The recent announcement of a temporary 30-day pause in the Canada-U.S. tariff war came as a relief to this country’s largest importer of Kosher foods made in the United States. Montreal-based Altra Foods spent the earlier part of the week scrambling to place rush orders from suppliers south of the border, after Canada vowed to slap 25% retaliatory duties on some of the company’s 3,000 kosher imported brands, such as Sabra, Geffen, Streit’s, Hadar and even Bush Beans. But Altra’s vice president ,Jack Hartstein, worries that if the negotiations collapse,and the Canadian tariffs kick in next month-just ahead of Passover–prices will rise by between 50 and 60 percent for kosher food imports from the key U.S. market. That’s why Canada’s kashruth organizations COR and MK,and the Hasidic community have teamed up with political advocacy group CIJA, and with help from several Liberal MPs, to urge Ottawa to exempt kosher foods from this current trade war. On today’s episode of The CJN Daily, we’re joined by Jack Hartstein, of ALTRA Foods, on how his company is bracing for the impact, and what to expect next.

What we talked about:

• Read the list of U.S. products slated for Canadian-imposed 25% import tariffs.
• Why the 2025 proposed Canadian import tariffs will be much worse for kosher food consumers than the previous 2018 trade war, in The CJN
• Learn more about ALTRA Foods.

Credits

• Host and writer: Ellin Bessner (@ebessner)
• Production team: Zachary Kauffman (producer), Michael Fraiman (executive producer)
• Music: Dov Beck-Levine

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• Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt)
• Subscribe to The CJN Daily (Not sure how? Click here)

A U.S. Senate committee is voting on Tuesday, Feb. 4 whether to recommend Robert F. Kennedy Jr. should go forward as President Donald Trump’s new secretary of health. If he makes it through, RFK Jr. would have a wide-reaching impact on a particular Canadian export: canola oil. Long considered a loud voice in the anti-vaccine movement , and pushing other conspiracy theories, RFK Jr. now on a crusade to ban the signature Canadian oil, along with other seed oils. He claims they are toxic, cause obesity and poison Americans. Notably, he is pushing McDonald’s to fry their foods in beef tallow instead. All this makes professor Michael Eskin shake his head. Eskin is an internationally renowned food scientist at the University of Manitoba who helped develop Canada’s $35-billion canola industry, including canola oil, as a heart-healthy part of our diet. Eskin’s nearly 60 years of research—spanning 19 books and 150 scientific papers—have earned him an Order of Canada, the Order of Manitoba, and countless professional awards, including, most recently, induction into the Canadian Agricultural Hall of Fame. Eskin is a fan of some of RFK Jr.’s other pet peeves: he is similarly critical of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s handling of COVID, for example, and Dr. Anthony Fauci of the CDC But on the canola oil file, the professor thinks the future health czar is giving out the wrong diagnosis. On today’s episode of The CJN Daily, Eskin joins host Ellin Bessner to explain the benefits of canola oil, share its origin story, and discuss what’s at stake should Canada slap tariffs on exports of canola to the U.S.

What we talked about:

• Read more on why Canada’s Agricultural Hall of Fame inducted Prof. Michael Eskin into the Class of 2024, for his decades of research on canola oil as a heart-healthy staple.
• Watch Prof. Michael Eskin’s rap video on lipids, on YouTube.
• Read why Eskin won the Order of Canada, in 2016.

Credits

• Host and writer: Ellin Bessner (@ebessner)
• Production team: Zachary Kauffman (producer), Michael Fraiman (executive producer)
• Music: Dov Beck-Levine

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• Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt)
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By day, Avrom Charach works for a property management company in Winnipeg. But since Oct. 7, the prominent Jewish community leader has been working even longer hours on a one-man clean-up crew, removing hate-fuelled graffiti from the streets of his home city. So far, Charach has wiped away more than 100 messages from a synagogue, community centre, sidewalks, public buildings and even street lamps.

Winnipeg's police department calls Charach a "community angel" for removing the tags, stickers, posters and slogans himself—for free—sometimes before the city's own clean-up crews can get to the scene. It's all happening since hate crimes have hit a historic high in the city after Oct. 7: in 2023, the last year with available figures, there were 46 cases of hate crimes, including 18 against Jews and five against Muslims.

On today's episode of The CJN Daily, Avrom Charach joins host Ellin Bessner to explain how this act of tikkun olam has made him an unpaid go-to graffiti buster.

What we talked about:

• Watch the Winnipeg Police news conference announcing the arrest in connection with antisemitic graffiti on Jan. 14, 2025.
• Read why Avrom Charach helped his Etz Chayim synagogue move to a bigger building, in the south end of Winnipeg, in 2024, in The CJN.
• More on the historic move from Winnipeg’s North End to the south side, where more Jews live, in The CJN.

