New survey finds people holding very negative opinions of Israel are more likely to be antisemitic
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Israel Independence Day begins the evening of April 30, marking the Jewish state's 77th birthday, amid a tide of antisemitism in Canada and elsewhere.
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'While people certainly have the right to criticize the government of Israel, it's a serious problem when it descends into antisemitism,' said Jack Jedwab, the president and CEO of the Association for Canadian Studies and the Metropolis Institute, in an email.
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Two surveys by Leger Marketing for the Association for Canadian Studies examine Canadians' views on Israel, Judaism, and Jews, and explore the connections between opinions of Israel and attitudes toward Judaism and Jews. They also investigate the impact of Holocaust awareness on shaping these attitudes.
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The first Leger survey, conducted on March 1-2, 2025, asked questions of 1,548 Canadians. The second survey took place between April 17-19 and involved 1,603 Canadians.
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One of the findings is that most people who hold a very negative opinion of Israel had the most negative views of Judaism. One survey found that the majority of people holding a negative view of Judaism hold negative views of Jews.
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'The study confirms some links between anti-Israel and anti-Jewish sentiment. The observation requires some nuance and is complex, as most Canadians holding negative sentiments toward Israel do not hold very negative sentiments toward Jews. Nonetheless, an important minority of Canadians do indeed channel strong negative sentiment towards Israel into negative views of Jews,' said Jedwab.
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'There is a point at which negative sentiment towards Israel translates into an anti-Jewish sentiment.'
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The second survey found that older Canadians more likely to view relations between Canada and Israel, as well as between non-Jewish Canadians and Jewish Canadians, positively rather than negatively.
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The survey found that 55 per cent of French-Canadians hold a negative view of Israel, compared to 42 per cent of English Canadians. Quebecers are more likely than the residents of other provinces to assess relations between Jewish and non-Jewish Canadians negatively. Quebecers are also the most likely to have a negative view of Israel. Francophones in Canada are also somewhat more likely to have negative opinions of Judaism and Jews, according to the surveys.
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