What was the motive in Montreal?

Were Jews the main targets?

We don’t know. But, for months - for 989 days, to be precise, when the atrocities of October 7, 2023 happened - governments have been told that someone would try to kill Jews here in Canada.

There have been no shortage of attempts.  Schools for little kids shot up - once, twice, thrice at one Jewish school for little kids in Toronto. Jewish businesses and synangogues firebombed - one Vancouver synagogue firebombed while people were still inside, praying.  Death threats, bomb threats, acts of violence. Predominantly-Jewish neighbourboods terrorized by roving gangs of antisemitic thugs.

And now, a Montreal Jewish neighbourhood has experienced bloody violence, and one of the city’s police officers has been killed - and a Jewish man, Michael Moshe Mizrahi, had been killed. Another officer is in hospital, and her condition is unclear.

On Monday morning, a 911 call was made: shots were being heard in the Côte-des-Neiges neighborhood, where many visibly-Jewish families and institutions are found.  The shooting took place near Beth Rivkah Academy, Chabad NDG, the Vaad Ha’ir, MADA, the Chai Center, Yagdil Torah, and many kosher businesses.

As many as a dozen shots rang out, and police immediately warned that an “armed and dangerous suspect” was on the loose. The shooter, wearing camouflage gear, was eliminated by another officer as he attempted to reload.

People were still warned to stay away from the area: “If you are in the affected area, shelter indoors, lock the doors, stay away from windows and follow instructions of local authorities.”

Police also shut down a section of the Decarie Expressway. In Toronto terms, that would be like shutting down the Gardiner. They searched the surrounding area, looking for a possible second suspect, but there was none. Montreal police issued a terse update: “Imminent Threat #Alert A suspect has been neutralized…The police operation is still underway. Please continue to avoid the area.”

Online, graphic and bloody video started to circulate, showing bodies and blood on the sidewalk near a supermarket that sells kosher foods. In one, a SKS-style semi-automatic rifle could be seen near an unmoving man in camouflage.  The SKS, originally from the Soviet Union, is favoured by terrorists around the world. The same weapon was used in a terror attack at Edmonton City Hall in March 2024. There, the shooter said he was motivated by “the genocide that’s going on in Gaza.”

The neighbourhood where the shooting took place is one where many families are found, and where people tend to get along. I know: my parents lived there, had their first date there. I was born there, surrounded by lots of other Jewish and Irish Catholic kids. It is not the front line in the Middle East.

It happened in Canada, however. Canada, the country now considered - by Israel and the experts - to have one of the worst antisemitism problems in the world. Where antisemitism, and antisemitic violence, has been getting markedly worse with every passing day.

Prime Minister Carney acknowledged as much at a speech at Holy Blossom Temple in Toronto a few weeks ago. The speech acknowledged that antisemitism had grown in the country Carney purports to lead. But it offered little.

The speech contained no real solutions, apart from a vague promise to study the issue. It talked about setting up a committee - one of whose members previously lobbied against the inclusion of Hamas on Canada’s terror registry. In Israel (where I was at the time) people were appalled by Carney’s inability to meet the moment.

And now, this. A shooting in a Jewish neighbourhood in Montreal. Following in the bloody wake of Bondi Beach in Australia, Washington, D.C., and Boulder, Colorado. Where madmen went to hunt Jews, and killed Jews. Was that what happened in Montreal on Monday? Was it just a coincidence?

Late Monday, a “manifesto” allegedly written by the shooter started circulating. The document runs to more than 100 pages, with footnotes.

In it, the author rails against capitalism and women - but also has this to say about Jews: “There was amongst the Western bourgeois class many Jews, who in their newly acquired power immediately set about creating the state of Israel, which became essentially a kind of base from which they were to assist in the expansion of capitalism.”

Capitalism, the author stated, was “evil,” “cruel and brutal” - and a system that allows bankers and globalists to “reign tyrannically over helpless populations.”

"Valid targets," he wrote, were "the headquarters of all corporations with ties to Zionism are fair game."

Is that antisemitic? It certainly sounds that way. But was that the shooter’s motive?

We’ll likely never know.