Ezra Levant attended Toronto’s August 1st town hall on anti-Semitic attacks, including the Pride of Israel synagogue’s vandalism during Pride Day, but criticized it as a "stitch-up"—cameras banned, protesters silenced—while politicians like Yaara Sachs and Olivia Chow faced security. Outside, he clashed with pro-Hamas migrants refusing to renounce violence, calling them "blatant terrorist supporters," and mocked Sachs’ poorly received speech, including her Hong Kong-"Heil Hitler" comparison. Rebel News’s anti-Gaza refugee truck drew crowds, but Levant warns Toronto’s Jewish community feels abandoned by authorities, forcing self-reliance amid escalating threats. [Automatically generated summary]
I am in Toronto at a huge town hall meeting with politicians trying to explain this anti-Semitic crime wave.
I'll tell you who was loved and who was hated and I'll tell you about how we deployed the rebel truck.
I really want you to see the truck.
It's gorgeous.
But to do that you have to become a subscriber to Rebel News Plus.
Go to rebelnewsplus.com, click subscribe.
It's eight bucks a month.
It lets you see our video content, but more than that, it helps pay our bills because we take no money from Trudeau and it shows.
All right, here's tonight's podcast.
Tonight, politicians gather to try and explain away their failure to stop the anti-Semitic crime wave in Canada.
It's August 1st, and this is the Ezra Levant show.
Shame on you, you censorious bug.
Ezra Levant here.
I'm standing in front of the Rebel News truck.
Long may she drive.
And right over there is a synagogue called Pride of Israel.
You might recall that a few weeks ago, the big plate glass windows in the front were smashed and the place was vandalized in a very serious way.
I came upon it and there was really nothing, no interest, very little interest.
Ironically, the synagogue is called Pride of Israel and it was smashed on the day of Pride Day, as they call it in Toronto.
Maybe if that had been a gay synagogue, police would have given a damn.
But I think vandalism and arson is now commonplace in the Jewish community in Toronto, which is so ironic because until just a blink of an eye ago, this really was one of the largest, most assimilated, most integrated, most successful, most peaceful Jewish communities in North America.
I mean, perhaps second only to New York and LA.
And now the Jewish community is terrified because literally every day there's another arson attack or another threat of some sort.
At this synagogue today, I understand that a number of politicians will be gathering to talk at the community.
I say talk at the community because you're not really going to listen.
You're going to see Mayor Olivia Chow show up.
Well, good for her.
It's a bit shocking she'd even attend.
She's very much pro-Gaza.
A liberal MP named Anthony Housefather will be here.
He claims to be a pro-Israel MP, and I believe him, but he puts his loyalty to Justin Trudeau first.
You'll also see, if rumors are true, Yaara Sachs, an odious MP who's a cabinet minister for Justin Trudeau.
She's bad enough in her official job as Trudeau's hard drug pusher.
She's the MP in charge of decriminalizing safe supply drugs across Canada.
But in an astonishing lack of judgment, she flew to the Middle East to meet with a terrorist kingpin named Mahmoud Abbas, embraced him, smiled with him, sort of gave him a kind of handshake hug.
It was really weird.
And she's just been an utter, utter disgrace.
I hope to see her and ask her if she regrets or apologizes doing that.
There's going to be some police here too, again, tighting the community.
It was incredible to me yesterday when a Jewish school was torched for police to say, no, no, there's no hate crime here.
It was just a homeless person.
Yeah, that's it.
Anyways, we'll see what happens today.
We'll see if we're allowed in.
It'll be interesting to see if we're given the bums rush, as sometimes happens to Rebel News.
We'll have our truck here.
It's on a public road, so I don't think we'll be evicted.
I hope that one of my colleagues, Avery, will have a chance to chat with ordinary people to see what they think about the themes of the truck.
This one is about stopping Gaza refugees.
Did you know that Trudeau is bringing thousands of Gaza refugees to Canada?
It's madness.
Not even fellow Arab countries are crazy enough to do that.
We also have a campaign called Deeport Hamas, where anyone in Canada who is not a Canadian citizen, if they're caught promoting Hamas at these hate marches, we think they should be sent home.
