There are two framed medical certificates missing from the wall of Dr. Michael Kalin’s office in his medical clinic in Montreal. Kalin, who owns Santé Kildare, earned them years ago from the College of Family Physicians of Canada, which oversees 45,000 family doctors. But the College has ordered him to take them down, after Kalin publicly resigned his membership and withdrew his application to sit on their board, following the College’s publication of a controversial article in their official magazine. Kalin—along with hundreds of his colleagues and Canadian Jewish medical associations—believes the article, titled “The Day the Pagers Exploded”, praises members of Hezbollah, a banned terrorist organization in Canada. The piece in question was written by a Lebanese doctor living in Beirut who has no apparent ties to Canada. She treated hundreds of wounded Hezbollah members in her local emergency ward in September 2024 on the night thousands of pagers and walkie-talkies suddenly exploded, as part of the stunning Israeli operation to take out terrorists planning attacks on the Jewish State after Oct. 7.

He feels there is no place for him any longer in the Canadian organization of family physicians, since they refused to retract the story or explain how it could be published in a peer-reviewed journal that usually talks about the care standards for Canadian patients.

On today’s episode of The CJN’s North Star podcast, Kalin explains to host Ellin Bessner what the reaction has been to his protest.

Related links

• Read the Canadian Family Physician magazine article about the wounded Hezbollah patients and the complaints and the CFPC response.
• Find out more about Santé Kildare, Dr. Michael Kalin’s family medicine clinic in Côte Saint-Luc, Quebec.
• Learn more about the exploding pagers operation in Lebanon, in The CJN.

Credits

• Host and writer: Ellin Bessner (@ebessner)
• Production team: Zachary Kauffman (senior producer), Andrea Varsany (producer), Michael Fraiman (executive producer)
• Music: Bret Higgins

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• Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt)
• Subscribe to North Star (Not sure how? Click here)

On July 18, Jewish communities will mark the 31st anniversary of the AMIA terrorist bombing in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in which Hezbollah, backed by Iran, murdered 85 people and wounded hundreds more at the city's Jewish Federation building. Until Oct. 7, 2023, the AMIA bombing had been the worst mass attack against Jews since the Holocaust.

For Irwin Cotler—the acclaimed lawyer, former justice minister and chair of the Montreal-based Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights—commemorating this anniversary brings a deeply unsettling sense of déjà vu. For two decades, he has been pushing the Canadian government to take stronger measures against the Islamist regime, resulting in an Iranian murder plot planned against him. Today, Cotler will be speaking on a national Federation panel entitled "The Islamic Republic's Long Shadow of Terror".

On today's episode of The CJN's North Star podcast, host Ellin Bessner sits down with Cotler in his home in Montreal to hear exactly how Canada's lax policies on Iran have come home to roost.

Related links

• Watch the July 18 official ceremony and panel on the Islamic Republic’s Long Shadow of Terror, live at 11 am EDT Friday, sponsored by Canada’s Jewish Federations.
• Hear how Winnipeg’s Argentinian Jewish community remembers the 1994 AMIA bombing by Iranian-backed terrorists.
• Read more about the search for justice in the 1994 AMIA terrorist bombing of Argentina’s Jewish community, in The CJN.

Credits

• Host and writer: Ellin Bessner (@ebessner)
• Production team: Zachary Kauffman (senior producer), Andrea Varsany (producer), Michael Fraiman (executive producer)
• Music: Bret Higgins

Support our show

• Subscribe to The CJN newsletter
• Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt)
• Subscribe to North Star (Not sure how? Click here)

It has been three weeks since a ceasefire on June 24 paused the brief war between Israel and Iran. As a recap of what happened: the Israel Defense Forces launched surprise air strikes on Iran’s nuclear bomb-making facilities and other targets. The Israeli government said Iran was weeks away from having working nuclear missiles, which officials say would pose an existential threat to the Jewish State. Teheran retaliated by firing 550 ballistic missiles at Israel and dropping more than 1,000 bombs via drone. Despite Israel intercepting most of those missiles and bombs, the Iranian strikes managed to kill 30 Israelis, while Israeli attacks resulted in an estimated 900 Iranian deaths. Thousands of civilians were wounded on both sides. U.S. President Donald Trump sent forces to bomb three of Iran’s main nuclear facilities, ultimately pushing Iran and Israel to call off hostilities. When the IDF launched its surprise attack, many Canadian-Iranian dissidents initially expressed support for Israel. Some hoped the war would prompt a regime change and bring back democracy and freedom to their homeland. But Trump vetoed the removal of Iran’s leaders, and now initial optimism in Canada has shifted to concern amidst reports of renewed crackdowns by the Islamic republic on its domestic opponents. On today’s episode of The CJN’s flagship news podcast, North Star, reporter Alex Rose sits down to speak with Kaveh Shahrooz, a Canadian lawyer and international human rights activist, on what the brief war achieved and what he fears comes next.

Related links

• Read more about how Iranian Canadians are now concerned for their homeland, after initial hope during Israel’s raids on the nuclear bomb building sites in June, in The CJN.
• How Canadian government agencies are preparing for Iranian domestic threats, in The CJN.
• Why Iran’s terror regime is creating common bonds between Jewish and Iranian Canadians, in The CJN.

Credits

• Host and writer: Ellin Bessner (@ebessner)
• Production team: Zachary Kauffman (senior producer), Andrea Varsany (producer), Michael Fraiman (executive producer)
• Music: Bret Higgins

Support our show

• Subscribe to The CJN newsletter
• Donate to The CJN (+ get a charitable tax receipt)
• Subscribe to North Star (Not sure how? Click here)