime?
Mr. Westmacott: That’s a very good question. I do point out that while we’ve been talking a lot about legislation and actions at the end, there is substantial work ongoing on the prevention side of all of this as well.
In terms of the Canada Centre for Community Engagement and Prevention of Violence, through the Community Resilience Fund, a big component of that is the prevention side of things. It’s about understanding and research, but they also fund community interventions to address radicalization to hate.
I would also like to mention the National Crime Prevention Strategy. While that’s focused on crime and addressing the root causes of crime, a lot of the root causes are actually quite similar in certain elements that may drive somebody toward hate as it may drive somebody toward crime, including feeling excluded from components of society, anger management or some elements on those fronts.
The National Crime Prevention Strategy, which provides around $45 million a year to crime prevention initiatives — which is, in a lot of cases, school interventions and community interventions focusing on youth from the ages of 6 to 30, starting at 6 — really focuses on those components and those root causes in addressing the prevention side of it.
Mr. Janzen: Mr. Beaudoin, do you want to speak about some of our counter-radicalization work?
Mr. Beaudoin: We have a program within the RCMP. It’s an intervention program wherein the goal is to identify people early. As I mentioned before, when we receive reporting of change in behaviour, there are groups across the country that can work with these people to help them get back on the right track. One of the biggest issues is to have these reports come in to the police or the school system to ensure that the help is provided.
That’s one program we have internally right now without new money or anything, and we are working with communities across the country.
The Chair: Thank you. We have seven minutes and five questions left. I propose that each senator ask their question, and I ask you to respond to what you can within the time we have left. For what you’re not able to respond to, we have already had requests for some written responses. We ask that you send those to us.
Senator Bernard: Thank you, chair. I want to pick up on the conversations around online hate. Are we able to monitor and collect data about the AI-generated spread of hate and racism? What’s being done about evidence-based digital interventions? How are we doing in that sphere?
The other question I had was a follow-up to a comment that was made during my last question around training. Mr. Janzen, you talked about intersectionality. Does the training include training for staff around how to apply an intersectional lens to investigations?
Senator K. Wells: Mr. Janzen, you mentioned the importance of provincial hate crimes units in partnership with the province, using the BC Hate Crime Team as an example.
Does the RCMP have a proposal? What kind of resources would be needed to create those provincial or territorial hate crimes units all across this country as one way to improve the specialization of investigations, but also building the evidence to what my colleague Senator Housakos has said about actually holding people accountable and getting charges and successful prosecutions? If you could send that back to us if you have something, I would appreciate it.
My other question is around Bill C-9 that was mentioned. For the RCMP, last year, a report came from the House of Commons entitled Heightened Antisemitism in Canada and How to Confront It. It made several recommendations that we see some of in the form of Bill C-9.
From the RCMP and policing perspective, could you comment on how those new powers, should they become law, will aid police organizations in their work?
Senator Arnot: I have a few questions for the RCMP that are similar to a couple of other comments.
Number one, how many RCMP officers have completed hate crime investigator training in the last fiscal year? Do you have specific targets for this training? Are those targets being met?
Secondly, will the RCMP publish quarterly anti-hate information concerning hate crimes? I’m thinking reports, charges, clearances, average time from complaint to charge, charge to trial and number of convictions.
Thirdly, do all RCMP detachments receive standing threat assessment intelligence concerning Jewish institutions? When were the last national directives issued?
Senator Coyle: Thank you for answering my earlier question. I have two questions. I’m interested to know what the risks are — and I’m sure both parties are watching this — of online hate escalating to actual physical violence of one sort or another. Are you watching that? What do those numbers look like?
Digging deeper, can we understand what some of the factors are that actually lead from that very large number of people who are involved in online hate and then act upon that?
Senator McPhedran: All departments have been asked to find at least a 15% cut. Could you tell us, please, if you anticipate cuts to this program?
The Chair: Those are the questions, but I do want to add one of my own. I think it’s been asked in a different way, but I’m wondering about the prosecution or conviction rate, let’s say over the past two years.
We do have two minutes. Are there any of these questions you want to tackle in the time we have left?
Mr. Janzen: There are certainly a lot of questions there, Madam Chair. I don’t think I can tackle all of them, but perhaps some of the more straightforward ones.
