These are strange times, but that much weirder if you happen to be a dual citizen of Canada and the United States. In one sense, it ought to mean being blasé about such questions as whether Canada becomes the 51st state, something President Trump keeps threatening to make happen. It would just mean easier taxes for people like me and better flavours of Häagen-Dazs, right?

But somehow, I care. I really am dually loyal here. I want the best for the United States, which includes it not imploding just because one president is particularly deranged. And I want the best for Canada—the place where I live and am raising a family—and that starts with its continued independent existence, but extends to it not being cowed in trade war by a tech-bro-helmed puppet regime.

It seems unlikely that we’re about to see the U.S. do to Canada what Russia has to Ukraine—and unclear if the tariffs themselves are even going to happen—but I’m not sure the alleged grownups in charge know what their plans are. I feel no sense of smug for having initially (as in, in 2016) been one of those people saying, yeah right, Donald Trump becoming president, and am not particularly interested, this time around, in cultivated a jaded, this-isn’t-going-to-be-anything stance.

And no, I’m not convinced that by dismantling DEI and deporting campus antisemites, the new administration has Jews’ back. (Insofar as such developments are unambiguously beneficial to Jews. I’d say ambiguously at best, at best.) Jews need to buy eggs too, right? And that’s not even getting into the implications for kosher food prices if tariffs proceed.

Or if you’re more into kosher-style, I highly recommend the Ukrainian potato-onion pierogies from the new Multicook on Roncesvalles. Unmistakably made in Canada as there are women in the window literally making them before your eyes.  

But it’s easy to doomscroll, which is why I suggest that you offset some of your own jaw-drops at the state of intra-North American relations with a sitcom from a time when none of this nonsense was going on. (Other nonsense, but not this nonsense.)

***

Did you ever find yourself wondering, what if Midsomer Murders, but Jewish and a sitcom?

From 1992 to 1994, a British sitcom aired by the name of So Haunt Me. It’s about the Rokeby family, who’ve moved on down to a less-nice house on account of the father having lost his advertising job. Things are looking a bit grim, but also a bit… spooky. Why was that mug moving like that? It’s clear something is afoot, and that it can’t be burglars because they’ve nothing to burgle.

The supernatural force turns out to be Yetta Feldman, a Jewish mother who once lived in the house, and as far as she’s concerned it’s still hers. She freaked out and drove away more than a dozen families but has decided that the Rokebies are honorary Jews and is fine with them staying. She sits in the kitchen, visible only to some of the newly-arrived family members, and complains about her own adult daughter—Carole with an e she specifies—having taken up with an unsuccessful musician. She grimaces when she overhears her this-life counterparts saying they’re going to make bacon. Bacon! But hers is a Jewish house. This she insists upon.

It’s all done very theatrically, where it’s acting rather than wild special effects conveying that one of the people on the set is a ghost. It seems like it might not work, but it does.

So Haunt Me stars George Costigan and Tessa Peake-Jones, both of whom have had Midsomer roles, but do you know who plays their sullen teenage daughter? Cully! Yes, Laura Howard, who plays Inspector Tom Barnaby’s aspiring-actress daughter on Midsomer, apparently got her big break on So Haunt Me. Same actress but a very different character, which I understand is what actual television critics refer to as range.

And then there’s Yetta herself, played by Miriam Karlin, a prolific British-Jewish actress. Like Grandma Yetta on The Nanny, this Yetta plays a specific Jewish mother, stereotypical but not just. Like The Nanny, it’s a show unafraid of Othering non-Jews, of showing the world from the perspective

I am but one episode in—with 18 more to go—and already thinking about the dissertation that someone could write (won’t, but could) about what the show means about the idea of Jews as settlers. Yetta views herself as the original and only authentic inhabitant! That’s why she’s not budging.

Yes, as has been pointed out to me, the haunted-by-Jewish-mother thing is a bit like Oedipus Wrecks, Woody Allen’s contribution to the 1989 anthology film New York Stories. In it, an Allen alter-ego character’s mother hovers in the sky, as a kind of visible spectre, telling him—before an audience of ordinary New Yorkers—how to live his life. Did Mendelson get the idea from Allen?

Not necessarily!

I heard a podcast interview with show creator Paul Mendelson where he was explaining that he had pitched So Haunt Me first, but been told it was too ethnic, and that you couldn’t have a show with kids and a dog. This—the casual antisemitism, ageism, and dog-o-phobia of the television world of 1980s Britain—is why he instead made sitcom May to December, which first aired in… 1989. Once that show was a success, he was given license to do So Haunt Me.

