Edmonton Heritage Festival still celebrates Israel, despite antisemitism and COVID

Last year, the Edmonton Heritage Festival, one of the city's biggest celebrations, was cancelled due to the pandemic. This year, organizers decided to go ahead—though at half capacity—and invited the Jewish Federation of Edmonton to join with their annual pavilion for Israel.

The pavilion could mark the only Israel-themed public gathering in Canada this summer, as many other large-scale events remained on hiatus or have gone virtual. The Edmonton pavilion featured Israeli folk dancers, selfie photo ops against a backdrop of the Dead Sea, a display wedding and, of course, Israeli food, from falafel to frozen mint lemonade.

Beyond the pavilion borders, however, Edmonton's police their tent was not far away. Indeed, the event's organizers worried about taking part in the festival this year—not just because of COVID, but also the summer of spiking antisemitic attacks that have surged across Canada since the violence between Gaza and Israel flared up in May.

Stacey Leavitt-Wright, the CEO of the Jewish Federation of Edmonton, joins the show to discuss her organization's thought process and offer an audio tour of what they put together.

What we talked about:

• Learn more about the Edmonton Heritage Festival at heritagefest.ca
• Learn more about the Jewish Federation of Edmonton at jewishedmonton.org

The CJN Daily is written and hosted by Ellin Bessner (@ebessner on Twitter). Victoria Redden is the producer. Michael Fraiman is the executive producer. Our theme music is by Dov Beck-Levine. Our title sponsor is Metropia. Find more great Jewish podcasts at thecjn.ca.