We have a couple others on there too, including one criticizing Toronto's awful, awful police chief.
Anyways, that's what we're up to.
We'll see if we have any luck as the night progresses.
I'm here supporting Israel, and there's a lot of anti-Semitic things that have been going on in the city, and I want to hear what the politicians have to say about it.
What do you expect to hear from the politicians?
I'm hoping to hear some type of solutions, but I actually doubt it.
I doubt there are solutions at this point.
I think that the anti-Semitism in this city has become intolerable as someone who's been born and raised here.
And I think on a political level, nothing has been done to help protect us and keep our community safe.
And so we have to come show support.
It really feels like we're the only ones looking out for ourselves.
And it's up to us to have our voice heard and to keep our community safe because no one else is willing to do it right now.
I love the truck.
We need a ton of those trucks.
Hi, ma'am.
What do you think about the truck?
I think it's amazing.
What do you think of the message of the truck, folks?
Good.
My opinion, precisely.
I'm now in the front doors of the synagogue.
You might remember this is exactly where I was standing when I was here the morning they smashed the plate glass windows.
As you can see, today it's a little bit different.
They've set up metal detectors and they have a ton of security.
And you can also see a certain kind of security that is our CMP special protection, a kind of security style.
I think that's RCMP.
I could be wrong.
We're having that security not to protect the Jewish community.
As soon as the politicians are gone, that security will be gone.
Those metal detectors and these security are for the politicians, not the people.
And I just spoke to the president of the synagogue, Steve Bloom, very friendly guy.
He sort of astonished me, though, by saying no cameras allowed, no recording whatsoever, and no questions allowed.
I said, are you saying that in this anti-Semitic crime wave that we will be sitting there and passively listening to the politicians instead of them listening to the people?
And he said, yes, absolutely.
Isn't that astonishing?
Isn't that incredible?
The people who have screwed everything up, the people who have either contributed to this crime wave or done nothing to stop it, they will stand and lecture the people of this community who will be told, shut up.
I think there's a lot of questions that need to be answered.
I'm not that interested in hearing for the 10th time from Olivia Chow her prefab speech, but that interested in hearing Anthony Housefather's latest excuse for Justin Trudeau.
I want to ask questions, not just for myself, but for the community.
And I want people who live around here to have the chance to ask questions too.
I think this is a stitch-up, as they'd say in the UK.
This is a fake town hall.
Town halls are for the people in the town to speak up, not for them to be told, shut up, they explained.
I'm not pleased with what I hear.
But the event hasn't started yet.
We'll see how it goes.
Now, I was just told by the president of the synagogue that there are no questions allowed.
I don't know if that's just a rule that applies to me, but he suggested it applies to everybody.
What do you think about that?
I think questions should be allowed, of course.
I think there's a lot of questions to ask.
Well, I think there should be questions.
There are questions.
Whether they list, whether they abide them or not, there are questions.
There are a lot of questions, and that's interesting.
I've been to a few of these, and they have allowed questions, so I wonder why they're not allowing questions.
Well, I mean, it doesn't seem like it just seems strange.
I mean, if I wanted to be a passive receiver of information, I'd just flick on YouTube.
Yeah, no, exactly.
Yeah, well, maybe they'll flip that around midstream.
I can understand because there are some political officials who are coming who are some of these events, you know, there are some reactions from the crowd, and I understand that wanting to show a level of respect for these politicians that are coming.
Questions could be asked respectfully.
They could even be written down on a piece of paper.
Yeah, I think we just as a whole, we want to show appreciation for these people showing up and coming to talk about what to do to make the community safer.
And if they think that it's just a more controlled way of doing it, I have no problem with it.
What question would you ask if you were allowed to?
What is happening with the increase in all these incidents that are going on?
Is there a plan?
What's happening?
Because it seems to be really getting out of control.
Yeah, four arsons in three days.
That's a lot.
Well, I think Canada has to take a look at France and England and see what's going on there because I think that's the track we're on.
And I totally agree with your comment that we really have to take a look.
Incidents On The Rise00:07:36
Are you guys the Jews for Palestine people?
