Bevilacqua: ‘Antisemitism has no place’ in Vaughan, home to large Jewish community

Bevilacqua made the statement after chairing the Ontario Municipal Leaders Summit on Antisemitism

Yorkregion.com
Jan. 25, 2022
Dina Al-Shibeeb

“Antisemitism has no place in Vaughan,” said Mayor Maurizio Bevilacqua in a statement Friday, Jan. 21.

Bevilacqua made the statement after chairing the Ontario Municipal Leaders Summit on Antisemitism, which was hosted by the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA).

“We continue to stand up against all forms of hate, systemic racism and intolerance, yet we understand that our community is not immune from hate-motivated violence,” Bevilacqua said.

Last year, the Ontario Human Rights Commission sounded alarm over an increase in antisemitic acts.

In 2019, Statistics Canada found police-reported hate crimes against Jewish people accounted for the highest number of religion-based hate crime in Canada. The B’nai Brith Canada 2020 Audit of Anti-Semitic Incidents also showed over 44 per cent of antisemitic violence was COVID-related.

These incidents include Jewish people being spat on and assaulted with weapons.

York Region didn’t stay unscathed from these incidents.

Recently, a York Regional Police hate crime officer was investigating an antisemitic graffiti scrawled in a Markham park on Jan. 17. Before that, elections signs were vandalized with antisemitic slogans in August last year.

"We cannot sit idly by as discrimination continues to undermine our collective well-being -- we must tackle it head on,” Bevilacqua said.

“The city continues to condemn all forms of racism and remains committed to defending diversity, inclusion and human rights,” he added.

Bevilacqua also described that Vaughan is “home to one of the largest Jewish communities outside of Israel,” adding that the city has been “positively influenced by the social, cultural and economic contributions of the Jewish community.”

He added that “our city shares a strong and enduring relationship with the State of Israel.”

Some examples of Vaughan-Israel relations is when the City of Vaughan led a business mission to Israel alongside Vaughan Chamber of Commerce in 2019.

Last year, Bevilacqua participated in the federal government's National Summit on Antisemitism alongside political leaders, academics and activists.

Also, Vaughan Council in 2020 chose Jan. 27 as International Holocaust Remembrance Day in the city.