From Auschwitz, 98-Year-Old Holocaust Survivor Issues Urgent Warning Over Rising Antisemitism in Canada

Nate Leipciger, a 98-year-old Holocaust survivor, has issued a stark warning about the surge of antisemitism in Canada while speaking from the grounds of the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp in Poland — the very site where he was imprisoned as a teenager during World War II. Leipciger, one of the dwindling number of living survivors, called on Canadians to confront hatred before it escalates further, drawing direct parallels between the conditions that enabled the Holocaust and trends he sees unfolding in his adopted country today.

Leipciger’s return to Auschwitz — the Nazi extermination complex where an estimated 1.1 million people, the vast majority of them Jewish, were murdered between 1940 and 1945 — carries extraordinary moral weight at a moment when the generation of living witnesses is rapidly disappearing. The Claims Conference estimates that fewer than 245,000 Holocaust survivors remain alive worldwide, with most in their late 80s or 90s. Their testimonies have long served as an irreplaceable bulwark against denial and historical revisionism. Leipciger, who lost his mother and most of his family at Auschwitz, has described how hatred begins with words, marginalization, and dehumanization long before it escalates to violence and genocide. His message from the grounds of the camp was explicit: the warning signs he witnessed in 1930s and 1940s Europe are reappearing in contemporary Canadian society, and silence in the face of such trends is complicity.

The statistical reality in Canada underscores Leipciger’s alarm. According to B’nai Brith Canada’s annual audit of antisemitic incidents, the country experienced an unprecedented wave of Jew-hatred in 2023, with incidents including physical assaults, vandalism of synagogues and Jewish-owned businesses, online threats, and harassment at universities. Canadian police services across Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver have all reported sharp increases in hate crimes targeting Jewish communities. The firebombing of synagogues, shooting incidents at Jewish schools, and large public demonstrations featuring explicitly antisemitic chants and imagery have shaken a community that historically viewed Canada as a safe haven. The Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs and other advocacy groups have called for stronger law enforcement responses and more robust hate crime legislation, while some university administrators have faced criticism for what Jewish student organizations describe as inadequate responses to campus antisemitism.

Leipciger’s warning also arrives amid a broader political reckoning in Canada over how the country addresses hate. The federal government appointed a Special Envoy on Preserving Holocaust Remembrance and Combatting Antisemitism, and Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has repeatedly condemned antisemitic acts, though critics across the political spectrum have argued that rhetoric has not been matched by sufficient action. Provincial governments in Ontario and Quebec have also faced pressure to increase security funding for Jewish institutions, many of which have been forced to hire private guards and install barriers. Looking ahead, the trajectory of antisemitic incidents in Canada and internationally will be closely watched. As the last survivors age, the question of how their testimony will be preserved and transmitted to future generations — through recorded testimonies, educational mandates, and memorial institutions — becomes increasingly urgent. Leipciger’s plea from Auschwitz is, in many ways, a final call from the generation that witnessed humanity’s darkest chapter: remember, act, and do not allow history to repeat itself.