Canada’s new antisemitism envoy Deborah Lyons urges tripling office staff to handle ‘moment of crisis’

On Oct. 16, 2023, Deborah Lyons was officially named Canada’s new special envoy on Holocaust remembrance and combating antisemitism. She takes over from the inaugural envoy, Irwin Cotler, at a time when Jews in Canada are facing frightening waves of antisemitism on the streets of this country, stemming from Hamas’s attack on Israel on Oct. 7 and the subsequent war. Lyons, 73, is not Jewish herself but has deep ties to Israel, and to the Canadian Jewish community, having served as Canada’s ambassador to Israel from 2016–2020. She calls what is happening in this country “a moment of crisis” that calls for numerous societal changes. And to oversee that, she needs more staff. Right now she has one senior civil servant to help her. Marking one month on the job, Lyons joins_ The CJN Daily_ host Ellin Bessner to explain what she is doing on the ground to help make Canada’s Jewish community feel safer.

What we talked about

• Learn more about Lyons’s recent appointment as Canada’s special Envoy on preserving Holocaust remembrance and combating antisemitism, in The CJN
• Read about Deborah Lyons’s appointment as Canada’s ambassador to Israel in The CJN, from 2016
• Hear Lyons’s tribute to the slain Canadian-Israeli peace activist Vivian Silver on The CJN Daily

Credits The CJN Daily is written and hosted by Ellin Bessner (@ebessner on Twitter). Zachary Kauffman is the producer. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Dov Beck-Levine. Our title sponsor is Metropia. We’re a member of The CJN Podcast Network. To subscribe to this podcast, please watch this video. Donate to The CJN and receive a charitable tax receipt by clicking here.