On Bill C-9, from a policing perspective, the Canadian Association of Chiefs of Police, or CACP has actually come out with a statement on Bill C-9, so we can bring that up and share it with the committee. That’s a much better speak for the policing community than what the RCMP can provide. We certainly don’t speak for all police.
In terms of the online AI space, we are still trying to get our head around AI. I’ll try to get a more in-depth answer for you, but it will be pretty nuanced; it’s a challenging question.
With intersectionality, I haven’t had a lot of chance to speak to the great work we are doing with the Canadian Race Relations Foundation. That is what we’re really relying on. Our partnerships with them bring academics, community members and religious groups together at the same table with police. The way they set up their Building Bridges Workshops is that it’s community first, police later. Then they bring people together for a conversation. It is a really interesting methodology.
But they are doing that for police across the country so it has been an important tool for us. We do have a trauma-informed investigator course that is required by our members. We do have some element in there and will try and unpack that a bit more and follow in a written response. Mr. Westmacott, did you want to touch on anything?
Mr. Westmacott: A lot was directed at you folks. I’m good with that. I think we’ll have to see where those cuts to the program are done. We can’t weigh in on that at this stage of the game.
The Chair: Thank you all. We have used our time very well today. Thank you all for being here and for agreeing to participate in this very important study. As you can tell from the questions, it’s a topic that we certainly have a lot of interest in. Your assistance with our study is greatly appreciated. Thank you for being here.
For our next panel, I would like to introduce our witnesses. They have been asked to make an opening statement of five minutes each. This will be followed by questions from the senators.
With us, by video conference, from the Center for Countering Digital Hate is Mr. Imran Ahmed, Chief Executive Officer and Founder, and with us at the table in person Sheryl Saperia, Chief Executive Officer, Secure Canada. I now invite Mr. Ahmed to make his presentation followed by Ms. Saperia.
Imran Ahmed, Chief Executive Officer and Founder, Center for Countering Digital Hate: Madam Chair and members of the Standing Senate Committee on Human Rights, thank you for the invitation to speak today. My name is Imran Ahmed. I’m the founder and chief executive of the Center for Countering Digital Hate, or CCDH, headquartered in Washington, DC, with offices in London and Brussels.
Combatting online anti-Semitism is a cross-party issue here in Canada, the U.S., the EU, and the U.K. As allies, our finest hour was defeating Nazism and its anti-Semitic ideology which led to the industrial slaughter of six million European Jews.
Today, those ancient lies have been breathed new life by modern technology which systematically advantages hate and lies through distortive, perverse platform design.
The Center for Countering Digital Hate studies how anti‑Semitism is produced, distributed and amplified by algorithms on social media platforms. These are not just random acts by users, but the direct result of choices made by major social media companies operating here in Canada and worldwide. Their effect is to drive many Jewish Canadians offline, feeling silenced and harassed.
A safe space for hate against Jews is a hostile environment for Jewish people. Following the October 7 Hamas attack, anti‑Semitic influencers exploited these design features to push hateful content and gain millions of new followers. This represents a systematic failure by companies to stop the shameful exploitation of tragedy for engagement and profit. What this shows once again is that social media platforms are irresponsible managers of our information ecosystem. They do not enforce their own rules to protect users or address systemic problems that affect the prevalence of anti-Semitism. We have also seen algorithms drive a dangerous cross-fertilization of anti-Semitic narratives with other conspiracy theories, making anti-Semitism the hybridizing connective tissue of many modern hate movements.
The result has been the normalization of hate against Jews. We are especially concerned by polling we commissioned showing that 14–17-year-olds are the age cohort most likely to believe anti-Semitic conspiracy theories in the U.S. and U.K.
Social media platforms are an incredibly potent vector for anti-Semitism, spreading the lies that sustain it. Our research shows that anti-Semitic influencers are free to recruit, proselytize, fundraise and operationalize hate online. Despite years of warnings, there has been insufficient action to stop it. We cannot forget that online hate has offline consequences. Social media companies’ failure to act is a recognized factor in hate-motivated attacks around the world, from Pittsburgh to Christchurch. Toxic communication is not simply an unavoidable occurrence in the digital town square; rather, it is a product of the social media business model that rewards it.
It is troubling that social media companies remain largely untouchable and completely unaccountable in Canada.
