North Star with Ellin Bessner

Maya Winkler, 19, was supposed to be taking classes at Reichman University in Herzliya this year—but is instead spending her days collecting supplies for Israeli soldiers and babysitting their kids. Leora Prutschi, 18, was supposed to be on a reverse Shinshinim project—a year of service for Diaspora teens in Israel—but is instead commuting from Eilat to Timna, 30 km north, to teach English to disp...

Just ahead of her first visit to Canada as Israel’s newly-appointed Special Envoy on Combatting Antisemitism, Michal Cotler-Wunsh had strong criticism of the Trudeau government’s decision to abstain last week on a vote at the United Nations’ General Assembly about the Israel Hamas war. Cotler-Wunsh calls the decision by Canada to abstain, rather than vote “No”: “worse than silence”. The new specia...

If you ask some relatives of the nearly 240 Israeli hostages taken by Hamas on Oct. 7, they will say “there hasn’t been enough pressure” to free their loved ones. That’s one of the key messages they emphasized during private meetings with Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, and with other Canadian politicians and journalists, on Oct. 30. The Israeli group said they are getting little to no information...

As Israeli tanks and infantry forces began a limited push into Gaza over the weekend, ahead of an expected full-scale ground invasion, families and friends of the now-230 hostages taken by Hamas on Oct. 7 want to make sure their loved ones aren’t forgotten. That’s why Toronto social worker Lynne Mitchell, a longtime friend of kidnapped Canadian-Israeli peace activist Vivian Silver, is speaking out...

Canadian social worker Joy Frenkiel can’t get two particular sounds out of her head: IDF soldiers hammering wood to build coffins, and the motors of refrigerated containers storing hundreds of still-unidentified bodies at an Israeli military base. Frenkiel moved to Israel from Chomedey, north of Montreal, in 1996; since the horrific murders of at least 1,300 Israelis and foreign nationals earlier...

Dr. Brad Strauss is a cardiologist at Sunnybrook Hospital in Toronto, with a roster of patients and several new medical devices under development. But immediately following the Oct. 7 Hamas attack on southern Israel, Strauss dropped everything and booked a plane ticket to Tel Aviv. Despite his flight being delayed by missile threats—it took him two days in transit—he arrived ready to work near the...

Ronnen Harary and his university friends founded the toy and entertainment company Spin Master in 1994, launching with Earth Buddies and later the wildly successful Air Hogs toys. Today, it’s their Paw Patrol characters and Gund stuffed animals that are globally famous. And for the last two weeks, since the Oct. 7 Hamas massacre in southern Israel, Harary has been on the ground in Israel distribut...

There’s been a lot of attention paid this week to the way some major news organizations are covering the surprise attack by Hamas on Israel, which was launched on Oct. 7. The CBC, in particular, has come under scrutiny because it is a government-funded body to the tune of more than $1 billion a year. Twelve days ago, a CBC internal memo was sent to staff right after the attack happened, reminding...

Tiferet Lapidot had been teaching English to children in Africa before she returned to Israel this fall to be with her family for the High Holidays. She was planning to go to Australia after holidays ended, around the time she was going to turn 23. But, first, she decided to go to the Supernova music festival near the border with Gaza. That's where she found herself frantically running for her lif...

Toronto cognitive behavioural therapy counsellor Leanne Matlow says her phone has been buzzing ever since the horrific attack by Hamas terrorists on southern Israel on Oct. 7. She’s been hearing from Canadian parents who don’t know how to reassure their children, who are being exposed to gruesome videos and images of blood-stained rooms and also wounded or dead Israeli victims of the massacre–not...

A student who’d been volunteering at an Israeli daycare. A widower and his three children honouring the anniversary of their mother’s death. A 15-year-old studying at an Israeli boarding school—and her mother, who was visiting her for Sukkot. These are just some of the first Canadians who’ve returned home from Israel Friday, having been safely evacuated as part of Ottawa’s emergency airlifts which...

On Oct. 11, the Canadian government announced it is mounting an emergency operation to fly Canadians out of Israel, possibly beginning as early as Thursday night. Several Canadian Forces transport planes will be sent to Tel Aviv to shuttle hundreds of Canadians and other passengers out of Israel to Greece, even as rocket fire continues raining down from Gaza, and mortars fall along the northern bo...