Because this is how I spend my limited time on the planet, I had been wondering whether there was anything Jewish about May to December. Does Scottishness serve as a proxy for Jewishness? (Mendelson himself grew up partly in Glasgow so it might be that Scottishness is serving as a proxy for… Scottishness.) Is the sarcastic humour different from that of other Britcoms? (No, they’re all like that.)

Effectively, no, there is nothing obviously Jewish about May to December, unless you take law offices as inherently Jewish environments. There are the jokes about middle aged soliciter Alec’s adult daughter Simone being a Nazi, but this is meant as, she’s uptight and conservative, not that she is rounding up Jews. Mendelson has said that every episode includes people having cake and coffee, and that this is a Jewish quality, but there is also the thing where Alec pours himself (or is poured) a Scotch when he gets home, which seems gentile-coded.

The only thing I can think of is that the age-gap relationship at the core of the show is played a bit like an intermarriage plot. It’s all about whether others approve or disapprove. The couple’s always surrounded by some mix of disapproving killjoy women and approving, would-if-I-could-saying men. Is Alec’s wife Zoë’s youth a stand-in for non-Jewishness? Is it, deep down, a shiksa plot?

These are all questions I would like nothing more than to ask Paul Mendelson, should he wish to discuss his earlier works on a podcast produced by The Canadian Jewish News. Just putting this out there into the universe. If you will Britcom legends as podcast guests it’s no fairytale.

The CJN’s opinion editor Phoebe Maltz Bovy can be reached at pbovy@thecjn.ca, not to mention @phoebebovy on Bluesky, and @bovymaltz on X. She is also on The CJN’s weekly podcast Bonjour Chai. For more opinions about Jewish culture wars, subscribe to the free Bonjour Chai newsletter on Substack.

The post Feeling haunted by tariff talk? Take comfort in how Great Britian was once soothed by a bubbe’s ghost appeared first on The Canadian Jewish News.

It’s not like Lior Bibas is signing as many petitions as he is medical reports—but it certainly seems like the prescriptions need writing.

The Montreal cardiologist and president of the Quebec Jewish Physician Association (AMJQ) added his voice to the Global Jewish Health Alliance (GJHA) condemning the Jan. 2 call by UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese for the global medical community to cut ties with Israel.

1/Nearly a quarter million people have united to condemn remarks by @UN Special Rapporteur @FranceskAlbs, suggesting severing medical ties with @Israel.

As President of the Québec Jewish Physician Association, I am proud to be a cosignator of the Global Jewish Health Alliance… pic.twitter.com/lG5ZLwMdUv

— Lior Bibas🎗️ (@LiorBibasMD) January 27, 2025

Albanese’s proposal is dangerous and endangers global healthcare progress, Bibas posted on social media. “Cutting ties with Israel, a leader in medical R&D, would delay or derail life-saving treatments,” he wrote. “Open science and global collaboration are the bedrock of progress in healthcare. This affects everyone.” Calls for academic and medical boycotts erode decades of trust, delay innovation, and disrupt care worldwide he said, urging the UN, World Health Organization and other professionals to condemn Albanese’s appeal. “Medical boycotts harm everyone—they don’t build a path to peace and certainly do not build a better world.”

Bibas co-founded the AMJQ in the weeks following the Oct. 7 terrorist attack on Israel. “We heard that trainees were having a hard time, and we’ve lived it every time there’s a war, like in 2021” he told The CJN. “We saw a worsening of the situation and were hearing stories of trainees removed from study groups, others put on the defensive about what’s happening, very uncomfortable situations,” and some saw relationships with residents deteriorating very quickly.

“I myself did eight years of residency,” said Bibas, an assistant professor of medicine at Université de Montréal. “Medical training is very hierarchical. You are getting evaluated constantly, it’s really hard and you don’t want to ruffle feathers, which can really have a negative impact on your career.” The AMJQ counts some 400 physicians and 150 medical students and residents as members.

The group participated in the national survey of some 1,000 Jewish Canadian medical professionals, and while it hasn’t released specific results yet, Bibas says there are similarities with Ontario counterparts. “Trainees are getting the brunt of all this. Their entire training ecosystem—relationships with peers and physicians—has changed.”

Whether anti-Zionist remarks, blaming Jews for Israel’s actions, or other behaviour, it can be debilitating in a grueling academic/career setting. “I’m not saying there’s systemic antisemitism in Quebec’s medical system. There are incidents that are dealt with, but issues of trust remain… One of the biggest problems is getting trainees to testify. They don’t trust the system.” The fear of retaliation is so strong, that some students are unwilling to report incidents, even anonymously.

