Avi Lewis’ Reckless Rhetoric
Avram David (Avi) Lewis, the leader of Canada’s left-of-center New Democratic Party, has come to his senses and no longer is holding Jewish Canadians accountable for Israel’s actions.
Lewis, an anti-Zionist whose wife Naomi Klein shares his views, caused outrage when, in a social media post on the eve of Yom Kippur, he wrote, “Tonight Yom Kippur begins, the most sombre moment of the Jewish calendar. It’s a time of atonement – a time to grieve those who have been lost, a time to acknowledge and take responsibility for harms we have caused, individually and collectively. For Jewish people, the personal has always been political and the political always personal. This year I’m reflecting on the fact that we failed to do our part to stop an ongoing genocide committed in our name.”
Lewis, the NDP’s second federal Jewish leader after his grandfather David, implicitly accused Jews in Canada of being complicit in crimes that Israel allegedly committed in the Gaza Strip during its two-year war with Hamas from 2023 to 2026.
By inference, Lewis held the Jewish community collectively responsible for the deaths of tens of thousands of Palestinian civilians in Gaza. He posted his views on X shortly before a gunman bent on killing Jews attacked the Sons of Jacob Synagogue in Belleville, Ontario.
Two Liberal Party members of parliament, Anthony Housefather of Montreal and Ben Carr of Winnipeg, blasted Lewis for his “irresponsible” and “despicable” comments, suggesting that this kind of narrative can trigger anti-Jewish hatred.
The Center for Israel and Jewish Affairs issued a strong rebuke, pointing out that “when Jewish people are collectively portrayed as complicit in atrocities, that rhetoric can become a justification for targeting Jews here at home.”
Robyn Urback, a Globe and Mail columnist, described Lewis’ remarks as “foolish and bigoted,” the kind of “abominable” and “insidious” rhetoric that “fuels acts of hatred against Jews in Canada and throughout the rest of the Diaspora.”
The Globe and Mail weighed in too and accused Lewis of throwing “tinder on the fire.” The newspaper added, “It was a reckless act, and an alarming misuse of leadership. Collective blame risks inciting collective harm …”
Demonstrably taken aback by this outpouring of opprobrium, Lewis recanted, publishing a second post on X several hours later, following the horrific Belleville incident.
“The shooting outside a synagogue in Belleville is deeply upsetting and has traumatized a community that gathered to pray,” he wrote. “It is yet another reminder of the work that remains to create a Canada that is truly safe for people of all faiths, including Jewish people – to worship, to come together, to live without fear. Today, I am sending love and solidarity to the Jewish community in Belleville and across the country on this Yom Kippur, the most solemn and holiest day of the year.”
“Holding Jews collectively responsible for the actions of the state of Israel is antisemitic,” he added. “I’ve never done it. I think it’s dangerous and that’s absolutely not what I did. I spoke as a Jewish Canadian from a place of profound sadness … Many Jews have said that we have not done enough as Jewish people, among a family of faiths and communities around the world.”
That Lewis categorically rejected the absurd and indefensible notion that Jews should be held responsible for Israel’s decisions and actions is belatedly commendable. Only antisemites seek out such opportunities.
Lewis’ statement, however, omitted a crucial point – his misguided belief that Israel is guilty of genocide.
Last September, before he announced his intention to run for the NDP leadership, he released a video stating that “the genocide in Gaza is horrific and unacceptable” and called on Canada to use diplomatic and economic measures to stop it.
During a debate last January hosted by the anti-Israel organization Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East, Lewis claimed that Israel was committing genocide in Gaza.
Immediately after being elected NDP leader on March 29 of this year, Lewis delivered an acceptance speech in Winnipeg in which he said, “When Israel commits a genocide in Gaza, we call it by its name, and we do everything in our power to bring it to an end.”
This past April, in an interview with Democracy Now!, Lewis said that the Liberal government had “utterly failed to condemn the genocide in Gaza.” In August, in another Democracy Now! interview, he referred repeatedly to the “ongoing genocide in Gaza” and said that governments should take a clear position against “apartheid” and “genocide.”
I am unaware of the “ongoing genocide in Gaza” because no such thing is happening.
What is crystal clear is that the vast majority of Jewish Canadians reject Lewis’ contention that Israel committed genocide in Gaza during the war.
The evidence is clear.
Israel did not take aim at Palestinians per se, but rather at Hamas operatives cynically using civilians as human shields in civilian infrastructure such as schools, mosques and hospitals.
Israel, therefore, did not contravene the United Nations Genocide Convention. Israel did not try to eliminate the Palestinians as an ethnic group. Israel warned civilians of impending attacks. Israel allowed the delivery of food, water and oil into Gaza, some of which was stolen by Hamas.
If Israel had really been bent on exterminating the Palestinians, as Israel haters contend, it would already have begun persecuting its two million Israeli Arab citizens, the descendants of Palestinians who remained in the country after the 1948 Arab-Israeli war.
That being said, a minuscule proportion of Canadian Jews believe that major Jewish organizations in Canada have been silent in the face of objectionable Israeli policies. This past June, the former Canadian ambassador to Israel, Jon Allen, told a Senate committee that they have adhered to a policy of “silence” in this respect.
Their failure to criticize Israeli government actions has led to the impression that Canadian Jews support all of Israel’s actions against Palestinians, said Allen, who is Jewish.
Unlike Lewis, Allen did not explicitly accuse Israel of genocide, a reckless and unsubstantiated accusation that Israel’s enemies are only too eager to trot out so as to defame and delegitimize the world’s sole Jewish state.
Genocide and apartheid are evil forms of human behavior that should be condemned, but Israel cannot be tarred with such crimes.
As for Lewis, he has a responsibility to himself, his party and Canadians to tell the full and unambiguous truth about these volatile issues. But being an avowed anti-Zionist, and the great grandson of Moishe Lewis, an organizer in the Jewish Labor Bund, an anti-Zionist movement in Eastern Europe before the Holocaust, he is very likely to carry on in this vein.
Last January 2026, he referred to himself as an “anti-Zionist Jewish person,” saying he was trying to “unlearn and unpack the Zionist myths” with which he had been raised.
As an anti-Zionist who once worked for the anti-Israel Al Jazeera broadcaster, he supports the Palestinian-led Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement. According to Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East,Lewis’ political outlook is motivated by Palestinian liberation and anti-imperialism.
Need more be said?