Canadian teen who burnt Israeli flags sentenced to year on probation

The teenager who tore down and burned Israeli flags taken from a Montreal Jewish elementary school – which he filmed and posted on social media in April – pleaded guilty yesterday to arson at the Quebec Court-Youth Division. The youth, 16, received a plea deal of one-year’s probation with conditions that impose protections for both the school and the Jewish community.

Montreal police arrested the boy about two weeks ago. Canadian media quoted a social media post in which the teenager distanced himself from alleged antisemitism on the basis of anti-Zionism: “We have nothing against the Jews, the Jews are our brothers in religion, but we don’t like the Zionists,” he wrote.

As thousands of Montrealers were celebrating Israel’s 75th anniversary at Yom Ha’atzmaut events and rallies across the city, the teenager removed Israeli flags from the fences of the Hebrew Foundation School, a private Jewish elementary school in the Dollard-des-Ormeaux suburb of Montreal, and subsequently burned them at a different location.

The incident happened after students had been dismissed for the day. The youth, seen with a keffiyeh on his head, posted the video of the incident on Instagram that evening.

After the sentence was given, many in the Jewish community remained concerned that it “did not sufficiently consider the hateful motivation behind his actions nor the magnitude of the incident’s impact on the community,” according to a statement on behalf of the Center for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA) and Federation CJA, Montreal’s Jewish Federation.

The youth’s video documenting the theft and burning of the Israeli flags “was perceived by many as an attempt to intimidate the Jewish community,’ these organizations said in a statement. Having sparked great concern among parents and their children, the Federation CJA’s Community Security Network (CSN) and local law enforcement increased security around Jewish institutions across Montreal in the days following the incident.

Canadian Jews believe sentence was too light

In response to the sentencing, Eta Yudin, Quebec vice president of CIJA said in a statement on Monday that the “sentencing underscores why we have requested that specially trained prosecutors, equipped with thorough guidelines, be assigned to handle hate crime cases.” Yudin emphasized that “ripping down the Israeli flag from a place where children gather and subsequently burning it, sends an unmistakably threatening message to Montreal’s Jewish community.” She added that when “anti-Zionism is used as a guise to target and intimidate Jews in Canada, that is antisemitism.”

Yudin stressed that, while the Jewish community appreciates the sentence conditions, “the one-year probation does little to deter others from committing hateful acts and nothing to educate the individual about the harm of his actions.”

Yair Szlak, president and CEO of Federation CJA, added that the sentence “should have sent a loud and clear message that acts of antisemitism are motivated by hate and the courts will respond accordingly. Attempts to intimidate Montreal’s Jewish community will never succeed. Our fight against antisemitism and hate will continue as we work to protect Jewish Montrealers from those who seek to do us harm,” he concluded.