“Even though I think people need to be a bit more outspoken, I understand their hesitation because I once faced an issue with an attending that could have set back my career severely due to power dynamics in academia.”  

2/ Albanese’s mad call to break all medical ties with Israel would put Israeli lives at risk, Jews & Arabs; deprive patients worldwide from life-saving treatments from leading Israeli R&D, including patients in developing nations, explains @LiorBibasMD 🧵https://t.co/sJJMVU8lMc

— Hillel Neuer (@HillelNeuer) January 27, 2025

One first-year Jewish Montreal medical student, who spoke to The CJN anonymously for fear of reprisal, saying within two months of beginning studies he was confronted by two students demanding he explain why Israel “withholds vaccines” from Gazans.

“I was terrified and felt trapped and laughed, asking them if they thought child hostages should be vaccinated. One laughed back and shouted that ‘You can’t stop lying!’. It completely changed my trajectory here. It’s head down and ignore. I’ll speak out when I have the energy to.”

Speaking out is what Bibas is doing, by pushing back on French radio, television, and social media, against unrest on streets and campuses, and calls for medical boycotts.

Peut-on aspirer à une société où ceux qui dénoncent la haine et la violence sont soutenus et encouragés, plutôt que réduits au silence ou diffamés?🤔

Hier, j’ai condamné sur X une image appelant à la violence armée contre des étudiants juifs.

Le résultat? Une attaque sur… pic.twitter.com/oXvdCEIqG3

— Lior Bibas🎗️ (@LiorBibasMD) January 15, 2025

Bibas also says while some colleagues talk of leaving Canada, “I don’t interpret that as people packing their suitcases. I haven’t heard of anyone from Quebec leaving. They may feel they may have no choice, but not because of what’s happening now in hospitals. More because of our future. I have a great practice, I love my work, but I see my kids and I don’t know… Do they have a long life here? With the way things are going, is there a future for our children?”

Elie Haddad knows the feeling. The pediatric immunologist came to Montreal 20 years ago for professional opportunities, “but also because my wife and I thought that France did not have a good future for Jews. So we wanted to leave.” He was often confronted with antisemitism, “of course, in the street, in the hospital, everywhere. It has become banal in France.”

Quebec was “a peaceful haven. We were incredibly surprised, at almost every level we found a beautiful community life, a respectful, multicultural society where people respect laws. It was going so well, but over the years, especially the last five years, we’ve noticed a dramatic abrupt change with regard to antisemitism.”

He himself experienced only one serious incident in the Quebec workplace which marked him significantly but praised his institution’s response as “incredible support which was very reassuring.”

Haddad doubts people really want to leave. “We know as Jews we may have to leave at anytime from any country, so this is saying ‘I feel I’m ready if it’s necessary’. On the contrary, we must not say we’re going to leave, we must fight. We share a vision as Quebecers: separation of religion and state, individual rights, respect for religions, respect for others. It’s a beautiful society and I don’t think we should let it be ruined by dark individuals.”

Bibas agrees. “I’m an optimist. People are saying we should leave but I personally don’t like that kind of talk. If things are not going the way we want, then we need to be empowered. It’s time to show strength and unity. Let’s stay. We belong here. It’s not time to leave because the going is a bit tough. We have it pretty good here and have to fight for that.”

He regularly makes the case that the Jewish and wider Québécois communities share common values that reject hate, fundamentalist and anti-western sentiment recently and regularly articulated in Montreal streets. “We want to live in peace. We respect other people but want people to respect us. And I think what’s happening in Quebec, specifically in Montreal, where people see 15 months of riots, disorder and chaos, is an international embarrassment that will likely affect the standing and investment in Canada and Montreal.”

He deplored the “complete indifference and inaction of Mayor (Valérie) Plante. Really, it’s embarrassing, the fact she just tweets meaningless things. What is she waiting for, more bullets?”

A clinician researcher in a Montreal hospital, Haddad concurs and points out that in France “the situation continues to worsen in a horrible downward spiral for Jews. In Quebec, it’s a multicultural society, it’s beautiful and it can work, but you have to respect the laws and enforce the laws. It’s hard when you have a mayor who does nothing, and people see that and continue with hateful speech, calling for people’s deaths, and we see how our youth, particularly in English-speaking universities, are stigmatized.”

