People attend a candlelight vigil at Lafayette Square across from the White House in Washington, on May 22, following a shooting that left two people dead.MANDEL NGAN/AFP/Getty Images
The fatal shooting of two Israeli embassy staffers outside a Jewish museum in Washington has drawn shock and sorrow across Canada, with Jewish leaders demanding that more be done to combat antisemitism.
Prime Minister Mark Carney said he was “devastated and appalled” by the murder of the young couple, Yaron Lischinsky, 30, an Israeli citizen, and Sarah Milgrim, 26, an American.
“This was a targeted attack against the Jewish community – a violent act of antisemitism,” Mr. Carney said in a post to X. “This hate is intolerable, and I condemn it in the strongest terms.”
Mr. Lischinsky and Ms. Milgrim were leaving an event at the Capital Jewish Museum on Wednesday night when a suspect approached a group of four people and opened fire, Metropolitan Police Chief Pamela Smith said at a news conference on Thursday.
The gunman then walked into the museum, was detained by event security and began chanting “Free, free Palestine,” Chief Smith said.
Elias Rodriguez, 31, of Chicago, was charged Thursday in U.S. federal court with two counts of first-degree murder, the murder of foreign officials, causing death with a firearm and discharging a firearm during a crime of violence.
Mr. Lischinsky had purchased a ring this week with the intention of proposing to Ms. Milgrim next week in Jerusalem, said Yechiel Leiter, Israeli ambassador to Washington.
The museum had been playing host to a humanitarian-aid event for Gaza.
Rabbi Dan Moskovitz, senior rabbi of Temple Sholom in Vancouver, said he was shocked but not surprised to learn of the shooting. He had been warning elected officials about their messaging on the Israel-Hamas war, which he said failed to appropriately identify Hamas as the perpetrator and scapegoated Jewish and Israeli people.
“It didn’t surprise me at all that someone would take from that, ‘I’m going to go be a vigilante and make an example of the Jewish people,’ and exact retribution or punishment on them for the suffering − the real suffering − that is happening in Gaza,” he said.
Noah Shack, interim president at the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, a Canadian non-profit advocacy group, said the shooting was the result of the predictable pattern of growing hate and incitement targeting Jews in North America.
“While our community is resilient, this should be a wakeup call to all governments about the urgent need for action,” he said in a statement. “This includes strengthening laws to tackle the open support for terrorism taking place in Canadian streets and enhancing measures to secure Jewish institutions here in Canada.”
Rabbi Andrew Rosenblatt of the Congregation Schara Tzedeck Synagogue in Vancouver, which was the target of arson almost exactly one year ago, said now is a time for Jews to grieve – and to remember that they are not the ones who should be feeling guilty at this moment.
“We don’t inspire this antisemitism,” he said. “People often say, ‘Rabbi, what are you going to do about antisemites?’ And I respond to them, ‘I don’t have antisemites in my congregation; it is not my responsibility to fix the antisemites.’ ”
Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre said he was “heartbroken and outraged” by the killings.
“Antisemitism is the world’s most enduring form of hatred. We see it rear its ugly head close to home here in Canada as well, with violence, vandalism and intimidation in our communities,” he said in a post on X.
“We must speak the truth, stand with the Jewish community, and unite to erase this hatred from Canada and the entire world.”
Meanwhile, the 2025 UJA Walk With Israel fundraiser in Toronto will proceed as planned on Sunday, with organizers saying that current events have made the gathering more important than ever.
Last year’s walk drew about 50,000 people, and preregistration is higher this year than last.
“The people who are targeting our community, the people who are espousing hate, want us to stay home,” said Sara Lefton, chief development officer at the UJA Federation of Greater Toronto.
“They want us to be afraid to walk outside in our own city, in Toronto, to live proudly as Jews and as Canadians. And we can’t allow that to happen. We can’t be afraid. We must be proud.”
The Israel-Hamas war was ignited on Oct. 7, 2023, when Hamas fighters killed 1,200 people in southern Israel and took more than 250 hostages, according to Israeli tallies.
Since then, Israel’s military campaign has killed more than 53,600 Palestinians, according to the territory’s health ministry, which does not distinguish between civilians and combatants. The fighting has displaced 90 per cent of the territory’s roughly two million population, sparked a hunger crisis and obliterated vast swaths of Gaza’s urban landscape.
With a report from The Associated Press