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Toronto family remembers their son, Tyler Wallace-Cohen, with a twinkling tribute
Two months after their 13-year-old son Tyler Wallace-Cohen died, his parents Jennifer Wallace and Eric Cohen did what their son would have wanted them to do and banished the mid-January darkness by filling their yard with glowing lights, inflatables and joy.
In the midst of the colourful display was the logo for Loeys-Dietz Syndrome, the genetic disorder that led to Tyler’s death in November 2024.
The family invited friends, classmates and neighbours to drive by the Toronto house and give a honk, or get out of their car and enjoy the lights display, take photos and share stories about Tyler. The special event was called Twinkling Tribute Hour for Tyler.
“We wanted to bring joy to others during the holiday season and shine a light on Tyler and the kind of kid he was,” said Wallace.
He was known for his infectious smile and cheering up those around him.
“Tyler would always champion for others. If someone was having a bad day or being bullied, he would always step in and advocate for that person,” said Wallace.
Tyler had no shortage of challenges himself. When Wallace was pregnant, the couple went to an ultrasound early on and found out there was a ‘laundry list of problems’ with their unborn child.
They decided to continue the pregnancy and hope for the best. After a difficult labour, Tyler was born and immediately whisked away by a medical team.
“In the middle of the night, Jen called me and said that he may not make it through the night, and I had to go to SickKids (Hospital),” said Cohen.
Tyler survived but this was the first of many dire medical situations that he would face throughout his life including 17 surgeries, four being major heart procedures.
He lived with Loeys-Dietz, a rare genetic disorder that affects connective tissue. It can cause aneurysms in the aorta and other arteries, as well as other abnormalities.
When he was born, there were fewer than 500 people worldwide with this diagnosis and he had one of the most severe cases the doctors had seen.
“We made it our mission that he was going to not just defy the odds but beat them,” said Wallace.
They tried to ensure Tyler did everything that other kids did including going to school, participating in extracurricular activities, and more.
“A cardiologist said to me, ‘we’re going to give him the best medical care that he can possibly have. Your job is to let him just be a kid,’ and so we did.” said Cohen.
They took family trips and tried to enjoy life as much as possible. One year they went to Niagara Falls and upgraded to the Presidential Suite.
“When Tyler found out, he was so happy and excited. He looked at me and goes, ‘Mom, we’re big ballers’,” recalled Wallace.
At one time, Tyler was followed by 18 different healthcare professionals. Tema Stein was Tyler’s osteopath. They first met when he was less than two years old.
“When he first came to me, he couldn’t bear weight on his feet. He couldn’t stand or walk,” said Stein.
She helped expand Tyler’s capabilities in different ways including introducing him to Kyoshi Dominic Moscone at the Northern Karate School.
“When I first heard about the medical issues he was going through, I was a bit skeptical. I was told to just meet him and right away he stole my heart,” said Moscone.
They started working together for just 10 minutes at a time because of his condition. They made their big goal to get up to an hour.
“His knees would buckle and he would fall over due to muscular imbalance. I would test his balance, push him over a bit. I would ask him if he fell and he would say no or that he almost fell. The almost fall was a huge accomplishment because it meant he could control that stuff,” said Moscone.
Before long, they were training together consistently every Saturday. They worked together for about seven years.
“He accomplished everything according to the same curriculum as everyone else,” said Moscone.
Just last year, Tyler got his black belt. According to Moscone, he never gave up no matter how difficult things were and his parents also played a big role in this major accomplishment.
“He’s a one in a million kid,” said Moscone, “He’s going to be deeply missed. He lived a short but meaningful life. He brightened the lives of everyone he came in contact with.”
Moscone attended the twinkle tribute hour with his sons last week.
“It was amazing. You look at his parents and his whole family and you can see why Tyler was as good as he was. They’re making this terrible thing into something fantastic. It’s just what they do,” he said.
On Nov. 5, 2024, Tyler had his 16th surgery, this time for his aorta. Just two days later, he had chest reconstruction surgery. He came home from the hospital and was recovering at home.
Shortly after, he wasn’t doing well and his parents took him back to SickKids.
“I was hoping it was just a panic attack and the pain was related to the surgeries. But when they hooked him up to the heart monitors, all hell broke loose,” said Cohen.
The doctors did everything they could to try and save Tyler one last time.
“The doctor came over and said there’s nothing we can do, your son is dying. Everyone just left the room and we were alone with him.” said Cohen. “It was the worst feeling because I knew he was gone.”
The couple said the holidays were an incredibly difficult time for them and their family but soon Wallace had an idea.
“Jen convinced me to put up the inflatables and then we started to expand it,” said Eric.
They started to get more inflatables donated to them and it just kept expanding. Eventually, the yard was filled with light and colour.
“We did everything we could to turn that darkness into something bright and fun because that’s what Tyler would have wanted us to do,” said Cohen.
At the tribute evening, they were joined by friends, family, community members, and even the police who flashed their lights and honked their horns in honour of Tyler.
