Passover has always been a holiday of contradictions a celebration of freedom that demands its participants remember the weight of chains. This year, for Jewish Canadians, that contradiction feels sharper than ever.
As families across the country prepare to gather around seder tables this week, community leaders say the ancient holiday is arriving at a moment of profound unease. The spring festival, which commemorates the liberation of Israelites from Egyptian slavery, begins Wednesday evening but the mood in many Jewish households is anything but festive.
“We’re supposed to really put ourselves into the story,” said Rabbi Carey Brown of Temple Shalom synagogue in Vancouver. “So we’re both at the same time joyful and really, I would say, attuned to pain and suffering. And it’s been a couple of years of difficult seders.”
The tension has been building since Hamas’s October 7, 2023 attack on Israel, which killed roughly 1,200 people and triggered a devastating Israeli military offensive in Gaza. For Jewish Canadians, the global fallout has been felt close to home. Statistics Canada reported this week that in 2024, a staggering 70 percent of all police-reported hate crimes targeting religion were directed at Jewish Canadians a community that faced an average of 77 antisemitic incidents every single month of that year, 69 percent above pre-October 2023 levels.
Then came the latest jolt. Shortly after Israel and the United States launched military strikes against Iran last month, three synagogues in the Greater Toronto Area were hit by gunfire within a single week. No one was hurt, but the message landed hard. Jewish leaders warned publicly that Canada stood “at a crossroads” in its response to antisemitism.
Sara Lefton of the UJA Foundation of Greater Toronto said the violence has made the themes of Passover feel uncomfortably immediate. “We’re literally sitting at our seder tables talking about freedom while we’re very aware that Jewish communities around the world are just feeling less secure,” she said.
Security this Passover is visibly tighter. Synagogues and community spaces across the country have coordinated with local police and private firms, and the federal government pledged an additional $10 million last month to help Jewish institutions strengthen their defenses. Jevon Greenblatt of the Toronto-based Jewish Security Network described the current environment as one of “significantly heightened security risk,” with communities taking preventative steps that would have once seemed unimaginable.
The anxiety extends beyond physical safety. A survey by the Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver found that 62 percent of Jewish community members had experienced at least one antisemitic incident, while 93 percent said they feel less secure now than before October 2023. In Ontario’s schools, more than 780 antisemitism-related incidents have been reported by parents since that same date.
Yet despite the climate of fear, Jewish leaders across the country say their communities are not retreating. In Calgary, Rob Nagus of the Calgary Jewish Federation described the mood as “bittersweet” marked by real anxiety but matched by quiet determination. “We’ll continue to do the things that make us Jewish and live a robust Jewish life,” he said. “Part of that is celebrating Passover.”
Rabbi Brown echoed that resilience. While a few people in her congregation have expressed nervousness about attending communal seders, she said the overwhelming response from her community has been the opposite. “Far, far more people are really saying, ‘I need to be there.'”
For many families, this Passover is also about the generation sitting across the table the children absorbing a story of survival that suddenly feels less like ancient history.
“I actually think it’s a very healthy and comforting and relevant message for the Jewish community to be discussing at their seder tables this year,” said Lefton. “Going into this Passover, I think all of us share the hope that we can continue to thrive as a strong Jewish community in Canada, and we can live openly and safely and securely.”
A hope, this year, that carries the full weight of history behind it.
