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Trade war meets tradition: Canadian Jews confront a Manischewitz-free Passover
(JTA) — TORONTO — Max Kirschner pondered the kosher wine section at an uptown Toronto liquor store, two days before the start of Passover.
As he mulled over which six bottles to purchase for his two seders, he had plenty of options: Wines from Israel, Italy, Chile, Argentina and New Zealand lined the shelves. The South African sauvignon blancs were directly below the French bordeaux.
There was something missing, though: any product from the United States.
That’s because all U.S.-produced wines and spirits have been pulled from the shelves across the province of Ontario in response to Donald Trump’s sweeping tariffs. Other provinces have enacted similar bans.
Which means that, for the second year in a row, Jewish customers don’t have access to some traditional, kosher-for-passover options such as Manischewitz.
The change has left some Jewish Canadians scrambling for alternative, sweet kosher red wines, or even having bottles shipped across the country. On Monday afternoon, however, Kirschner seemed unbothered by the change.
“I graduated from Manischewitz,” Kirschner said. “Twenty, 25 years ago Manischewitz and Carmel were the only two choices. Now, there’s lots of choices.”
Though tucked away in a corner on the second floor, the kosher section is particularly robust at this liquor store location, in the predominantly Jewish Ledbury Park neighborhood. An employee, who’d been speaking on the phone about wines for haroset, guided a steady stream of customers through the global selection of kosher wines.
Mike, who declined to share his last name to avoid potential backlash at his workplace for supporting Israel, said Manischewitz has never been on the table at his family’s Moroccan Jewish seders.
But he said he saw a silver lining for those who partook in the Manischewitz tradition. “Now people can buy Israeli,” he said.
A number of customers said they would be supporting Israel by buying bottles from its wineries. And according to Josh Greenstein, executive vice president of the Israeli Wine Producers Association, the American booze ban in provinces like Ontario has “created a meaningful opening” for Israeli wineries in Canada.
That demand has been “absorbed primarily by domestic Canadian wines,” but Greenstein said there are “pockets of increased interest in imported alternatives, including Israeli wines — particularly within the kosher market and among consumers already familiar with the category.”
While the long-term impact will depend on future trade dynamics and consumer behaviors, he said, “Israeli wine is well-positioned to gain incremental share, and we are actively working with partners to support that growth.”
Some Jewish Torontonians are not making a trip to the liquor store at all.
For Sylvia Babins, Manischewitz is a crucial ingredient in her haroset recipe — so she ordered a shipment from a liquor store across the country, in Calgary, Alberta, where American wines are still on shelves.
Babins said she ordered nine bottles of the kosher wine — six for her, three for her sister — at a cost of $11 per bottle and about $50 in shipping.
“I’m sure I can go find a sweet, red kosher wine [at a Toronto liquor store], but I make haroset every year for the family and I always use Manischewitz,” Babins said. “I need it.”
In a Jewish Toronto Facebook group that she’s in, Babins said other members reported making the two-hour drive to Buffalo, New York. But between paying for gasoline and import duties, Babins said the costs would’ve exceeded her shipping payment anyway. Plus, she added, she didn’t have to give her business to an American store.
“Yeah, I’d rather support Canada,” she said.
There was clearly some demand for the sweet Manischewitz taste at the store on Monday. An employee pointed out a spot on the bottom-left shelf, where they’d kept the bottles of Carmel Palwin, a sweet, yellow-labeled Israeli wine that tastes similar to Manischewitz (though it isn’t made with Concord grapes).
They had run out.
This article originally appeared on JTA.org.
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UK adopts sweeping measures against antisemitism in schools
(JTA) — The U.K. has adopted sweeping measures to combat antisemitism in English schools, prompting pushback from the country’s largest teachers’ union.
The move came after a new government-commissioned review found that three in five Jewish students reported experiencing antisemitism in English schools. The most common incidents were jokes, stereotypes and comments about Jewish people. About half of respondents who witnessed or experienced antisemitism said the incidents were not reported, most often because they did not think they would be taken seriously.
The government on Wednesday accepted 27 recommendations from the report, including dedicated antisemitism training for leaders and staff, improved recording of antisemitic incidents and moves to build a better understanding of Jewish life, identity and contemporary antisemitism.
The government commissioned the report following a spate of high-profile attacks on Jews in Britain, including an attack on a synagogue in Manchester last year that left two men dead.
The report’s author, Sir David Bell, the vice chancellor of the University of Sunderland and former chief inspector of schools in England, recommended addressing antisemitism distinctly from other forms of racism. He argued that antisemitism was a “uniquely complex” problem because of intertwined racial and religious dimensions, since Jewish identity can encompass both an ethnicity and a religion, along with expressions of prejudice that hold all Jews responsible for the actions of Israel.
The government will also encourage English schools to adopt the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) working definition of antisemitism. The definition is supported by many mainstream Jewish organizations and has been adopted by 47 countries, including the U.K., but critics say that it conflates some forms of antisemitism with criticism of Israel.
