BURST
The issue of shots being fired at three Toronto-area synagogues in less than a week is no longer just a Jewish one. It’s fast becoming a Canadian issue and the impetus to do something about it has never been more immediately vital.
That was the united message from a group of Jewish community and political leaders during a press conference outside Shaarei Shomayim in North York, one of the two synagogues, along with Beth Avraham Yoseph of Toronto (BAYT), that were peppered with bullets early Saturday morning . A third, North York’s Temple Emanu-El , was shot at on Monday night.
“Canada is at a crossroads,” said Noah Shack, CEO of the Centre of Israel and Jewish Affairs. “We have a clear choice to make about whether we are going to be a city, a province, and a country that buries our heads in the sand and tolerates this kind of intimidation, this kind of terror in our communities, or whether we will be united to stand against it and push back.”
Three shootings at GTA synagogues in one week! This isn’t just about the safety of one community—it’s about the future of our cities, our provinces, and our country.
— CIJA (@CIJAinfo) March 8, 2026
It's time for all Canadians to push back.
Go to https://t.co/hSTWgbDYsC to take action right now, and stay tuned… pic.twitter.com/Rp3Of4vmRH
Toronto Police Services and York Regional Police say their respective firearms and gang investigation teams have increased collaboration and that both forces’ hate crime and intelligence units are also assisting.
There were no injuries in any of the shootings, but police say they nonetheless represent a serious escalation in violence targeting Jewish institutions.
YRP Deputy Chief Kevin McClosky told reporters Sunday that while there is no definitive evidence linking the Friday night shootings, they “can’t ignore the fact that they happened so close together to each and that both targets were in fact synagogues.”
“So obviously we are looking at that connection and hope to be able to determine whether they are or are not related as soon as possible,” he said.
Community leaders warned that the attacks come amid a broader pattern of rising hostility toward Jews in Canada since the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terrorist attack on Israel and the ensuing war in Gaza.
Sarah Lefton of UJA Federation of Greater Toronto said that while the shootings are “beyond anything that we could have imagined… the trajectory over the last couple of years is exactly what we should have known was coming.”
“And so, much like in other parts of the world, like we saw in Bondi Beach and elsewhere, hateful words turn into hateful protests and hateful rallies, and they turn into hateful actions.
And that’s what we’re seeing here.”
Lefton and Shack spearheaded the reiterated calls for all levels of government and security agencies to coordinate rapidly on funding and protections for vulnerable institutions, arguing delays can translate directly to danger.
Public Safety Minister Gary Anandasangaree acknowledged Ottawa was committed to doing its part, which includes “changing the requirements for the infrastructure funds that are critically important to support Jewish and other community infrastructures.”
Shack later said that building physical protections such as bulletproof glass, cameras, and walls is the “bare minimum threshold” for the safety requirements that need to be met.
“There is a need for focused initiatives to push back against the kind of hate and intimidation, harassment and violence that we’re experiencing that go beyond just physical security,” he explained.
“We need to deal with the promotion of hatred, the promotion of terrorism that we’re seeing all too often go without convictions and without accountability for the perpetrators.”
Lefton later pointed to the Al-Quds Day anti-Zionism protests in the city scheduled for next Saturday as a “real-time example” of something that they need the government’s help in shutting down in Toronto and across Canada.
“It’s not just hate,” she said, “this is promotion of terrorism in our streets.”
Among the initiatives Shack would like to see explored is “empowering the community to coordinate its security posture so that we can have expertise focused on a community level to look after our security needs.”
Teachers, daycare workers or community centre operators should be able to focus on their work instead of worrying about trying “to become a security expert.”
York Member of Provincial Parliament Mike Kerzer and Toronto Deputy Mayor Mike Colle, who are both Jewish, vehemently condemned the shootings and passionately echoed Shack and Legton’s calls for meaningful action.
Kerzer, whose grandparents were among Shomayim’s modern-day founders, said the Doug Ford government is ready to collaborate with federal and municipal peers. When the legislature returns, he said the PCs will put forward legislation restricting protests from disrupting “key infrastructure,” which would include synagogues and other places of worship.
“And we will move forward and faster with deliverables to make sure that the message across our great province and our country is one of unity, that an attack on the Jewish community is not just an attack on the Jewish community, it is an attack on Canada.”
Colle, who is a congregant of Shomayim, said Toronto police, as dedicated as they have been, “cannot do this alone.”
They need the assistance of the Ontario Provincial Police, the RCMP and the Canadian Security Intelligence Service “to combat internationally funded, directed terrorism” against not just the Jewish community, but Toronto and Canada as a whole, he said.
“So enough with the speeches,” he said emphatically. “Let’s get some resources in here yesterday to tell the terrorist-inspired agitators this is not going to continue.”
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