To conclude, CCDH supports and thanks you for your inquiry into the state of anti-Semitism in Canada, and we urge this committee and the Government of Canada to further investigate and act upon social media platforms’ role in amplifying and distributing this harmful content.
Thank you.
The Chair: Thank you very much for your presentation.
We’ll now go to Ms. Saperia.
Sheryl Saperia, Chief Executive Officer, Secure Canada: Thank you, esteemed senators, for inviting me to testify on the issue of anti-Semitism. It’s difficult to confine a subject of this scale and urgency to five minutes, so I will focus on how anti‑Semitism fits within Secure Canada’s mission to combat terrorism and extremism, and to strengthen Canada’s national security and democracy.
Since Hamas’s terrorist attack on October 7, 2023, Canadian officials have disrupted roughly a dozen terrorism-related plots. We are profoundly grateful for their vigilance; yet, I can’t help but recall the IRA’s chilling remark after failing to assassinate Margaret Thatcher: “Today we were unlucky, but remember we only have to be lucky once — you will have to be lucky always.” That is the insidious calculus of terrorism.
Terrorism is the end product; it’s what grows when the conditions are right. If terrorism is the poisonous fruit, extremism is the soil that nourishes it and that soil in Canada is becoming increasingly fertile. What is feeding that soil? A central component of nearly every extremist ideology we see today, whether on the far right, the far left or within Islamist movements, is anti-Semitism. Indeed, anti-Semitism has been found to be a key entry point for radicalizing, joining extremist groups and mobilizing to violence.
Someone who runs a major deradicalization program in Ontario has told me that all of his clients, from neo-Nazi- to ISIS-inspired and everything in between, walk into his office repeating anti-Semitic conspiracy theories. He also observed that distinct extremist ideologies are sometimes now blending together: Islamists quote Hitler or far-left activists embrace jihadist slogans. This fusion often has anti-Semitism at its core.
The Red-Green Alliance is worth mentioning: the growing cooperation between far-left and Islamist movements, united by hostility toward the West and hatred toward Jews and Israel, despite the glaring contradiction for the far left to be affiliating with misogynistic, homophobic and theocratic Islamist ideologies.
Anti-Semitism defines Jews and Israel as the ultimate source of evil, however one defines “evil.” For those on the far right, it could mean that Jews are blamed for promoting the immigration of non-White populations they claim threaten White dominance. This is not just a problem for Jews; it is a danger to all Canadians, as this ideology seeks to replace democracy with racial tyranny.
For those on the far left, Israel, the only Jewish state, is cast as the world’s greatest oppressor, a stand-in for Western civilization, liberal democracy and capitalism. This is not just a problem for Jews but is a danger to all Canadians, as this ideology seeks to tear down every liberal-democratic institution, erase merit and divide citizens into perpetual categories of victim and oppressor.
For Islamists, Jews are blamed for everything the West has done that they perceive as hostile to Islam. This is not just a problem for Jews but a danger to all Canadians, because this ideology divides humanity into believers and infidels, and demands that all of society submit to their extremist interpretation of religion.
The late U.S. Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan observed that when deviant behaviour becomes too widespread, society begins to recast it as normal or at least tolerable. Anti-Semitic and extremist rhetoric have grown so commonplace in Canada that they no longer provoke outrage. We must actively resist this instinct to normalize anti-Semitism.
Part of the paralysis we are seeing in Canada stems from fear of criticizing extremism when it is cloaked in culture, identity or religion. Yet diversity cannot mean moral neutrality. Malek Bennabi, the Algerian philosopher, wrote that ideas and ideology decide the destiny — the life or death — of a nation. He argued that the development and prosperity of a people depend upon the vitality of their moral and intellectual foundations.
So what are the Canadian convictions that bind us together? If our only values are diversity and tolerance, we will find ourselves forced to tolerate intolerance. Without better civic literacy for all Canadian students and all newcomers to Canada, Canadians will become increasingly vulnerable to grievance politics, imported hatred, authoritarian ideas and foreign propaganda.
The liberal-democratic bargain at the heart of Western civilization holds that everyone is free to live by their faith and culture, provided they uphold the democratic order that protects everyone’s rights. Today, many Canadians sense that this bargain is fraying — that peace, order and good government are being replaced by disorder, confusion and fear. anti-Semitism is both a driver and a symptom of this decline.
