I think education is a key component of what a Canadian Jewish heritage month can help bring about. Education on issues like anti-Semitism and tolerance and diversity, and the value of those things in Canadian society, is increasingly necessary as we see the problematic behaviours that this committee has recently examined. I think there are a lot of things to celebrate during a Canadian Jewish heritage month, but there are also a lot of difficult things to reflect on, whether it's the treatment of Jews back in the thirties and forties or the rise in sustained anti-Semitism that exists across the country.
The Toronto board of education recently had an exhibit on the Holocaust, and it was quite a remarkable exhibit. It was staged at a school that has no Jewish presence. They had Holocaust survivors and Holocaust educators go in, train a number of students at the school who were not Jewish, and then they brought students in from across the city to experience it. Some of the facilitators had more of a formal background in Holocaust education, but the students also spoke to them about what they had learned and how it had opened their eyes. I sat in on one of these sessions. As I said, it was a group of kids from a school with no Jewish presence, and I don't think many of them had heard of or understood the impact of the Holocaust and what it was all about, what the lessons are, and the depths of the depravity that took place. Watching them get these lessons from other students and watching them relate to one another, many of them in tears, was quite a remarkable moment.
I think Canadian Jewish heritage month should be a celebration, but it should also be a time to reflect on the difficult lessons that Jewish Canadians have faced across the country. I think this is going to be a poignant element that will be reflected, whether in your community or in the larger communities of Montreal and Toronto.