Bibas is a child of Bill 101, raised in the French school system and integrated into Quebec society, and says there’s much to share, and the Jewish doctors group presents itself proudly in French. “We’re a Quebec organization. We want to continue building, contributing to Quebec. We work with patients from all backgrounds, we understand Quebec society, politics, and culture. We want to bridge that gap and show we’re part of the community. We’ve been here for over 250 years and aren’t asking for special treatment—we’re not causing disruptions or protests. We’re not the ones destroying the streets.”

The AMJQ came out prominently in April, responding to a March letter published by a doctors’ collective denouncing Israel’s military campaign. In a written response in French-language media, the AMJQ slammed the letter as a “militant pamphlet conveying mendacious rhetoric” which in addition “to expressing a humanism with variable geometry, spreads erroneous information with impunity, without concern for the accuracy of the facts, with the result of misinforming Quebecers and stigmatizing Israel.”

Un collectif de medecins a publié une déclaration manquant de nuances et de recherches, la rendant de ce fait trompeuse. Voici un article d’une grande importance, qui apporte de la substance à ce sujet.@LP_LaPresse @IsraelenFrance https://t.co/4TNNkHQUYt

— Consulat général d’Israël (@IsraelaMTL) April 1, 2024

War is always monstrous, they wrote, regardless of who it affects. “For us, AMJQ doctors, a Palestinian mother who has lost her child constitutes the same calamity as the Israeli mother who mourns hers. Our compassion has no double standards.”

On Jan. 6, a group of Montreal-area medical professionals walked off the job to protest outside Radio-Canada offices, calling for an arms embargo, ceasefire and medical boycotts. Those who could not attend were encouraged to wear pins and keffiyehs to work. Demonstrators insisted they only abandoned administrative and other tasks, not medical duties.

The CJN asked Quebec Health Minister Christian Dubé’s office if such a walkout should be sanctioned, given the waiting lists and backlogs in the province’s healthcare system.

Spokesperson Marie-Claude Lacasse told The CJN the ministry had no comment. “It’s the Collège des médecins (CDM) ethics code that governs professional responsibilities and not the ministry.” The CDM was similarly mum, referring queries to individual establishments. Only one institution responded, the CHU Sainte-Justine children’s hospital stating, “in Quebec, doctors work in the health network as self-employed workers. This means that they have autonomy in the management of their activities and their professional commitments.”

Bibas was unimpressed. “As physicians, our foremost duty is to provide care and preserve life,” guided by ethical principles that prioritize patients. “It is deeply concerning to witness a call for boycotting Israeli medical institutions and universities—actions ultimately jeopardizing patient care locally and beyond.” He said the group was ignorant of vital contributions by Israeli medical institutions, “including an unwavering commitment to humanitarian aid such as Israel facilitating the polio vaccination of over 1 million children in Gaza over the past year.”

A Jewish staffer at the Centre hospitalier de l’Université de Montréal also speaking on condition of anonymity saw the protest on her way to work, telling The CJN she was “disgusted. We’re working endless hours to keep the system going, dealing with all kinds of shit, and our schedules are locked down. These people claim to do something noble? Why not on a day off? I haven’t heard a single word from any of these types after Oct. 7 other than about Israel’s ‘so-called ‘genocide’. That tells you what they are really all about.”

Haddad says it’s too late for France “and Quebec could get worse if we don’t act.” He has a prescription for that: “Get involved in politics at provincial, federal and municipal levels, explain our situation, make sure laws are enforced. We’re not asking to reinvent the wheel. Multiculturalism can be beautiful but if it’s not working, remake it. I won’t tear my shirt over the model,” he said, in regard to the province’s Jan. 30 announcement that it will completely revamp its model of integrating newcomers to Quebec, with increasing focus on secularism, equality between sexes, and adherence to common values.

In a parliamentary brief last year, the Canadian Federation of Jewish Medical Associations (CFJMA) with more than 2,000 members, said there are non-Jews in Canadian medical faculties “who do not hate Jews and who do not want harm to come to Jews, and there are even a few who are actively working to learn more about antisemitism in order to be better allies to Jews.”

CFJMA’s provincial member organizations however, report increasing numbers of people working in faculties and institutions that govern and accredit medical training “who do not believe that Jews are worthy of equity, equality, or even basic human rights. It is also our experience that the most vocal of those faculty members are active in promoting equity and human rights for other groups, sometimes as individual advocates but often as leaders or as educators in the EDI space.” They added, “this issue of open antisemitism in anti-oppression circles” has grown steadily in North America over the past 10 to 20 years.

The post Quebec Jewish Physicians Association members unite to fight antisemitism in the medical system appeared first on The Canadian Jewish News.