We are living in a post-truth era in a battle of narratives. Secure Canada’s research shows that anti-Semitic, anti-Western and anti-democratic narratives now move together. Confronting anti-Semitism is, therefore, not an act of special pleading; it is a fight for the physical, moral and civic health of Canada itself.
Thank you.
The Chair: Thank you both for your presentations. We will now proceed to questions from senators. Colleagues, you will have five minutes each for your questions and the answers, both.
Senator Bernard: Thank you both for being here and for your testimony today. I will start with Mr. Ahmed.
You talked about social media companies being untouchable, there being a lack of action and them feeding into the normalization of anti-Semitism — the “everydayness” of it, if you will. What do you think should be done; what are the recommendations that you would put forward to this committee? Are there examples from other jurisdictions or countries that are addressing the online hate through the social media companies?
Mr. Ahmed: Thank you for your question.
Our central contention at CCDH is that hate and lies about Jews are actually profitable for social media companies. They create controversies that actually increase engagement, make people stay on platforms. People respond and are looking to see how many people back them. It creates firestorms around individual incidents, yes, but around Jewish people more generally.
If you allow something to be profitable, not just for the distributors — the social media platforms — but also for producers — we’ve done studies showing that people who were spreading anti-Semitic hate after October 7 saw a quadrupling in their gain of new followers, so the algorithm rewards the producer, as well.
Of course, on most social media platforms these days, people who produce content get to share in share in some of the ad revenue through the way that monetization works. So if it’s profitable for the producers and distributors, you have to create costs when they are causing harm to individuals, their psychology, our kids and our communities. That means either having regulatory costs or allowing causes of action and litigation.
Other jurisdictions have introduced legislation. For example, the U.K., has introduced the Online Safety Act and the EU has the Digital Services Act. Both create mechanisms for independent regulators to assess whether platforms are enforcing their terms and conditions, and community standards. Where they are not and it is causing real-world harm, it is able to ask them to take measures to fix those problems and, if they don’t, they are ultimately able to fine them.
It is the threat to the bottom line that really does get them moving, even when negative reputational pressures don’t. In the end, economic pressures always bear fruit.
Senator Bernard: Is there a specific recommendation that you would give to this committee in the context of our study?
Mr. Ahmed: At the moment, Canada’s privacy law is 30 years old, and it does not have any legislation to create either transparency or accountability for social media companies.
One problem that we have is that it’s very difficult to study social media companies.
When we did a study on the increase, for example, on anti‑Semitism and other forms of hatred, including hatred against African-Americans, LGBTQ+ people and women on the platform X after Elon Musk took it over. We showed that hate had exploded. That research was very widely cited. As a result, X sued us saying that we had broken the terms and conditions of their platform, because their platform essentially allows you to view their platform to consume content, but not to study it, which is a bizarre thing to claim.
We ultimately prevailed in that lawsuit.
But you need to have statutory data access pathways, so ways for researchers and others to get access to data from the platforms. Second, transparency is great, but transparency is like documenting the end of the world. Your job as politicians and my job as an advocate and practitioner is to try and stop bad things from happening. You have to have realistic mechanisms.
In the end — I can tell you after nine years of doing this work — reputational pressures are not enough. Even investigations from the Senate and from other bodies aren’t enough. You need to have something to impact their bottom line because these are amoral companies that will respond to economic pressure.
Senator Arnot: In this round, my questions are for Ms. Saperia.
From your 2024 brief in the other place, which Criminal Code or regulatory changes would most quickly deter anti-Semitic threats?
Ms. Saperia: Thank you for the question. We have put together a series of policy and legal recommendations. I always say we’re in the business of offering responses not solutions. We’re not going to solve anti-Semitism or terrorism or extremism, but if we can be smart and strategic about the types of laws that can be put in place, we can make it harder for bad guys to operate and easier for the good guys to live their lives in peace.
In terms of the legal recommendations that we can make, one is to apply terrorism laws where warranted for anti-Semitic violent crimes. Often times this is treated as a hate crime, but it may meet the criteria for a terrorist crime. So we would like law enforcement to be thinking more about this.
The second thing is for a terror listing to be a faster and more robust process. It took a very long time for Samidoun to be listed. It took them burning Canadian flags in public before it just created enough of the political cover, but it should have been a faster process.