Yes.
And Ger.
And how would that work with Hamas though?
They sort of want to exterminate the Jews, don't they?
He's our spokesperson.
No, I mean, but the...
No, sir, right here.
This guy.
Just...
But you don't have to touch them.
Yeah, I'm happy to talk to you.
So why won't you let her speak?
You seem like a bit of a bully.
Yeah, that's me.
I'm totally a bully.
Well, you're crowding, like you're one inch away from my face.
I'm helping you with media.
No, you're super gross.
You just interrupted.
You're mansplaining for her.
I was asking her questions, and you came in and mansplained.
What's your name?
It's none of your business.
I think if you're ashamed of what you're doing, so you won't even say your name, you're pretty gross.
You're gross.
You're mansplaining over a woman.
You won't even use your own name.
I won't use mine own name.
Let me ask you this: the Hamas Charter calls for the extermination of Jews everywhere.
How can you support Hamas?
I'm not answering your questions.
I think anyone who supports Hamas by definition hates Jews because Hamas.
You're the only one talking about the Charter of Hamas calls for the extermination of all Jews.
When was the last time you read the Charter of Hamas?
A week ago?
Have you ever read it?
Get it out.
I'll do that.
Absolutely.
Yeah, let's see the 2018 version.
So they've changed the word Zionist.
Are you saying that you support Hamas now?
Since 2018, are you saying that?
We are against.
We are against genocide.
Why can't you just say you're against Hamas?
Because we're not necessarily against Hamas.
You know what?
The first piece of truth I've heard from you today, sister.
There you have it.
So there's a very strange thing.
In New York City, I see this group of Orthodox Jews called the Naturai Kartai.
They're paid by Iran to show up and protest.
This is even weirder.
These are Jews who literally say they support Hamas.
It's creepy.
What do you think about these Jews for Hamas?
I think it's crazy.
It is crazy.
It's actually quite sad.
What do you think?
Do you think it's a psychological thing?
Do you think it's daddy issues?
Do you think it's like it's just so weird?
It really is when Nenyahu said chickens for KFC.
I like that.
Yeah, that's quite good.
I'm told there's no questions allowed today.
The president in the synagogue told me that.
That seems a little weird, doesn't it?
It sure does, especially when you're with a whole bunch of Jews.
We always ask questions.
That's exactly right, and especially when there's some bad politicians who need a bit of a spanking.
Well, I'm a bit disappointed in one of them.
Can I ask which one?
I expected more from House Father.
I really did after his elaborate speech in the House of Commons, and then nothing.
We have helped build this country, and 95% of Canadian Jews are Zionists.
Zionism means we believe that we have a right to have one Jewish state in our ancestral homeland.
Jews are indigenous to Israel.
I'm just going to see if these Jews for genocide are allowed in.
These are pro-Hamas Jews, if you can believe it.
They literally just told me that.
Pro-Kill killers.
They just literally told me that.
They're not carrying anything.
They should be allowed in.
That's for you.
But I think you're right.
I think they should be searched.
Well, as long as they're not carrying anything and they're not going to spray paint anybody, then they should be allowed to say what they have to say and we should be allowed to answer them.
Very exciting moment.
All these Jews for genocide trying to get in.
Will they be allowed in?
Get out of my way.
Clear my way.
Get out of my way.
Our safety is in her twine.
Do you say no to genocide?
Our safety is in intertwine.
Do you say no to genocide?
Our safety is in her twine.
Get out of here.
No, no.
Get out of here.
Jews say no genocide.
We aren't getting rules.
That's a good question.
Our safety is intertwined.
Our safety is in our twin.
Liars.
Well, these are the pro-Hamas Jews I was talking to in the line.
They were not allowed in, so they've linked arms in front of the synagogue.
To be honest, it's not an impenetrable barrier.
You can go around them each side.
What'll be interesting to me is if they're carted off.
Part of me thinks they won't be.
Hot rock up, please.
Hot rock.
I'm off.
I agree.
You've got to get out of the park.
Come on.
Stay there.
Stay there.
Are you being arrested?
We're done.
I'm not dragging the thoughts.