British Education Secretary Lucy Powell called Bell’s review a “generational moment” and said that “implementation is now my priority.”
However, the National Education Union, the largest union representing teachers, lecturers, teaching assistants and support staff in the United Kingdom and Europe, raised concerns on Wednesday about recommending the IHRA definition for schools. NEU general secretary Daniel Kebede said in a statement that the definition “risks deepening the problem rather than tackling it, and actively undermining efforts to confront antisemitism.”
“The IHRA’s contested framing risks blurring the line between antisemitism and legitimate criticism of the Israeli government and the genocide in Gaza, leaving teachers with uncertainty when they need clarity,” said Kebede. He cited a risk that “children who cannot critically explore issues through classroom discussion will instead seek their answers in online and unsafe groups.”
Kebede also encouraged Britain’s Department for Education to strengthen guidance on all forms of racism, not only antisemitism, saying that 65% of teachers report they have not received any antiracism training in the past year.
The Board of Deputies of British Jews, an umbrella organization for British Jewish communities, celebrated the antisemitism report and the government’s adoption of its proposed measures. The group specifically praised the report’s “clear recommendations that schools and local authorities follow government guidelines by adopting the IHRA Working Definition of Antisemitism as a tool to deepen understanding of contemporary antisemitism.”
“We remain concerned about undue external influence on schools driven by narrow political agendas, and tendentious materials seeping into schools and increasing disharmony, and we will continue to press for vigilance against this,” said the Board of Deputies.
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Orthodox Jewish man stabbed in midtown Manhattan
(New York Jewish Week) — An Orthodox Jewish man is in stable condition after being stabbed on Wednesday evening in the Diamond District of midtown Manhattan. Police are investigating the attack as a possible hate crime.
Police told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that the NYPD’s Hate Crimes Task Force is investigating the incident as a possible antisemitic attack, and Manhattan Shomrim — the Jewish community watch group — has asked people to share footage as police search for the suspect. No arrests have been made.
The victim was identified by police as a 26-year-old man, and Orthodox Jewish outlet COLLive identified him as a resident of Crown Heights, the neighborhood that is home to the Chabad-Lubavitch Hasidic movement’s headquarters.
He was taken to Bellevue Hospital in stable condition. Police said they were called at about 5:50 p.m. on Wednesday after the man was stabbed in the back with “an unknown sharp object” on 47th Street near Fifth Avenue. ABC7 reported that the victim told investigators he believed he was stabbed with a needle or syringe.
According to the Chabad website, which published an interview with the victim, he is a recently ordained Hasidic rabbi named Joseph, who commutes to Midtown each day to wrap tefillin with Jewish merchants. The attacker, Joseph told the website, was a woman who seemed to be following him prior to the stabbing.
The attack comes as Jewish New Yorkers have been targeted in more than half of the hate crimes committed in New York City this year, despite making up about 12% of the city’s population.
In July, an assailant stabbed two men on the Upper West Side, including one who was leaving a synagogue, while yelling “Allahu akbar,” and was charged with committing hate crimes.
Louis Keene contributed reporting.
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VIDEO: A Hasid gives us a tour of Morocco in Yiddish
דער ירושלימער יוטוב־שטערן וועלוול קירשנבוים האָט לעצטנס אַרויסגעשטעלט אַ ווידעאָ אויף ייִדיש פֿון אַ פּרעכטיקן וויזיט, וואָס ער האָט געמאַכט אין מאַראָקאָ. עס באַגלייט אים זײַן חבֿר אַבֿרהם פּרץ.
אינעם ווידעאָ זעט מען ווי קירשנבוים דאַוונט שחרית מיט די אָרטיקע ייִדן און באַזוכט אַ גוט אָפּגעהיטענעם בית־עולם, וווּ עס ליגן באַערדיקט גרויסע צדיקים ווי למשל הרבֿ חיים בן עתר (1696–1743), באַקאַנט ווי דער „אור החיים“. „מענטשן מיינען, אַז נאָר אין אייראָפּע זענען דאָ קבֿרים פֿון צדיקים!“ זאָגט קירשנבוים.
מיר זעען אַ גרויסע, שיינע שיל מיט אַ פֿײַנער אַרכיטעקטור אין קאַזאַבלאַנקאַ; דעם גרויסן אַראַבישן שוק, וווּ קירשנבוים קויפֿט זיך אײַן מלבושים פּונקט ווי די מאַראָקאַנער גייען אָנגעטאָן. ער באַוווּנדערט אויך די שיינע טיי־גלעזער און טשײַניקן, וואָס מע פֿאַרקויפֿט דאָרט, און באַקענט זיך מיט אַ ייִדישן סוחר וואָס האַנדלט מיט זילבער און גאָלד, פּונקט אַזוי ווי זײַן טאַטע און זיידע האָבן געטאָן פֿאַר דור־דורות.
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