There is a loophole we have identified with respect to non‑profits because Samidoun is a non-profit organization. Right now in Canada, if you become listed as a terrorist entity, your charitable status automatically gets revoked. That’s really good, but your non-profit status does not. And Samidoun currently has a non-profit status in Canada as a listed terrorist organization. That is a gap that must be corrected.
This is too big of a topic, but immigration is a big piece of the puzzle. There are so many pieces of it that are defective right now. Maybe I’ll just park it as a topic in and of itself.
And I would also say we need to be thinking again about what pluralism means. Because we know DEI is a very popular concept. We know it came from very noble intentions, but unfortunately, it’s been co-opted into something else. What we would like to see is for publicly funded DEI initiatives to be audited for exclusionary or anti-Semitic content to ensure they align with Canada’s constitutional values and human rights obligations.
I would also add that one of our organizations’ strengths is coming up with legislative solutions. However, one piece of the puzzle is actually more consistent enforcement of the law. I have colleagues who say, “The laws are good but are not being properly enforced.”
When you talk to police on the ground, what they’re saying is something different, that they don’t have the political cover to enforce the law as they want.
Is this a question of pointing fingers and everyone has a different take? Maybe, but it starts at the top and filters down from there.
I want to mention two more things; one, a colleague — and he’s actually in the room with me, Ches Parsons — is a retired RCMP Assistant Commissioner, 36 years in the RCMP. We went back and forth actually creating a legislative proposal that would criminalize membership in a terrorist group.
You might be surprised to learn that it is not a crime to be a member of a terrorist group. It is a crime to give money to a terrorist group and a crime to commit a terrorist attack. If I wanted to join Hamas tomorrow, I would be allowed. If I wanted to recruit you to become a member, that is also not illegal. We want to see that corrected.
Finally, I think there is room to explore rules around the investment by foreign states and foreign actors who we know are hostile in some way, even if not at war, in terms of how they can be investing in our non-profit sector.
Senator Arnot: In 30 seconds, here are two more questions that you cannot answer now but can put in writing. Do you support multiyear Canada Community Security Program agreements for Jewish institutions instead of one-off grants? Please explain why.
Also, what 12- and 24-month indicators would tell you the federal government’s approach is actually reducing anti-Semitic victimization not just increasing reporting? Thank you.
The Chair: Perhaps second round.
Senator Coyle: My question is for Mr. Ahmed. You started telling us a little bit about X. I know that you’ve recently released a report called A Home for Hate: How Antisemitism Thrives on X.
The report indicated that the report’s conclusions were very simple; that X is amplifying anti-Semitism at a massive scale despite Elon Musk’s promises to limit the hate speech visibility.
And you have talked about that being profitable. This makes money for both the distributor as well as the person who’s promoting the hate.
Can you tell us a little bit more about the findings of that research? Then maybe go into a little more detail about what your recommendations would be, based on the research, to stop the spread of anti-Semitism online. What role should our government play in stopping that?
Mr. Ahmed: Yes. A Home for Hate came out recently as a joint report with the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, or JCPA, in the United States. We studied 670,000 posts on X which violated its policies on anti-Semitism finding they had 193 million views despite X’s promises to limit visibility. When Elon Musk took over X he said, “I’m all for freedom of speech but I want to limit freedom of reach for hateful content.”
In fact, he said, “if you had hate with no consequences, it would crate a hellscape.” The reality is that our research shows that is precisely what he has created for Jewish people for the platform X. Anti-Semitic conspiracies perform particularly well on X constituting 59% of the posts in our sample of 679,000, but 73% of likes. The way that all social media platforms work, if you get high engagement, you get high amplification.
Whether or not you are seen by lots of people on social media, it has nothing to do with your credibility or the worth that should be placed on your comments. It is really down to how much engagement you get. In part, that is also based on how many people are angry with you. So because it offends Jewish people and all those who are allies of Jewish people, like myself, people respond to it or send it to someone else. They are very angry. Perversely, that actually amplifies it further on engagement‑based platforms that care only about one thing, which is keeping you on the platform.
He has also claimed that Community Notes ensure that if someone tries to push a falsehood like Holocaust denial, they can immediately be corrected. But we found that only 4 in 300 posts promoting anti-Semitic conspiracies had a publicly visible Community Note, including just 2 in 100 Holocaust denial posts.