Up you go.
I Saw That You Guys Were Targeting Islamophobia00:15:08
They don't want you here.
They have the right to refuse your entry.
Really?
And you're private and operations.
What boss is?
We are literally here with.
We are here with members of this congregation.
Where's the copy of it?
You're putting a test.
Why is it that you can't go in if you're a Jew?
Anyone could go in?
Why do you have to be their property?
It's their property to the right to refuse entry.
I've told you you don't want it.
I'm going.
You don't have to miss one.
What's your basis?
Cops are choose.
What's with the South African flag?
Why do you have the South African flag?
Speak English?
No.
You don't speak English?
Do you know where you are?
You don't know where you are?
You're at a Jewish synagogue.
Really?
Yeah, so why do you have a South African flag?
Oh, you should know why I have a South African flag.
I don't know.
Please tell me.
Okay, well, then I don't know either.
Go find out.
Google.
Well, I think that you're like a lot of these other folks.
You really don't know what you do.
Everything.
You know everything.
I don't think you're very articulate.
No comment.
Or she's very articulate.
I don't see it.
We don't talk to Rebel, okay?
Bullshit.
We don't talk to you.
The rapes of all the Palestinian detainees.
How about you tell us about that?
How do you feel about that?
What's your name?
What's your name?
About Muslims.
Are you part of the Jews for genocide?
I asked you a question.
You're going to respond?
Would you storm this synagogue if you could?
How do you feel about Muslims?
Would you storm this synagogue if you could?
You got nothing to say, right?
You're just stupid questions you gotta ask.
I'm wondering what you're doing.
I'm wondering what you're doing.
I'm reporting on an anti-Semitic march.
Okay, so anti-Semitic, right?
You like to conflate Muslims with anti-Semitism?
No, just Hamas supporters like you.
Tell me how you feel, like me, right?
Are you a Hamas supporter?
Well, tell me right now: do you renounce Hamas or not?
I never will renounce Hamas.
So there you go.
You're an anti-Semitic bigot.
All right, perfect then.
Are you a Canadian citizen?
Doesn't matter, but I think you should be deported if you're not.
Right, deport me.
Well, I don't have that power myself.
Did I?
Go back to Daddy Warbucks for it.
Why do you care about Jews?
Well, I'm Jewish myself.
But what's your name and why are you here?
Ask Leviathan.
He knows my name, everything he wants.
Tribal news.
Why don't you ask?
Why don't you interview that old guy?
They won't let him talk.
They won't let him talk.
Why are they afraid to let that guy talk?
You seem pretty chatty.
What's your deal?
I'm one of this group.
And why?
I've known for decades what Israel is doing to the Palestinians.
Israel is a Jewish supremacy state, and as a Jewish supremacy state, no, it doesn't have a right to exist.
If it were a democratic state which included all the people under its control, yes, it would be fine.
But Arabs and Muslims and Christians all have the vote in Israel.
There's even Arabs on the Supreme Court, Arabs in the parliament.
Have you ever been there?
Yes, I have.
And you know what?
They can vote.
What they cannot vote for by law is a party that does not recognize Israel as a Jewish and democratic state.
That's not true.
There's extremely hostile parties in the Knesset right now.
They may be hostile, but they are forbidden by law to deny Israel's existence as a Jewish nation.
Oh, they break that law all the time.
I don't think I have anything more to say to you.
The two years you're about to face in prison when you get actually charged with your truck.
With what?
Super racist.
With a truck that you actually put up out there with the one that you own.
What do you think's wrong with the truck?
And that you're facing two years of imprisonment.
Well, I find out what's going to happen to me in the truck.
We'll find out.
We'll find out.
Do you like the truck?
What about the truck?
You like it?
Why would I like it when it's all about hate and it's a target in Islamophobia?
Like, what was on it that you didn't like?
Why would I have to give in to your?
I don't think you know.
I was there.
I saw it.
What did you see?
I saw that you guys were targeting Islamophobia.
Just tell me what you saw.
I don't think you actually saw it.
I was there.
You were where?
Yeah.
What about it?
Where?
You were where?
What do you even talk about?
