Why Canadian Jews are increasingly averse to identifying as 'Zionists' despite supporting Israel: study

Some Canadian Jews refuse to refer to themselves as Zionists, but it’s not because they don’t support the right of self-determination for Jews and the existence of a Jewish state, according to a newly published study. It’s largely due to a perceived negative connotation associated with the term, notably since the Oct. 7, 2023 terrorist attacks in Israel by Hamas.

“It’s become a pejorative word in the mass media and on the street and in places of work, in the university system, in public schools and so on,” the study’s author Robert Brym told National Post. He is also a professor of sociology and S.D. Clark Chair in Sociology at the University of Toronto.

“This does not mean that Canadian Jews who refuse to say they are Zionists are unconditionally opposed to Zionism as English-language dictionaries and general encyclopedias define the term (support for Jews having self-determination in a country of their own),” Brym writes in the study’s conclusion.

“Even among Canadian Jews who refuse to say they are Zionists, 88 per cent agree that Israel has the right to exist as a Jewish state.”

“I think this is a way of informing the general public that Jews are hurting,” he told National Post, about surveying the Canadian Jewish community.

“They’re scared, not all — but many, if not most — are scared about what might transpire. Some awful things happened this year in Manchester, U.K. and in Sydney, Australia. They can happen here.”

The study , published in last month’s issue of the academic journal Canadian Jewish Studies, is a follow-up on a previous study commissioned by three Jewish groups in 2024 with Brym as a consultant, which found that 49 per cent of Canadian Jews polled did not identify as Zionists. However, 94 per cent of them said they supported the existence of a Jewish state in Israel.

He wanted to find out why there was such a discrepancy.

What he determined was that the term has undergone what linguists call a pejorative “semantic drift” — when a word’s established meaning changes over time, in this case, from positive to negative.

Given the constant and consistent negative messaging, such as “Zionism is racism,” since October 7 — the phrase has appeared on signs at protests, in the form of graffiti, banners, t-shirt inscriptions, and adhesive stickers, Brym wrote — he hypothesized that Canadian Jews were shifting away from the term for three reasons: negative sentiment associated with the term in some settings, or because they feel “uncertain and unstable” of their views on Israel after October 7, or as a response to the semantic drift.

“The only question is whether (Canadian Jews) want to label themselves as such,” he said. “And apparently, a large number of them, close to half, are either ambivalent or refuse to label themselves as such, because it’s become a pejorative word.”

In Canada, there have been ongoing anti-Israel protests in Jewish neighbourhoods . Five people were arrested in November after an anti-Israel protest at an off-campus event hosted by Jewish Toronto Metropolitan University students. Two people were arrested at an anti-Israel protest outside of a Munk debate event featuring former politicians from Israel in December.

Also in December, mezuzahs (Hebrew prayer scrolls) were ripped from the doorways of homes belonging to seniors in the Jewish community and an alleged hate-motivated extremism plot that targeted Jewish women led to three arrests.

Brym said that study’s like his are crucial in order to get a “better sense of what’s going on and how the Jewish community is reacting to it,” especially because data about Canadian Jews are scant.

For the follow-up study published last month, Leger polled 332 out of the 588 Canadian Jews who took part in the first study between Jan. 3 and Jan. 25, 2025.

The results indicate that factors such as “mass media, social media, and colleges and universities seem to have undermined the willingness of many Canadian Jews to refer to themselves as Zionists, although they remain highly likely to say they are emotionally attached to Israel and are almost certain to support the existence of a Jewish state in Israel.”

Writer and pro-Israel advocate Aviva Klompas told National Post that the term has been “deliberately distorted and weaponized to the point where identifying with the word now carries social, professional, and even physical risk.”

“In that environment, it’s not surprising that people distance themselves from the label, even as they continue to support Israel and affirm its right to exist,” she said.

“ That’s why the finding that 88 per cent of Jews who avoid calling themselves Zionists still believe Israel has the right to exist as a Jewish state is so telling. This isn’t a rejection of Jewish self-determination. It’s a response to stigma.”

Brym also said that in a 2018 study, he found that 84 per cent of Jews in Canada considered their support of Israel to be an essential part of Jewish identity. Klompas pointed out that Jews are being told, in order to be accepted, they have to hide or disavow a core part of that identity.

“That is a loyalty test no other people are asked to pass. It demands that Jews renounce their national identity, history, and collective rights simply to be welcomed in public and social spaces,” she said.

For Brym, he said it was crucial to note “there’s almost unanimity in the Jewish community behind support for Israel as a Jewish state” and that “many Jews do have an aversion to calling themselves Zionist (but) that’s only because it’s become a pejorative term.”

“I think that’s a very important distinction to make. It doesn’t mean they’re anti-Zionist. It doesn’t mean that they don’t hear extreme statements against Israel as being OK. They don’t,” he said.

“You know, shots have been fired , fires have been lit (at Jewish schools and synagogues). Terrible things have been said. People march into into Jewish neighbourhoods in this city — the way the (Ku Klux) Klan used to, in the States, march into Black neighbourhoods — just to intimidate and frighten people. That’s something that never occurred before and should not be occurring now, because it’s harassment based on religion, based on ethnicity, and it’s appalling. People have to understand that.”

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