The other thing we found was that X has been enabling the rise of anti-Semitism influences not present on other platforms. Just 10 of these anti-Semitism influences accounted for 32% of the likes on the posts in our study — 10 people, one third of all likes. They enjoy unique benefits on X. Nine in 10 of them had more followers on X than any other platform. Five in 10 have ads placed next to their content, which is a reminder that this is an economic issue. Six in 10 had a verified blue check mark, which gives them enhanced visibility on the platform, and 3 in 10 of these anti-Semites offered paid subscriptions to their content on X, so you could pay them to get more anti-Semitism. That’s what we found in that survey.
In terms of my recommendations for Canada, I am aware of the debate over Bill C-63 in the last parliament. I was actually in Montreal last week speaking at a conference organized by McGill, and I was speaking with folks from your government, both elected representatives and civil servants, and it is clear that there is an appetite for some mechanism for both transparency and accountability of social media companies.
I cannot pretend to understand the politics of Canada myself, but I urge you to make sure that you don’t slip behind every other jurisdiction in the world. Let me make a point. Not to be too cute about it, but in the past year, President Donald Trump has passed a piece of legislation, the TAKE IT DOWN Act, that criminalizes non-consensual intimate imagery. Canada hasn’t even done that yet, so you’re behind the U.S. when it comes to accountability and transparency for social media companies.
Senator K. Wells: My question is to Mr. Ahmed. Picking up on what you’ve just mentioned, globally, where would you currently rank Canada in terms of its programs, laws and education to combat online hate?
Mr. Ahmed: I can’t speak to your programs to educate people about it and to create resilience in communities, but what I can tell you is that in your mechanisms for transparency and accountability — we don’t study privacy necessarily, but I am aware of the situation in Canada. You are very far behind the curve. The truth is, what you have is a lot of countries that have done very little and a few countries that are moving ahead with confidence, with swashbuckling legislatures that are trying to legislate and regulate in a new space, and digital spaces are new.
No one has to apologize for having taken time to work out exactly what’s happening and then having put into place an initial framework upon which we have to iterate. But now that there is a growing evidence base of what works and what doesn’t from other countries, we would expect countries like Canada to be the very early second movers. Right now, it doesn’t look like there are any plans to be a fast second mover. I think that needs to change.
Senator K. Wells: What countries would be, as you say, the swashbucklers, the leaders in this space right now?
Mr. Ahmed: The European Union, the United Kingdom, Australia, which has had an eSafety Commissioner in place for some years, Julie Inman Grant, and she’s shown real progress. There are countries in the developing world, and there are even countries like Brazil that have legislation on the books. There are individual states in the United States that have gone further than the U.S. federal government and further than Canada, of course, which has nothing on the books.
Senator K. Wells: In terms of accountability, you mentioned fines being important. Do you know of other jurisdictions or countries that, in addition to fines, have looked at actually criminal sanctions for shareholders, particularly when we’re talking about propagating online hate?
Mr. Ahmed: The fines are a backstop. If people don’t comply with the law in the most egregious way possible, theoretically, they can be fined, for example, in the EU’s Digital Services Act, up to 6% of global revenues — not earnings, revenues. That is an enormous amount of money.
In the U.K., in the Online Safety Act, it does actually provide for criminal sanctions for executives who fail to ensure that their platforms abide by the law, and that would make sense. Think about health and safety anywhere else. We do so much work not just on anti-Semitism but on children’s mental health. I’m a parent myself. When I think about the fact that there are platforms amplifying eating disorders and self-harm content to kids every day, if platforms don’t take action to deal with it, I think any parent would say to you that if a platform is harming kids or it’s harming Jewish people and they fail to take action repeatedly after they are told repeatedly, at that point, you need to be able to take quite significant action against them, and criminal sanctions are one option.
Senator K. Wells: Thank you. Ms. Saperia, you mentioned that you had created some briefs previously. I’m just wondering if you could send those to our clerk for our information.
If you’ve had the opportunity to look at Bill C-9 that has been introduced, if your organization has a brief on that, we would welcome that as well. Or right now, in the short time we have, could you share your opinion as to whether you think that current legislation would be effective in providing tools?
Ms. Saperia: I’m happy to speak to it very briefly.
