MONTREAL — The assault on a Jewish visitor from France that took place in broad daylight on the streets of Ste. Agathe des Monts last month is the latest and most serious incident in what the community’s longtime rabbi sees as escalating anti-Semitism in the region.

Rabbi Emanuel Carlebach, left, spiritual leader of the House of Israel Congregation for 23 years, said this summer is the worst he has seen, with a spike in verbal harassment, vandalism and other property crimes directed at visibly observant Jews who summer in this region of the Laurentians.

On Aug. 16, a French vacationer, originally from Montreal, and his three sons, all wearing kippot, were walking to the House of Israel for Shabbat services, Rabbi Carlebach said. They told police they encountered a group of youths who threw pennies at them. The Jewish family objected to the derogatory prank, the exchange became heated, and then one of the teens, who had a ring or other metal object on his finger, struck the eldest of the sons, aged 23, in the face, and ran off.

Carlebach said the young man’s face was cut and bleeding, but he did not need to go to hospital.

“What really bothers me is that other people were around and did not come to his aid,” Rabbi Carlebach said. The father, he said, asked witnesses to call the police but no one did so.

The Sûreté du Québec said late last week that they were close to making an arrest of a suspect aged 18 to 20, who was among about eight youths involved in the incident.

Rabbi Carlebach thinks the police and municipal officials should recognize that the situation is worsening and try to find a solution. “We can no longer take these as isolated incidents.We feel this is not random; Jews feel they are being targeted.”

B’nai Brith Canada denounced the assault as a hate-motivated crime and part of a disturbing increase in anti-Semitism in the Laurentians. Canadian Jewish Congress said the incident “clearly has elements of anti-Semitism,” but cautioned against concluding that there is an anti-Jewish campaign in the area or that municipal authorities are losing control of the situation.

Rabbi Reuben Poupko, a member of the CJC Quebec region board of directors, said Congress is satisfied that the police are “taking very seriously” this and other incidents in the Ste. Agathe area this season, but does not believe “there is a co-ordinated conspiracy against Jews.”

At this point, he said, there is no evidence that a spate of vandalism or break-ins of property owned by Jews were hate-motivated.

Rabbi Poupko said the charge of anti-Semitism is far too serious to be levelled on the basis of a gut feeling, as understandable as Rabbi Carlebach’s concerns are.

“The greatest of care must be taken before calling something anti-Semitic,” he said.

Rabbi Poupko agrees there are tensions between religious Jews who holiday in the Laurentians and the local population, but does not think the situation is any worse than elsewhere, such as New York’s Catstkills.

Other incidents cited by Rabbi Carlebach include the spray-painting in July of some 10 cars in the Trout Lake section of Ste. Agathe, where many traditional Orthodox Jews from Montreal have vacation homes. Homes there have also been broken into or damaged, and there has been mischief like garbage cans being turned over.

In early August, a kosher grocery store in Trout Lake, owned by Chassidim, was burgled, but the intention appears to have been to harass rather than to rob, he said. “The freezer doors were open but nothing was taken,” said Rabbi Carlebach, whose son works at the store.

Rabbi Poupko said these incidents, while troubling, also should not be labelled as anti-Semitic in the absence of such evidence as hateful graffiti, and he is not prepared to see a pattern yet. “Sometimes vandalism is just vandalism. Because the victim was Jewish does not necessarily mean he was targeted for being Jewish.”

Rabbi Carlebach said there has also been an increase in anti-Semitic slurs, mostly from teenagers, and eggs have been thrown at Jews on their way to synagogue.

“I had a nine-year-old going by on a bike say to me, ‘Heil Hitler,’” Rabbi Carlebach said. He himself is a Lubavitcher, but the House of Israel is a mainstream Orthodox congregation.

In general, Rabbi Carlebach said the Jewish community has very good relations with other residents and the authorities.

“We are very open. We have Catholic kids coming here to visit the synagogue every year,” he said.

B’nai Brith urged Premier Jean Charest, Ste. Agathe Mayor Laurent Paquette and politicians from the Laurentians to denounce the situation and the police to put adequate resources into investigating what it terms a “rash of hate incidents targeting members of the Jewish community.”

This summer’s incidents in the Ste. Agathe area are part of a “disturbing trend” of increased anti-Semitism recorded by B’nai Brith in the Laurentians and elsewhere in rural Quebec over the past couple of years, said Allan Adel, national chair of the organization’s League for Human Rights.

“We are deeply disappointed in the passersby who witnessed this assault yet failed to alert police to the crime in progress,” he said.

Because the victims tend to be religious Jews whose identity is visible, Adel thinks it is reasonable to presume these incidents, including the property crimes, are hate-motivated.

Ste. Agathe, about 100 kilometres north of Montreal, is the largest town in the Laurentians with a population of about 10,000.

Alex Werzberger, president of the Coalition of Orthodox Chassidic Organizations, said the Laurentian communities where Chassidim vacation in significant numbers, such as St. Adolphe d’Howard, Préfontaine, Val Morin and Val David have not experienced any upsurge in incidents this season.

“There’s always anti-Semitism, but I can’t say there’s been anything exceptional,” he said.

Mayor Paquette was on vacation last week, but the Jewish community hopes to meet with him to express their concerns when he returns.