It hasn’t been this bad in many, many years.
Antisemitism, Jew hatred, that is. By any objective standard, in places like Canada, it is worse than it has been since World War II.
Statista, a global data and business intelligence platform, aggregates data and statistics from thousands of sources, and it annually produces more than a million statistical analyses on 80,000 different topics.
For 2025, Statista reported, the worst country in the world for violent antisemitic attacks was Canada. Canada had 6,800 such attacks last year, far more than Germany (5,729), the United Kingdom (3,700) or Australia (1,750). The United States was far down Statista’s list, with 398 violent crimes committed against Jews.
A crisis
I’ve been writing about antisemitism and racism for 40 years. I’ve published half a dozen books on the subject, and written thousands of columns about the problem. And I’ve never before seen things as bad as they are now – in Canada, and across Western democracy.
There have been firebombings, shootings, arsons, assaults and murders – in places like Washington, D.C., Boulder Colorado and Bondi Beach in Australia. And Canada, as noted, is considered to have one of the worst problems with antisemitic hate crimes in the world.
What has become apparent about this wave of hate-based crime is this: it is largely the product of a well-funded, well-organized global propaganda campaign against Jews, the Jewish state and Western democracy. In effect, it is the direct consequence of an information war, with the target audience mainly being young people in the West.
The bad guys are losing the kinetic fight
On the kinetic warfare front, of course, the bad guys are mostly losing. Israel has become a regional military superpower, and has ultimately prevailed over its enemies in the Gaza strip and Southern Lebanon. But on the cognitive warfare front, Israel – and its putative allies in the West – are losing. Badly.
For my book The Hidden Hand: The Information War and the Rise of Antisemitic Propaganda, I travelled widely and interviewed dozens of experts about this ongoing propaganda war. All agreed: Israel, and the West, are losing.
Proof of that is seen in public opinion polling. A sampling of opinion, going back to the days that immediately followed the atrocities of October 7, 2023:
- Nearly half of American Gen Z — those from ages 18 to 24 — support Hamas over Israel. Almost 40% of Millennials — ages 25 to 34 — support the terror group over Israel.
- Forty per cent of Gen Z think Hamas should reject any peace plan. And almost 30% want Israel “ended,” and power simply handed over to Hamas/Palestinians.
- Forty-one per cent of Canadian Gen Z side with Hamas, and the killing of innocent Jews. One-third of Gen Z and Millennials supported targeting Canadian Jews with violence.
- In Europe, it has been same thing: the younger a respondent was, the more likely he or she supported antisemitism, conspiracy theories and terror.
While Israel has been largely successful in the military expression of its conflict with Hamas and its cabal, it has been an abject failure on the information war front. So, too, governments in Western democracy. In Canada, the U.S., U.K. and Europe, governments have edged away from Israel, largely because Hamas – aided and abetted by Iran, Russia, China and an alphabet soup of antiseptic NGOs, non-profits and charities in the West – has been so successful in capturing youthful public opinion with its propaganda efforts.
How does this happen?
How? Mainly because Hamas et al. have successfully propagate the false notion that Israel is a fascistic, colonialist, white supremacist apartheid state, in the way that South Africa once was. These young people now believe they are being “anti-racist,” not antisemitic.
A characteristic of modern warfare is not just drone technology. In the new era, social media – along with hashtags, bots, AI and the like – have helped the hatemongers to amplify their message, and reach millions of young people.
Any student of military history knows that wars are not won with bullets and bombs alone. Capturing hearts and minds, as well, it is critical to any mission.
That is what Hamas and its axis have done. On our computer and TV screens, and in our streets, that is the unavoidable reality: they are winning the propaganda war, and we are losing.
We need to fight back before it is too late.