Overview

• The Ottawa Police Service’s hate and bias crime unit opened a hate crime investigation and is urging anyone with information to contact its tip line.
• Red paint and the phrase “FEED ME” were scrawled across the concrete memorial, a message investigators and community leaders say likely alludes to Gaza’s humanitarian crisis.
• Ottawa Centre MP Yasir Naqvi, Conservative deputy leader Melissa Lantsman and Jewish organizations including the or Israel aIsrael and Jewish Affairs condemned the act as a vile antisemitic attack.
• Statistics Canada reported 900 hate crimes against Jewish Canadians in 2023, up from 527 in 2022, reflecting a broader surge since the October 2023 Hamas attack on Israel.
• This is the second vandalism incident at the monument since its opening in 2017, prompting co-chair Lawrence Greenspon to demand concrete action against rising antisemitism.