We support Bill C-9 in principle, but we believe that some significant amendments are needed in order to make sure that it accomplishes what you want it to accomplish without creating undue harm.
I would say one of the most important amendments that we would like to see is that Attorney General consent for private prosecutions should be retained, whereas lifting Attorney General consent for public prosecutions would be appropriate.
In addition, we think that the definition of hatred needs to be absolutely consistent with the Keegstra decision rather than kind of like a morphing of that definition. I would be happy to share with you a written brief on this, but I would say those are the very significant ones.
In our remaining seconds, what was very interesting to me was hearing from some leaders of the Hindu community who were sharing that the swastika is a sacred symbol for them, and it’s being conflated with the Nazi Hakenkreuz. So to the extent that the bill can take that into account, even with proper terminology, that would really make a difference.
Senator Housakos: Thank you, Ms. Saperia, for being here before us.
When it comes to faith hate and anti-Semitism, it’s not something that will be defeated with words alone. You mentioned it earlier in your presentation, and I do agree with you, that there needs to be political will in order to tackle this problem. I have said this before and I’ll say it again: I don’t have confidence in the current federal government that there’s political will to take this on when we have a Liberal member of this government who publicly went out just a couple of days ago and said that members of the Israeli Defense Forces who try to enter Canada should be arrested by Canada Border Services Agency. Or when we have Samidoun, the opposition, that has been screaming for years — for that matter, a proponent of hate of our values in this country — finally gets listed as a terrorist organization yet still holds a not-for-profit status in this country, it’s shameful. The government cannot tell me they are serious about fighting anti-Semitism when they don’t take action in order to mitigate this problem.
Of course, last but not least, we have a government that has been excellent at playing diaspora politics, and that’s where I’d like to have your comment. They have been masterful at dividing Hindus and Sikhs, Muslims and Jews, Armenians and Azerbaijanians based on foreign policy. In terms of diaspora politics and the lack of political leadership, what role has that played in order to encourage the growth of anti-Semitism in Canada?
Ms. Saperia: I think that every sector of society has a role to play. My organization is a non-profit organization, part of civil society. I think civil society is there to help stimulate the legislative and the policy-making process. We have an important role.
The government has an even more important role, and they are there to steer the ship. If we were to create a hypothetical where we identified a different identifiable group that would be receiving the level of hate and violence that has been directed to the Jewish community, but replace the Jews with another group, it’s hard to imagine that more wouldn’t be done.
I don’t think that there is necessarily bad faith or bad intentions, but truly the West and Liberal democracy are really struggling with how to deal with the limits of free speech and the true glorification of terrorism and terrorist groups.
Senator Housakos: I want to go back to the question of diaspora politics. It’s something that has been practised by all political parties in this country now for decades, and when I say diaspora politics, it goes back to the whole principle of multiculturalism, but I’ve never seen it to the degree where in the last 10 years it drives our foreign policy, it drives the way mayors and municipalities dictate how police forces operate in our streets.
In my own city of Montreal, where I have a large Jewish community, I have friends on the police force saying to me, “Senator, we can’t do certain things because the political masters at city hall want us to keep the peace rather than to apply the Criminal Code,” for example.
Again, that is being done for nothing more than vote banking and political expediency. The question I have for both our guests is: Have you seen diaspora politics play a role today in decisions that are being taken, both at the federal, municipal and provincial levels of government?
Ms. Saperia: I do think that our society today is, unfortunately, structured around the elevation of some identities at the expense of others. I don’t think that is just the government’s fault; you see that in many institutions today. We have strayed from the intention, which was to create a pluralistic, diverse society. It’s now fighting over different diaspora groups, different identifiable groups.
Even in terms of coming to Canada, people come now and instead of sufficient civic literacy to be taught, “This is what it means to come to Canada. This is what Canadian values are,” instead you’re kind of taught to declare which group you belong to, which minority group you are, and then to assert and reaffirm that element of your identity, which is fine, but not at the expense of those broader Canadian values that we need to be sharing.
The Chair: Mr. Ahmed, would you like to respond?
Mr. Ahmed: No.
The Chair: Okay, great.
Senator Arnot: Mr. Ahmed, you’ve talked about financial impacts for big social media platforms. Do you have developed a menu of those impacts and a regime to enforce those impacts that you’re talking about?
