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Montrealers gathered Wednesday evening to commemorate the three-year anniversary of the Hamas-led attack that killed 1,200 people in Israel and saw 251 people taken hostage.
Rabbi Lisa Grushcow said the attack on Oct. 7, 2023, left a lasting impression on Jewish Montrealers. Three years on, she says life for people in her community has been forever changed.
“For the vast majority of Jews who I know, everyday life has been absolutely changed,” she said. “It really is a watershed moment in ways that we never would have imagined three years ago.”
Grushcow said one of the best things for non-Jewish Montrealers to do is educate themselves and foster mutual understanding.
“It would be wonderful if people could learn more about what being a Jew is and isn’t, about what Zionism is and isn’t — if we could be less quick to demonize each other or to polarize,” she said.
The commemoration, held at the Gelber Conference Centre, was hosted by Federation CJA and the Montreal Jewish community.
During the ceremony, attendees observed a moment of silence, lit candles and shared memorial prayers and musical tributes.
Raquel Look is the mother of Montrealer Alexandre Look, who was killed during the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas-led attack in Israel. (Alexandre Silberman/CBC)
The program featured first-hand testimony from Lee Rahav, who helped defend Kibbutz Nirim — a collective farming community in southern Israel near the Gaza border — during the Oct. 7 attacks.
Since then, Israel has launched a retaliatory campaign in Gaza that has killed more than 74,000 people — including more than 1,400 since a ceasefire was signed last October.
To highlight Nirim’s ongoing recovery and its close ties to Montreal, the evening also included video presentations and the creation of a community tile mosaic to be installed in Israel.
When it comes to the attacks, Grushcow said it’s important to remember “that we’re talking about faces and names and people’s lives and not numbers.”
Whatever your position on the conflict, she said, the vast majority of people who were murdered, wounded or kidnapped were civilians — parents, children and grandparents.
Eliaz Luf, the consul general of Israel in Montreal, serving Quebec and Atlantic Canada, attending the commemoration Wednesday and said it’s important to have this type of event in every city in the world.
“Not only for the Jewish community, but for the world community,” he said, adding it’s important to remember the attack to make sure nothing like it happens again.
Raquel Look, mother of Montrealer Alexandre Look, who was killed in the attack, said the passing of time has made his loss even more painful in some ways, as she can’t hold him, talk to him or celebrate holidays with him.
“This whole weekend has been excruciatingly painful,” she said. “Bombarded with all the images again — the sounds of Oct. 7.”
Robert Presser, a CIJA Quebec board member, said the commemoration was an opportunity to raise awareness and remind people of the seriousness of the Oct. 7 attack. (Alexandre Silberman/CBC)
She said the community has helped her get through the pain. “It’s important to me to keep Alex’s light shining bright.”
Recalling her son’s life-saving heroics during the attack — which she witnessed in a video call with him — Look said events like the commemoration and others are important to build public awareness.
Robert Presser, a Quebec board member for the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA), said it was more than a commemoration. It was an opportunity for the community to come together, raise awareness and show the world “that we will not be put down,” he said.
“It’s events like this that remind people of the seriousness of the act and the risk of it happening again.”