What do you want to do with these questions?
I think you're just so stupid.
I want to say, well, I appreciate that.
Anyway, it was all fun and games.
And the Jews for genocide sat in front of the and made a barrier, and police cleared them away very quickly, and they were sort of harmless.
But things have changed in the last 15 minutes.
The hardcore pro-Hamas migrants, people who have come to Canada, you can hear in their accent, they're not Canadian, they're not pretending to be Jews.
These are Hamas supporters.
In fact, I asked one guy, will he renounce Hamas?
He said, never.
Take a look.
Are you a Hamas supporter?
Well, tell me right now, do you renounce Hamas or not?
I never will renounce Hamas.
And here's my point.
I was mocking earlier all the police cars that were here.
I was saying the police cars are here for the politicians.
They'll be gone tomorrow and the other 364 days a year when the Jews are unguarded.
But I now realize why.
There are people here.
There are pro-Hamas protesters here.
If the police were not here, and if they could, they would kill the Jews in this room.
I'm not talking about those lame Jews for genocide, just the daddy issues crew.
They're weird and in a way that's very Jewish to be that neurotic and you gotta, you're working, it's like Woody Allen, you're working out some issues.
I'm not talking about them.
I'm talking about the Hamas activists, the blatant terrorist supporters, many of them from foreign lands who have scoped out this place and if the cops weren't here, would be committing mayhem right now.
This is what solidarity looks like.
And that's why I am here.
To stand in solidarity with you, with the violent obligation, and to Toronto's Jewish community.
With the dangerous lives of anti-separatism in our city, people who want to get worried about being targeted are being Jewish.
I ask you to please join me in welcoming Yara Sachs to share with us.
To rise above it, put your sides down, or leave the room.
Yara Sachs, this is your action.
Are you proud to shake a Mahmoud Abbas hand?
Why did they take you out?
They didn't take me out.
I came out.
No, no, no, they have eyes.
We just saw you guys.
May I say you asked a question, may I ask?
MP Yara Sachs.
Where you learned the speech that you were recording.
The guy said that don't tell you a speech.
I came out and the police officer aggressively mistaken me with the other people.
Well, the weird thing about this town hall is it wasn't much of a town hall.
Town halls typically have a question and answer session.
Maybe you even grill a politician.
There were so many politicians, but you weren't allowed to ask them anything.
You weren't even allowed to heckle them.
Joining me now are two people who did not follow the advice and they were sternly ejected.
I'm talking about Daniel Boardman and Salman Seema.
Great to see you guys.
Thank you, Israel.
Now, why did you heckle?
I didn't heckle.
I was just sitting and recording.
Credit goes to Daniel for holding Yara Sachs accountable.
And as you know, with the fight that I had in Iran, I have some feeling.
I had some experience.
I saw that the security and the organizer are targeting Daniel, okay?
This past November while at the Washington DC rally with my colleague Andrew Lee House father.
Don't grab my phone.
Don't touch me.
You're out.
Don't touch me.
What do I do?
After decking me inside, let's go.
That's a problem.
Let's go.
I said that you go after my friends.
No, I'm going to record everything on the video.
They tried to silence Daniel and I take it on the camera.
Got it.
Thank you.
So Daniel, I think we share the same point of view about Yara Sachs.
I think we were both extremely skeptical of her.
What was it about her speech that set you off today?
Well, I mean, everyone would boo it before a speech.
I mean, just to say that any of these people are making speeches, a lot of them are just that they're looking down at a piece of paper and hate has no place here.
Sky is blue.
Killing Jews is bad.
Islamophobia also bad.
You know, breathe out carbon dioxide and oxygen.
That's what it was.
Well, it's almost 10.30 at night, and finally, the meeting has come to an end.
I tell you, politicians, they'll talk your ear off.
We've been here for about five hours.
It was very interesting.
First of all, the truck was a hero of the evening.
And as you can see at nighttime, I know it's a little bit, it flares a little bit on camera when you film something like this at night, but let me tell you, it is brilliantly bright at night.
And the truck really shows its power in the evening.
Lots of people reading the truck, taking pictures in front of the truck, hopefully signing the petitions on the truck.
