The Ben Mulroney Show - A Synagogue In Shock and Sorrow

Episode Date: September 24, 2026

On this episode of 'The Ben Mulroney Show,' Ben welcomes Noah Shack, CEO of the CIJA (The Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs). They discuss the terrible shooting at a Belleville, Ontario synagogue that rocked a small community on the holiest of Jewish days. If you enjoyed the podcast, tell a friend! For more of the Ben Mulroney Show, subscribe to the podcast! ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://link.chtbl.com/bms⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Also, on youtube -- ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.youtube.com/@BenMulroneyShow⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Follow Ben on Twitter/X at https://x.com/BenMulroney Insta: ⁠⁠⁠@benmulroneyshow⁠⁠⁠ Twitter: ⁠⁠⁠@benmulroneyshow⁠⁠⁠ TikTok: ⁠⁠⁠@benmulroneyshow⁠⁠⁠   Executive Producer:  Mike Drolet Reach out to Mike with story ideas or tips at [e-mail] Enjoy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Discover free sports tips, casino games, and poker guides at OZoon.net. 20th, register and fundraise for cancer research at Terry Fox.org. You're listening to the Ben Mulroney show. Welcome back. And we've got to spend more time on this synagogue shooting in Belleville. It's the weirdest thing happened. You know, I posted about it yesterday. And a whole bunch of people who react immediately negatively to anything I say, assumed I had said something against the Muslim population, which I've never done.

And they said, oh, did you notice the guy was white? And I said, yeah. And I also noticed he was a member of the military. And I noticed that the CBC had no problem showing us that he was white and in the military. They did not, they did not miss a beat in showing us his picture. I'll leave it there. But it also proves to me that anyone can be poisoned by the toxic rhetoric that is put out designed to demonize Jews across this country.

That it's not, it's not, no one is inoculated and no one is more sensitive than anyone else. And this guy got, this guy got poisoned just like everybody else. So let's invite my next guest in the conversation. Noah Shaq is a CEO of Aceja, and he's got a perspective on this that I want to hear. Welcome, Noah. Thank you very much for having me.

So what's Siege's position on the shooting, but on everything that's happened since, including something I can't stop talking about today, which is the clearly, provably, demonstrably anti-Semitic tweet by Avi Lewis? Well, I spent a day in Belleville today with Jewish community leaders, members of the synagogue, and with police leaders as well, really trying to get to understand up close and personal what happened there and what needs to happen going forward. And I need to start by just expressing unabounding gratitude to Constable Jeff Smith and his. colleagues at the Belville Police Service to put their lives on the line to prevent a far greater

tragedy from unfolding with this gunman approaching the synagogue at peak attendance on the evening of Yom Kippur, the holiest night of the year for the Jewish community there. And frankly, this isn't something that has only targeted that synagogue and that Jewish community. It targeted the entire neighborhood in Belleville, a peaceful neighborhood where children are out in their yards playing. Families are getting together like they would in any peaceful neighborhood anywhere in this country. And it underscores the extent to which these types of incidents are not just a threat to Jewish Canadians. It's a national security threat to our country. Yeah. And Noah, I'm sorry, those links are not necessarily being made by the leaders who have the power to make those links

and affect the change they do. I'm not saying one or the, look, I find it really distasteful that this, that our prime minister pledged another $100 million in aid to Palestine today. I just, I feel he could have waited a couple of days on that one, given the, given the politics of it all. And it's just odd to me. And again, when you've got somebody like, Auvie, Lewis claiming chanting genocide, genocide, genocide, and Jews are collectively responsible.

The only person responsible for the violence on Sunday is the gunman. But when you feed them a steady diet of blood libel and you say those are the people responsible for the things that you hate the most. And they're tearing down to use Darahorn's expression. The Jews are responsible for trying to destroy the thing that you value most. somebody's going to think it's noble of me to do something about it. Absolutely. And the statements that our political leaders make don't happen in a vacuum.