Credits

• Host and writer: Ellin Bessner (@ebessner)
• Production team: Zachary Kauffman (producer), Michael Fraiman (executive producer)
• Music: Dov Beck-Levine

Support our show

• Subscribe to The CJN newsletter
• Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt)
• Subscribe to The CJN Daily (Not sure how? Click here)

In less than two months on the job for Noah Shack, the interim CEO of the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA) has had to speak out after someone shot at a Jewish girls' school in Toronto; decry a repeated arson attack on a Montreal-area synagogue; and oversee the response in Winnipeg after five swastikas were spray-painted on a community centre in a Jewish area during the final days of Hanukkah. But none of those moments marked his true national introduction, which came on Jan. 27, when he delivered a televised speech from Ottawa's Holocaust monument as part of the official ceremony to mark the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. Shack—who spent nearly 15 years working for CIJA in Ottawa and Toronto—has now risen to become the organization's public face, following the exit of Shimon Koffler Fogel, who managed Jewish government relations in the capital for approximately 40 years. Insiders have told The CJN that CIJA's board wanted a change of leadership ahead of an expected change in government in the coming federal election. Shack is also clear that CIJA is eager to combat anti-Israel policies, such as federal funding for the UN-backed Palestinian relief agency UNRWA—but insists CIJA isn't hitching its wagons to the Conservative party. On today's episode of The CJN Daily, Shack sits down with host Ellin Bessner to explain why he took the job, why he's calling for unity among Canada's Jewish organizations, and why he hopes Jews soon won't need to think about fleeing Canada for their own safety. Related links

• Read more about Noah Shack’s Holocaust survivor relatives, the late Zalman and Pola Pila, of Toronto, in The CJN.
• Read Shimon Fogel’s outlook for the Jewish community, in The CJN archives.
• Watch Shimon Fogel’s final testimony to the Canadian Senate about antisemitism, on Dec. 2, 2024. sure how? Click here)

Monday Jan. 27 was a busy day for Canadian politicians pledging to remember the Holocaust, fight antisemitism, and, in some cases, stand by the embattled State of Israel. The historic day—80 years since the liberation of Auschwitz—also provided a convenient ramp for some early campaign pledges as the country heads into a federal election later this year.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made one of his final international visits, to Poland to visit Auschwitz and attend the official commemoration ceremony, where he spoke with two Canadian survivors of that infamous death camp. Back in Canada, his minister of addictions and mental health, Ya’ara Saks, visited the Toronto Holocaust Museum to explain how $3.4 million federal dollars will go toward six organizations to combat Holocaust denial and antisemitism while a million more goes to UNESCO; in Ottawa, his minister of official languages, Rachel Bendayan, revealed the date of the forthcoming second national summit on antisemitism while speaking at Canada’s official national Holocaust monument. At the same event, Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre attacked the Liberal record on protecting Canadian Jews and standing up for Israel.

On this episode of The CJN Daily, you’ll hear all these voices and more—including Canadian survivors Howard Chandler and Miriam Ziegler, and U of T law student Pe’er Krut, who had a front row seat in Poland—part of a sweeping glance at what the monumental day sounded like across Canada and beyond.

Related links

• Learn more about the federal funding for Holocaust education and museums in Canada, announced on Jan. 27, in The CJN.
• Read Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s statement on International Holocaust Remembrance Day, and Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre's speech.
• Listen to Calgary’s Daniel Pelton’s launch of three new compositions of music inspired by “The Tattooist of Auschwitz:, and recorded using the Violins of Hope, once owned by Holocaust survivors, on The CJN’s Culturally Jewish podcast.

Credits

• Host and writer: Ellin Bessner (@ebessner)
• Production team: Zachary Kauffman (producer), Michael Fraiman (executive producer)
• Music: Dov Beck-Levine

Support our show

• Subscribe to The CJN newsletter
• Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt)
• Subscribe to The CJN Daily (Not sure how? Click here)

Pinchas Gutter, 92, and Mariette Doduck, 89, were both children when they survived the Holocaust. But now something else unites them: when a government representative called them a few months ago to inform them they would be receiving the Order of Canada, both thought it was a prank call. Eventually, the two renowned speakers realized it was for real. They are among 88 Canadians recently named to the honour by the governor general. Gutter and Doduck’s families and friends, it turned out, had kept the four-year-long application process a secret. As the world gathers on Jan. 27 to mark the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz—where Dodeck’s mother and two brothers were among the million Jews murdered—both survivors sit down with Ellin Bessner on The CJN Daily to explain what keeps them going, how Holocaust education has shifted post-Oct. 7, and how they hope to change the world for their great-grandchildren.