“Tyler would have loved this and the world needs more kind, caring, and compassionate people like him,” said Wallace.
Proceeds from the event went to SickKids Hospital.
The post Toronto family remembers their son, Tyler Wallace-Cohen, with a twinkling tribute appeared first on The Canadian Jewish News.
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Twitter AI’s Spree of Antisemitic Answers Provokes European Union Meeting as US Military Signs Deal With Company
European Union flags flutter outside the EU Commission headquarters in Brussels, Belgium, on June 17, 2022. Photo: Reuters/Yves Herman
Following an update earlier this month to xAI’s Grok chatbot which resulted in a wave of antisemitic and pro-Hitler responses to users on X/Twitter, the European Commission summoned representatives from billionaire Elon Musk’s artificial intelligence company to a Tuesday meeting to explain themselves.
The move comes after Italian parliament member Sandro Gozi urged for the Commission to begin a formal inquiry, as “the case raises serious concerns about compliance with the Digital Services Act (DSA) as well as the governance of generative AI in the Union’s digital space.”
Poland’s Minister of Digital Affairs Krzysztof Gawkowski had also called for the Commission to take action and said that the Polish government would consider banning the app.
Due to the size of the X platform, the site falls under the European Union’s DSA which requires transparency about operations. Musk’s app already faces multiple investigations by the Commission.
On Wednesday, following the initial antisemitic statements from Grok, X’s Linda Yaccarino, the company’s CEO, announced her resignation.
On Monday, xAI announced a $200 million deal to provide Grok to the US military. The company stated that “under the umbrella of Grok For Government, we will be bringing all of our world-class AI tools to federal, local, state, and national security customers.” Customers in the plan could “use the Grok family of products to accelerate America – from making everyday government services faster and more efficient to using AI to address unsolved problems in fundamental science and technology.”
The Pentagon also announced on Monday other AI companies would receive contracts, including Anthropic, Google and OpenAI.
Douglas Matty, chief digital and AI officer at the Defense Department, said that “leveraging commercially available solutions into an integrated capabilities approach will accelerate the use of advanced AI as part of our Joint mission essential tasks in our warfighting domain as well as intelligence, business, and enterprise information systems.”
Also on Monday, Musk unveiled a new release to the AI capabilities on X. The Companions feature will allow users to interact with cartoon characters, including a mischievous fox and an anime-style goth girl named Ani.
On Tuesday, xAI put out a statement explaining that it had “spotted a couple of issues with Grok 4 recently that we immediately investigated & mitigated.” The company said it had “tweaked the prompts and have shared the details on GitHub for transparency. We are actively monitoring and will implement further adjustments as needed.”
The post Twitter AI’s Spree of Antisemitic Answers Provokes European Union Meeting as US Military Signs Deal With Company first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Jewish Synagogue, Holocaust Memorial Vandalized in Poland After Politician Denies Holocaust
An antisemitic slur spray-painted on the ruins of a former synagogue in Dukla, Poland. Photo: World Jewish Restitution Organization
Two Jewish sites in Dukla, Poland, were vandalized over the weekend mere days after Polish member of the European Parliament (MEP) Grzegorz Braun claimed gas chambers at the former Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp were fake and repeated an antisemitic blood libel in a live radio interview.
Vandals spray-painted the word “F–k” followed by a Star of David on the ruins of a former synagogue that was destroyed by the Nazis during the Holocaust, and a memorial commemorating Holocaust victims located at the entrance of the Jewish cemetery in Dukla was defaced with a swastika and the word “Palestine,” according to the World Jewish Restitution Organization (WJRO). The memorial honors Jews of Dukla and the surrounding areas who were murdered by Nazis during the Holocaust.
The two Jewish sites in Dukla are cared for by the Foundation for the Preservation of Jewish Heritage in Poland (FODZ), which was established in 2002 by the Union of Jewish Communities in Poland and the WJRO to protect and commemorate Poland’s Jewish heritage sites.
“These hateful acts are not only antisemitic, but they are also attempts to erase Jewish history and desecrate memory,” said WJRO President Gideon Taylor in a released statement on Tuesday. “Polish authorities must take swift and serious action to identify the perpetrators and ensure the protection of Jewish heritage sites in Dukla and across the country.”
“The vandalism of Jewish sites in Dukla—with swastikas and anti-Israel slurs—is not an isolated act,” insisted Jack Simony, director general of the Auschwitz Jewish Center Foundation (AJCF), in a statement to The Algemeiner. The nonprofit focuses on preserving the memory of the Jewish community in Oświęcim (Auschwitz) and maintains the Auschwitz Jewish Center, the last remaining synagogue in town.
“While we cannot say definitively that it [the vandalism] was sparked by Grzegorz Braun’s Holocaust denial, his rhetoric contributes to an atmosphere where hatred is emboldened and truth is under assault,” added Simony. “Braun’s lies are not harmless — they are dangerous. Holocaust denial fuels antisemitism and, too often, violence. This is why Holocaust education matters … because when we fail to confront lies, we invite their consequences. Memory must be defended, not only for the sake of the past, but for the safety of our future.”