Unidentified men carrying a model of Iran’s first-ever hypersonic missile, Fattah, past a mosque during a gathering to celebrate a failed Iranian attack on Israel, in Tehran, Iran, on April 15, 2024. Photo: Morteza Nikoubazl/NurPhoto via Reuters Connect

Iran has covertly ramped up efforts to construct nuclear warheads for solid-fuel missiles at two sites, a coalition of Iranian opposition groups revealed on Friday.

The National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), which seeks to overthrow the country’s Islamist regime, unveiled a new report detailing how the nuclear warheads are intended for solid-fuel missiles with a 3,000-kilometer range and are being constructed at both the Shahrud and Semnan missile test sites in Iran. The initiatives are being spearheaded by the Organization for Advanced Defense Research (SPND), which is responsible for managing Iran’s nuclear weaponization efforts. 

“Now, we have documented evidence showing that the missile sites in Shahrud and Semnan are fully coordinated with the regime’s nuclear weaponization body, SPND,” NCRI representative Soona Samsami said at a press conference discussing the group’s findings.

The report was sourced from the People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI/MEK), an Iranian dissident network.

According to the NCRI, the regime’s nuclear efforts are being furtively pursued under the guise of being parts of a new “space initiative.”

While Shahrud has traditionally been used to develop and launch new rockets and satellites, the facility has been collaborating with the SPND to advance Iran’s nuclear ambitions, NCRI claimed. To bolster these efforts, SPND has allegedly deployed new personnel at the Shahrud missile test facility and “camouflaged” its efforts as a “satellite program” when, in reality, they are developing a satellite communication system to track the path of nuclear warheads. Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) Brigadier General Ali Jafarabadi has helped develop the Ghaem-100 missile — the main nuclear warhead missile carrier — at the Shahrud site, NCRI said on Friday.

Alireza Jafarzadeh, deputy director of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), discusses new report about Iranian nuclear efforts on Jan. 31, 2025 in Washington, DC. Photo: Screenshot

Moreover, the regime is reportedly constructing liquid-fuel missiles and nuclear warheads at a facility outside of the Iranian city of Semnan. The SPND has allegedly expanded the mostly underground facility for the stated purpose of “space operations.” The Semnan site currently houses eight complexes, up from two in 2005. A series of underground tunnels connects the complexes to each other, according to NCRI. The SPND Geophysics team — led by key experts Mohammad Javad Zaker, Hamed Aber, and Farhad Moradiani Khosrowabad — uses the Semnan site to conduct underground research regarding “high explosive detonations,” which NCRI claimed is “a key part in the development of nuclear weapons.”

Iran has gone to extensive lengths to hide its alleged nuclear proliferation ambitions and evade accountability from the international community, NCRI said on Friday, noting that SPND attempted to conceal Iran’s activities by creating the “Directorate for Nuclear Treaties,” an office which supposedly helps the regime stay in “compliance” with mandates imposed on its nuclear program. The office engages in negotiations with the United States and Europe to supposedly give updates and receive feedback on the nuclear program. 

Iran has claimed that its nuclear program is for civilian purposes rather than building weapons. However, the UN’s nuclear watchdog, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), reported in December that Iran had greatly accelerated uranium enrichment to close to weapons grade at its Fordow site dug into a mountain. The UK, France, and Germany said in a statement that there is no “credible civilian justification” for Iran’s recent nuclear activity, arguing it “gives Iran the capability to rapidly produce sufficient fissile material for multiple nuclear weapons.”

NCRI argued, according to a confidential Iranian internal memo, that Tehran is “attempting to buy time through negotiating” with the United States and Europe to “maintain the current status quo to complete its nuclear weapons program.” According to the memo, the regime wants to prolong current negotiations for six months to circumvent United Nations Security Council Resolution 2231 — a 2015 resolution which outlines an inspection process for Iranian nuclear sites and establishes an end date for UN sanctions against Tehran. 

US President Donald Trump, who withdrew from a 2015 deal with Iran that placed temporary restrictions on the Iranian nuclear program in exchange for lifting sanctions, has, along with several European countries, expressed interest in renegotiating a new nuclear agreement with the regime.

However, NCRI recommended that the international community reinstate previous UN sanctions against Iran that were lifted under the 2015 accord. Further, the group said that all Iranian nuclear sites should be closed and the IAEA should be given unfettered access to the facilities for inspection.

The post Iran Covertly Developing Nuclear Warheads to Be Placed on Missiles, Dissident Group Reveals first appeared on Algemeiner.com.