Related links

• Watch the ceremony live at 10 a.m. ET on Monday Jan. 27 from Auschwitz here.
• Learn about Toronto survivor Pinchas Gutter’s story in The CJN; interact with his hologram testimony done by the USC Shoah Foundation, which we covered in The CJN.
• Discover Mariette Doduck’s struggle as a Holocaust orphan after she arrived in Canada with three of her surviving siblings, and laterfounded the Vancouver Holocaust Education Centre, in The CJN. Her new book is called A Childhood Unspoken.

Credits

• Host and writer: Ellin Bessner (@ebessner)
• Production team: Zachary Kauffman (producer), Michael Fraiman (executive producer)
• Music: Dov Beck-Levine

Support our show

• Subscribe to The CJN newsletter
• Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt)
• Subscribe to The CJN Daily (Not sure how? Click here)

Hamilton’s Jewish community agencies—including synagogues, schools and camps—spent the evening of Jan. 20 learning new security protocols to handle antisemitic protests, vandalism and terrorist attacks. The “Guardian Training” session was part of Hamilton’s new membership in the U.S.-based Secure Community Network (SCN) program, run by the New York-based Jewish Federations of North America. Hamilton is the first Canadian Jewish community to join this network. Hamilton received hundreds of thousands of dollars in funding for the next three years, and quickly used part of it to hire a former local police commander as their new regional security director, whom they sent for training in Chicago. That's where the SCN Network's 24/7 command centre is located, where former FBI agents and ex-military experts sit in a computer-lined war room and monitor attacks and threats to the Jewish world. After Oct. 7, Jewish leadership in Hamilton were looking for an answer to protect their community, but its small size of 5,000 people made it unrealistic to afford the needed staffing and resources to build its own security network. On this episode of The CJN Daily, we hear more about why Canadian federations are looking south of the border for help: we’re joined by Glenn Mannella, the new regional security director at Hamilton’s Jewish Federation, and Gustavo Rymberg, the Federation’s CEO.

Related links

• See what the Jewish Federations of North America’s Secure Community Network command centre looks like, and how it saves Jewish lives.
• Learn why Hamilton’s Jewish Film Festival was moved after original venue cancelled, after Oct. 7, in The CJN.
• Read more about private security agencies setting up to act to protect the Jewish community in Canada after Oct. 7, in The CJN.

Credits

• Host and writer: Ellin Bessner (@ebessner)
• Production team: Zachary Kauffman (producer), Michael Fraiman (executive producer)
• Music: Dov Beck-Levine

Support our show

• Subscribe to The CJN newsletter
• Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt)
• Subscribe to The CJN Daily (Not sure how? Click here)

Some Toronto residents have more reason than most Canadians to be overjoyed with the release of the three Israeli women hostages on Sunday Jan. 19, as part of the first stage of an agreed upon “cease-fire for hostages” deal with Hamas that is expected to last six weeks. Maureen Leshem’s younger cousin Romi Gonen, 24, was one of the trio to come out first after 471 days in captivity. Gonen was shot while fleeing the Nova Music festival on Oct. 7, where Hamas murdered many of her friends. Meanwhile, Aharon Brodutch found it hard to watch the coverage of this new round of freed hostages because it reminds him how four members of his own family were released from Gaza over a year ago, in November 2023. His sister-in-law Hagar Brodutch and her three young children, Ofri, 11, Yuval, 10, and Oriya, now 5, spent 51 days in captivity after being captured during the terrorist rampage through their Kibbutz Kfar Aza. On today’s episode of The CJN Daily, we’ll hear from Aharon Brodutch, who shares details about what the rehabilitation process for freed hostages looks like, and from Maureen Leshem about what the release of her young cousin means, and why they continue to advocate for the release of the remaining 95 hostages.

Related links

• Donate to the Hope for Romi fund to send financial help directly to Romi Gonen’s family to help her heal.
• Hear our original The CJN Daily interview with Toronto physicist Aharon Brodutch from November 2023, when his Israeli sister-in-law and her three children were released from Hamas captivity.
• Read more about Iris Weinstein Haggai’s campaign to have her Canadian-raised mother, Judah Weinstein Haggai’s body returned from Gaza, in The CJN.

Credits

• Host and writer: Ellin Bessner (@ebessner)
• Production team: Zachary Kauffman (producer), Michael Fraiman (executive producer)
• Music: Dov Beck-Levine

Support our show

• Subscribe to The CJN newsletter
• Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt)
• Subscribe to The CJN Daily (Not sure how? Click here)