On July 10, a ceremony was held commemorating the 84th anniversary of the 1941 Jedwabne massacre, when hundreds of Polish Jews were massacred – mostly by their neighbors – in the northeastern town in German-occupied Poland. The ceremony was attended by dignitaries and faith leaders including Poland’s Chief Rabbi Michael Schudrich and Israeli Deputy Ambassador Bosmat Baruch. Groups of anti-Israel and far-right activists — including MEP Braun and his supporters – tried to disrupt the event by holding banners with antisemitic slogans and blocking the vehicles of the attendees, according to Polish radio.
Hours later, during a live radio broadcast, Braun falsely claimed the Auschwitz gas chambers were “a lie” and the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum was promoting “pseudo-history.” He also claimed that Jewish “ritual murder is a fact.” Polish prosecutors launched an investigation into Braun’s comments, they announced that same day. Under Article 55 of the Act on the Institute of National Remembrance (IPN), Holocaust denial is a criminal offense in Poland.
The Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and Museum issued a swift condemnation of Braun’s remarks and said it intents to pursue legal action. The Institute of National Remembrance — which is the largest research, educational and archival institution in Poland – also denounced Braun’s remarks, saying there is “well-documented” evidence supporting the existence of gas chambers. His comments were also condemned by the Embassy of Israel in Poland, Polish Foreign Minister Radosław Sikorski and the US Embassy in Warsaw, which said that his actions “distort history, desecrate memory, or spread antisemitism.” AJCF called on the European Parliament to consider disciplinary measures against Braun, including potential censure or expulsion.
Auschwitz Jewish Center Director Tomek Kuncewicz said Braun’s comments are “an act of violence against truth, against survivors, and against the legacy of our shared humanity.” AJCF Chairman Simon Bergson called the politician’s remarks “blatant and baseless lies,” while Simony described them as “a calculated act of antisemitic incitement” that “must be met with legal consequences and universal moral condemnation.”
The post Jewish Synagogue, Holocaust Memorial Vandalized in Poland After Politician Denies Holocaust first appeared on Algemeiner.com.
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Coalition of 400 Jewish Orgs and Synagogues Urge Teachers Union to Reverse Decision Cutting Ties with ADL
Anti-Defamation League CEO Jonathan Greenblatt. Photo Credit: ADL.
Following a vote by the National Education Association (NEA) on July 6 to end its relationship with the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), 400 Jewish communal groups, education organizations, and religious institutions have come together to call for the influential teachers union to change course.
“We are writing to express our deep concerns about the growing level of antisemitic activity within teachers’ unions, particularly since the Hamas terrorist attacks in Israel on October 7, 2023,” the letter to NEA President Becky Pringle stated. “Passage of New Business Item (NBI) 39 at the National Education Association (NEA) Representative Assembly this past weekend, which shockingly calls for the boycott of the Anti-Defamation League, is just the latest example of open hostility toward Jewish educators, students and families coming from national and local teachers’ unions and their members.”
In addition to the ADL, signatories of the letter included American Jewish Committee (AJC), Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, Jewish Federations of North America, #EndJewHatred, American Jewish Congress, B’nai B’rith International, CAMERA (Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting & Analysis), Combat Antisemitism Movement, Democratic Majority for Israel, StandWithUs, Simon Wiesenthal Center, Zioness Movement, and Zionist Organization of America (ZOA).
The group told Pringle that “we have heard directly from NEA members who have shared their experiences ranging from explicit and implicit antisemitism within the union to a broader pattern of insensitivity toward legitimate concerns of Jewish members – including at the recently concluded Representative Assembly. We are also deeply troubled by a broader pattern of union activity over the past 20 months that has targeted or alienated Jewish members and the wider Jewish community.”
The letter to Pringle included an addendum providing examples of objectionable rhetoric. These named such incidents as the Oakland Education Association (OEA) putting out a statement calling for “an end to the occupation of Palestine” and the Massachusetts Teachers Association (MTA) accusing Israel of genocide.
The coalition of 400 organizations urged the NEA to “take immediate action” and suggested such steps as rejecting NBI 39, issuing a “strong condemnation” of antisemitism within the union, drafting a plan to counter ongoing antisemitism in affiliate chapters, and opposing “any effort to use an educator’s support for the existence of Israel as a means to attack their identity.”
ADL CEO and National Director Jonathan Greenblatt wrote on X that “Excluding @ADL’s educational resources from schools is not just an attack on our org, but on the entire Jewish community. We urge the @NEAToday Executive Committee to reverse this biased, fringe effort and reaffirm its commitment to supporting all Jewish students and educators.”
The post Coalition of 400 Jewish Orgs and Synagogues Urge Teachers Union to Reverse Decision Cutting Ties with ADL first appeared on Algemeiner.com.