I feel great about it.
The senior officer who was commanding the troops here today, he must have taken 20 photos of our fire the chief petition to fire the chief of police.
I'm not afraid.
In fact, I encouraged him to sign it.
I'm not giving you an interviewer statement, but I'm not asking for one.
I'm telling you, there's three other petitions on there.
You can sign in good projects.
No, I cannot.
You'd be surprised how many cops support rebel news.
But getting back to the town hall itself, I've been to 100 town halls in my life, and typically they have speeches but a QA session.
Town halls are for people in the town to hear the news but give feedback to give an audience attitude adjustment to politicians.
That did not happen tonight.
No one was allowed to ask a question.
If anyone even booed, they were shamed immediately.
And there were a couple times when heckles were presented and security kicked out people who were heckling.
And I don't know, it just felt like these politicians were so brittle that they couldn't stand any feedback.
I am interested in what politicians have to say, but I can hear what a politician has to say anytime by going to their YouTube channel or their Twitter feed or whatever.
But when was the last time politicians had to listen to the grassroots?
And to be criticized, I think that pretty much every single politician in that town hall tonight deserves criticism because obviously they have failed.
There's a regular crime wave across Canada, but there's also an anti-Semitic crime wave.
Like I said on the show that I recorded today, four arson attacks in three days.
Every single person in that room who holds public office has some responsibility for that.
But none of us were able to criticize, not even with the media.
It's bizarre how they said we couldn't record.
It was remarkable how much booing Yaara Sachs got.
It was just astonishing.
I want to show you a little bit of that.
Thank you to the Pride of Israel community and thank you to the Jewish community for having me and all of the additional skills speaking.
It's important that we're here together.
This is Anli and SpongeBob.
One, this was my grandmother's show.
Axel's needs to come here every morning and must have advice and to embrace one another so that we can move through this from the darkness towards the light.
When she continued her speech after that initial round of boos, I honestly thought she was going to cry.
And by the way, she is an awful, awful speechwriter, speech giver.
Then again, you already knew that.
She's the lady who stood up in parliament and said Hong Kong was code for Heil Hitler.
Remember that?
How much vitriol do we have to see of Hong Kong, which is an acronym for Hail Hitler?
Well, the evening comes to a close.
The police are dissipating.
There's still probably a dozen police or security here, but all the VIPs have gone home.
And so the synagogue, again, is undefended.
Yeah, there's some surveillance cameras, but do you doubt it'll be firebombed or windows broken and smashed again?
Of course it will be because we haven't dealt with the underlying issue.
And not just that, we have normalized anti-Semitic violence, low-level violence.
There's been no murders in Canada yet, thank God.
But this low-level vandalism, mischief, trespass, uttering threats, arson, it's happening literally every day.
And those are just the ones we know about.
I think that the fact that there was such a massive police presence tonight, metal detectors, police, private security, and it's all gone now and the synagogue and the community remains unprotected.
That's really the moral of the story.
Is that the powerful people, well, they'll be taken care of.
Don't you worry about it.
Those politicians, they won't have arson on their lawns.
But for the rest of us, not just Jews, but Canadians, we've got to tough it out.
Oh, and by the way, thousands more migrants coming from Gaza.
No, no, they won't be put in the communities of the fancy people, but they'll be dumped in the community.
Canada has a lot of fixing to do, and tonight's town hall meeting made me see that.
Amazing Reception to Rebel News00:00:49
But I also saw one more thing.
Just how amazing the reception to Rebel News was.
If I had to rank who was popular tonight, Melissa Lanceman by thunderous applause was the most popular person in the room.
But in second place was Rebel News.
I couldn't walk 10 feet without people thanking us for the videos we were doing.
People asking, where's David Menzies and how's he?
And people for telling us it's their only source of news about this issue.
It felt wonderful to get that support from the community.
It felt a little bit like when we were the only people standing up for the truckers.
Had a little bit of that feeling here today.
Well, that's it for me.
We're going to take this lovely truck home.
I'm going to go to bed and I'll be back in the office in the morning.
On behalf of all of us at Rebel News, see you at home.