It's imperative for them to understand that we're living in a toxic climate where conspiracy theories about Jews and Israelis abound. And that our leaders have a duty to be responsible, back responsibly within that environment and not contribute to. to the radicalization and extremism that we're seeing in our midst. I mean, it's being reported that the shooter in Belleville was discharged from the Canadian Armed Forces, at least in part because of anti-Jewish conspiracy theories and espoused. And, you know, we are seeing this time and again,

people believing the absolute worst about Jews, about Israel, and the double standard exhibited by our government in terms of foreign policy is a contributing factor to this permissive environment that we find ourselves in. And to say nothing of the heinous comments from the leader of the NDP, putting a responsibility for anything people think is wrong, half a world away on the back of Jewish Canadians here at home and giving full license for would-be attackers targeting the Jewish community. Noah, does it not concern you that the fact is the Jewish communities always had to shoulder a lot of responsibilities that other levels of government shoulder for other communities?

Meaning when I walk down the street, I've got that, when I go to my church, I don't really have to worry about anyone shooting it up. I mean, I might have to worry about somebody lighting on fire, but I don't have to worry about it because I know the cops are going to be around. For the longest time, you've had to make sure that at your schools and at your places of worship and other cultural places that mean something to the Jewish community, you've had to get your own security there. And then I guess because of pushback,

the mayor of Toronto, finally started putting police officers, more of them where they need to be. But it shows that even that is not enough. There was a police officer, two police officers there, in Belleville. And one of them is no longer with us. The other one is injured, like this is,

what are we supposed to do if a police presence itself is not enough? Well, thankfully in this circumstance, the police efforts were able to prevent the worst case scenario from happening at a mass casualty event from taking place. But it underscores the reality of the need for an armed police presence

to protect Jews from gathering in Canada. which is an unacceptable reality. Nobody should require that level of protection to exercise basic freedoms in this country. And I think it's also important to point out that we've seen a member of the Toronto Police Services killed in the line of duty investigating shootings targeting a synagogue in Toronto. We now have a member of the Belleville police services in critical condition in hospital for protecting a synagogue that was shot at in Belleville. Forget about wanting to protect the Jewish community for a moment. We should not be living in a country where our men and women in uniform are put into this kind of danger on what's becoming a regular basis. We need to confront this not only as a community in need, but a problem in need of prevention. And that requires not just sympathy, not just platitudes of thoughts and prayers, but a commitment to deal with the root of this problem that's targeting our fundamental way of life as Canadians.

Yeah. Listen, I wish, I wish, Noah, that I could say it's behind us and, you know, better days ahead. I know that's not the case. I know that's... 100% this is the beginning and I hope that the lives that were saved by Constable Jeff Smith

and his incredible heroic sacrifice and the efforts of his colleagues, number one, don't go unnoticed by Canadians of all walks of life, but that there are a wake-up call that his injuries are not in vain and that we recognize

that we should not be putting are men and women in uniform in harm's way, that we need to deal with the root of this problem collectively as a country and holding our leaders to account when they fail to take the action necessary. Noah Shaq, thank you for being here. I really appreciate it. Thank you for having you. All right.

Before we go to break, let's turn the page on this frustrating story. It's beyond sad now. We're in frustrating because we have the power to do stuff about this and we choose not to. So that's what's frustrating to me. And but let's speak of those moments of happiness I was talking about at the beginning of the show because somebody out there at some point is going to score a pair of tickets to go see Dave Chappelle on his Carmageddon tour October 23rd at Scotia Bank Arena. Now tickets are available at Ticketmaster.ca.

I think what we're going to do is we are going to, oh, well, here's the trivia question. And the first person to text in at 416-870-6400 is going to win the tickets and we'll tell you about it at the end of the show. is the trivia question. Which Ontario Nuclear Power Plant is undergoing a major refurbishment project to help deal with our provinces growing electrical needs? Which Ontario Nuclear Power Plant is undergoing a major refurbishment project

to help deal with our provinces growing electrical needs? 416870-60 600. You could win tickets to see Dave Chappelle. We'll be right back. And when we come back, the polls are tightening in the mayoral race in Toronto. We'll talk about those numbers and I'm going to ask you about what is going to get you off the couch to vote in this next election? James and Jessica were trying to sell their newly purchased townhouse,

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