Mr. Ahmed: We would be happy to send you over an analysis of what other countries have done and how they have ensured that there are fines as a backstop.
Let me be absolutely straight. Fines should not be your first option. Your first option should be working with the platforms to put into place mitigation measures. Senator, they all claim that they do. Even X claims that it doesn’t want to create a hellscape of hate without consequences, that they want to limit freedom of reach for hateful content, which is their fundamental right to do so as a publisher. They get to decide who gets the most visibility, who doesn’t.
But as it happens, the way the systems work on their platforms is that actually they elevate hate and the lies that underpin hate. When it comes to anti-Semitism, we know that lies are inextricably interlinked to hate, whether it’s the blood libel 2,000 years ago, the protocols of the elders of Zion that underpinned Hitler’s ideology, or the great replacement theory in the 21st century that led to the massacre at the Tree of Life synagogue in Pittsburgh.
We know those lies play a significant role in the transmission and the pre-zealotization of hate.
So reducing the virality of those things is something that platforms can do if they wish, and what we’ve seen other countries do is work with platforms to actually assess whether or not they’ve got guardrails in place. No one wants to have a content-based regime where you can find someone for hosting content. You want to ensure they have systemic processes in place to reduce the prevalence and virality of hate, and also to ensure it’s not profitable.
Where they fail to do that, where they fail to take adequate, reasonable measures to enforce their own community standards and their rules, and where that leads to real-world human harm, countries have said we are able to take punitive economic action against you, sanctions against you.
That’s how a regime would work, but we would be very happy to send you through a fuller version of our STAR Framework, which is our framework for legislation and regulation of social media companies and AI companies, and also a comparative analysis of how other countries have done it.
Senator Arnot: We would be very happy to receive that analysis. Thank you very much.
Mr. Ahmed: Yes, sir.
Senator Coyle: Ms. Saperia, I want to test if I heard certain things, and I heard mentions and then I didn’t hear any details.
Your point about our society today elevating certain groups over others — I believe you just made that statement — is a problematic thing and contributes to anti-Semitism, for example.
You mentioned auditing. I believe you said auditing DEI efforts, and I’m assuming you mean auditing them to see that they are not or should not be elevating certain groups over others. I would like to hear a little bit more about that.
My next question, because I didn’t catch it, you mentioned something about immigration being a factor, and I didn’t hear a factor in what way. Could you deal with those two things?
Ms. Saperia: Sure. With respect to the auditing, I was suggesting that publicly funded DEI initiatives should be audited for exclusion and discrimination.
When you do elevate a specific identity at the expense of others where you see some as privileged, some as oppressors, some as victims, it oftentimes is a zero-sum game where someone wins but someone loses.
Anti-Semitism has become rationalized and even mainstreamed within these spaces because there is an ideological framework that is not treating all minorities equally and cannot process complexity or dual identity.
Being Jewish and being a member of a historically persecuted group and yet Jews are also associated with being wealthy or powerful or White or pick your term.
We need to shift that whole ideological framework, and that’s really hard to do. I’m not suggesting that there is an easy answer because it is so deeply built into so many of our institutions right now, including our academic institutions.
Even to start with where it’s publicly funded, then the government could at least have a right to explore those.
With respect to your question on immigration, there are very specific areas within the immigration system that we are looking into based on our conversations with front-line workers who are struggling right now with our immigration system.
I would prefer to give you that in written form. However, in terms of how it applies to the diaspora politics that was being asked in a previous question, not enough that is being done today to educate new immigrants about Canadian values and setting expectations for what Canadian values are. Nor is there enough screening being done before people can come. This is not a question of where you’re from, your religion or your skin colour. None of that matters. It’s about the shared values. Either you’re making an effort to not bring in people who are coming from places where that type of hate is being promulgated in the education curriculums from the youngest age, or if you are going to bring them in, then you need to do a much better job of teaching them a replacement of that and empowering them as part of a bigger Canadian project and not to simply identify based upon their minority group, whichever they might belong to but something bigger — a bigger Canadian project.
The Chair: Thank you both for your presentations today. I would like to just acknowledge the importance of what you’re contributing to our study. Your assistance with our study is greatly appreciated.
Honourable senators and guests, the public portion of our meeting is now over. We shall suspend this meeting for a few minutes and then resume in camera to discuss a draft report.
(The committee continued in camera.)