Jewish students at Wilfrid Laurier University in Canada returned to their campus residences after Rosh Hashanah to discover that mezuzahs attached to their doors had been smashed or torn down, The Jerusalem Post reports
Jewish organisations condemned the vandalism as an antisemitic attack on students in their own homes and warned that it forms part of a wider pattern of growing hostility towards Jewish students on Canadian university campuses.
The vandalism took place during the Jewish High Holy Days, while students were celebrating Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year. Mezuzahs, which contain passages from the Torah, are traditionally attached to the doorposts of Jewish homes and are an immediately recognisable expression of Jewish faith and identity.
Hillel Ontario and StandWithUs Canada issued a joint statement condemning the incident and expressing concern that Jewish students had been targeted within their university residences.
The organisations said they were “horrified that, over the holiday weekend, Jewish students at Wilfrid Laurier University were targeted with antisemitic hatred in the place they call home on campus”.
“This cannot be the welcome Jewish students receive when they come to university,” they said. “Students have a right to feel safe and secure in their residences and to express their Jewish identity openly and proudly without fear of being targeted.”
The organisations said the timing of the vandalism made the incident particularly disturbing.
“At a time when Jewish students should have been marking the beginning of a new year with pride, renewal, and hope, they were targeted by despicable hate,” the statement said.
Hillel Ontario and StandWithUs Canada stressed that the destruction of Jewish religious symbols should not result in students feeling pressured to conceal their identity.
“Jewish students are not going anywhere,” they said. “They will not be intimidated into hiding who they are or removing the symbols of their Jewish identity.”
The organisations added that Jewish students “are proud, they belong at Laurier, and they deserve to be safe being openly Jewish on campus”.
Jay Solomon, CEO of Hillel Ontario, said the vandalism should be understood within the wider context of antisemitic hostility affecting Jewish students across Canada.
“We condemn this act of antisemitism in the strongest possible terms,” Solomon said. “It is not an isolated incident, but part of a broader pattern of escalating hostility toward Jewish students that we have seen across campuses in Ontario and Canada.”
Solomon said Hillel had contacted university leaders following the incident and had expressed alarm about the targeting of Jewish students. He noted that similar incidents had occurred at other Canadian universities since the Hamas-led 7 October 2023 attack on Israel and the subsequent war.
“The administration has assured us the matter is under investigation,” he said.
Solomon called on universities to take stronger action to protect Jewish students and ensure those responsible for antisemitic incidents face consequences.
“This cannot continue. All institutions of higher learning have an obligation to keep Jews safe, and we urge all schools to enforce their policies and hold perpetrators to account swiftly and transparently,” he said.
Wilfrid Laurier University confirmed that it was investigating vandalism within its student accommodation, although its statement described broader damage across several residence hallways.
The university said it “is aware of an incident of vandalism that involved widespread damage along various residence hallways”.
“We are treating this matter very seriously, and our Special Constable Service is leading the investigation,” the university added.
Laurier said the affected students had contacted residence staff and that support had been made available to them.
“We take the safety of our students very seriously,” the university said. “We strongly condemn acts of antisemitism and have zero tolerance for hate speech, racism, threats, and harassment.”
The destruction of the mezuzahs comes amid heightened concern about antisemitism across Canada, particularly within universities.
A federal report released in August by the Department of Canadian Heritage and produced by the Association for Canadian Studies and the Metropolis Institute documented widespread experiences of antisemitism among Jewish students.
The Campus Antisemitism and Student Experience (CASE) report found that more than 95 per cent of Jewish students surveyed had either personally experienced or witnessed antisemitism on post-secondary campuses across Canada.
The vandalism at Wilfrid Laurier University therefore adds to growing concerns that visibly Jewish students and expressions of Jewish identity are increasingly becoming targets of hostility. For the affected students, the attack was particularly personal: the perpetrators did not simply damage university property, but targeted religious symbols attached to the doors of the places where Jewish students live.
Photo credit: Ayelet Ein Vered
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