One is a doctor. One is with a tank unit. One is in reconnaissance. All three sons of Toronto-born Ira Garshowitz were called up on the weekend to serve at the front with the Israel Defense Forces after the unprecedented Hamas attack on Oct. 7. Garshowitz’s daughter is also in uniform–and like her brothers, all are Canadian citizens but born in Israel. Meanwhile, Jonathan Shiff now has two married...

Iddo Moed arrived in Ottawa only six weeks ago to take up the post as Israel’s new ambassador to Canada. He hasn’t even presented his credentials to Governor General Mary Simon yet, which means he isn’t permitted to make direct contact with Canadian politicians until that ceremony takes place. Nevertheless, Moed is making Israel’s position clear on who is behind the unprecedented surprise attack b...

On the morning of Saturday, Oct. 7, 2023, Gloria and Howard Wener woke up to the sound of rockets and an air raid warning. The Canadian couple immigrated to Israel 50 years ago as pioneers of Sde Nitzan, a moshav of 500 people, less than 10 km from the Gaza border. Now, two days into Israel’s latest war with the Hamas-controlled region, the Weners remain locked inside their home, angry and disillu...

A century after Chicago 58 Food Products’ late founder, David Bernholtz, borrowed $500 dollars to open a kosher butcher shop in Toronto’s Kensington Market, his grandchildren—and great-grandson—are still running the business. Chicago 58 threw a 100th anniversary barbecue for suppliers and customers last week, complete with fresh hot dogs and steaming brisket sandwiches on rye. For 80 years, the Ch...

As the fallout continues from the Canadian Parliament applauding a 98-year-old former member of a Nazi-led Ukrainian Waffen SS unit, the spotlight is focusing on how the former soldier Yaroslav Hunka and thousands of other enemy troops like him, were permitted to come to Canada in the first place. For decades, Jewish groups have been calling on the Canadian government to release the complete files...

Artur Wilczynski has choice words to describe what happened in the Canadian House of Commons on Sept. 22, when lawmakers gave two standing ovations to a 98-year-old former Ukrainian solider who served with a Nazi unit during the Second World War. Wilczynski, a former diplomat and senior civil servant in Ottawa—and the grandson of a Holocaust survivor—calls the scandal an “absolute public relations...

On Sept. 26, Temple Sholom in Vancouver is hosting two of the leaders of Israel's months-long protests: Jerusalem professor Michal Muszkat-Barkan and Ora Peled Nakash, a computer engineer who lives on a kibbutz outside Haifa. The pair will speak about their grassroots efforts these past nine months to stop the policies of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's government. The two women are being flow...

Last Monday, the Ottawa-Carleton District School Board voted to determine if trustee Dr. Nili Kaplan-Myrth breached the board’s code of conduct by sending a series of arguably bullying text messages to another trustee in trying to garner allies as she attempted to reinstate a mask mandate in Ottawa schools. In her messages, Kaplan-Myrth wrote that trustees opposing her motion didn't care "if...

Many Jews around the world will be reciting the Yizkor memorial prayer as Yom Kippur approaches this weekend. And while most synagogues maintain traditional memorial wall displays, with columns of bronze or brass yahrzeit plaques, a growing number of Jewish congregations in North America and even Europe are embracing new technology and replacing the hardware with interactive digital memorials. Not...

This weekend, Atlantic Canada is preparing to get slammed by Hurricane Lee, a Category 1 hurricane that could blast winds as strong as 110 km/h across parts of the country. Nova Scotia and New Brunswick are on especially high alert in the storm's path, with residents preparing for worst-case scenarios: power outages, storm surges, flooding and property damage. This is the second year in a row that...

September 10 was a milestone day at the Donald Berman Jewish Eldercare Centre in Montreal: the staff threw the organization's annual group birthday party for a record number of residents over 100 years old. This year’s 22 “super seniors” include a Second World War veteran, David Kucer, who worked forging metal miniature weapons as collectors items, and also Bella Bernstein, the oldest of the group...

This summer, Canadian housing minister Sean Fraser blamed Canada's housing crisis, in part, on post-secondary institutions bringing in unregulated and record-high numbers of international students. This could cause the rental market to skyrocket in urban areas; on the flip side, the number of newcomer students has also created a swell of illegal rooming houses, even fostering homelessness among in...

As rescue efforts continue in Morocco to find survivors of Friday’s powerful earthquake, the disaster is also affecting Canada’s significant community of Moroccan Jews—especially those based in Montreal. As of Sunday night, more than 2,100 people were killed in the 6.8-magnitude quake, while at least 2,400 have been seriously injured. The quake hit hardest in the remote villages of the Atlas Mount...