Searching for 14-year-old Esti Absent From Her Toronto Home

"It was Friday night. It was cold outside and she left, and it was dark and she didn't have her shoes. Both of her pairs of shoes are by the door. And she doesn't have her phone. Her phone is in the house."

"I don't know who else she might have contact with. I really hope that she's OK and maybe she's just scared to come home and she has friends or someone helping her."

Shira, mother of missing 14-year-old Esther, Toronto 

Toronto Police Duty Inspector Peter Wallace, with Shira and Joseph, the parents of Esther, who is missing, speak to the media outside the Earl Bales Community Centre, May 19, 2026. (Facebook)

 

"We are currently appealing to the public to please check your backyard if you reside in this area, your sheds and also your surveillance camera."

"We are concerned for her safety."

Toronto Police Duty Inspector Peter Wallace 

The Toronto Police Service announced that the search for a missing 14-year-old Jewish girl has been elevated to Priority 1 status and a dedicated phone line has been set up for tips from the public (647-355-4148). The girl has been identified by her parents (whose family name has been withheld for privacy and security reasons) as having been diagnosed on the autism spectrum. Explaining further that the "only reason we're OK saying it now is because she's still missing". Missing, in fact, for over a week. 

 

Police have assured her frantic family that their daughter's disappearance has seen them committing all available resources to finding her. Community volunteers have enlisted themselves in a joint effort to find the girl. Launching a Priority or Level 1 search represents the highest level of police response in cases of missing children. Last seen on May 15 in North York in the area of Earl Bales Park at Bathurst Street and Sheppard Avenue West, the entire community awaits news of her safe recovery and return home.

 

As well as the concerned local Jewish community volunteering in the search, the Shomrim Safety Patrol, a group committed to ensuring the safety and security of Jewish communities across the Greater Toronto area founded in 2021, has also been involved in the search. At nearby Petah Tikvah Synagogue a command centre has been set up in the parking lot. 

 

Police have deployed a drone along with marine, canine and mounted units in their extensive search for the girl. They have, as well, created a QR code for people to scan and upload any video they may have, that might be of assistance in the investigation. There is, needless to say, an added element of fear when a young Jewish girl is alone and unprotected during this period of  high tension where Jews have become targets of heightened antisemitism and stated threats. 

 

 

"Esti, my love, if you are watching this, please come home. We love you so very much. We miss you terribly. Your family, here, across the country, and around the world, are searching and praying for you every minute. Your friends, classmates, neighbours, and community are all worried about you and hoping to see you safe."

"Please know this dearly: You’re not in trouble. Nobody is angry with you, no matter what has happened. All we care about is knowing that you are okay. If you can contact anyone, family, a friend, police, anyone, please do. We just want to know that you are safe."

Shira, mother of missing 14-year-old Esther 

Kidnapping With a Firearm/Sexual Assault With a Weapon

"This guy's phoney refugee claim was rejected almost a decade ago and  he's still in Canada causing chaos."

"The Liberals will never fix immigration or the border -- they broke both."

Parliamentary Conservative Opposition Leader Pierre Poilievre 

 

"[As per the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, obtaining status based on] humanitarian [grounds is a  special exemption requiring cabinet-level approval]."

"[Any applicant can only be approved after a minister examines] the circumstances concerning the foreign national [and comes to the opinion that their protection is] justified by humanitarian and compassionate considerations]."

"[The minister is required to ensure the foreign national does not pose] a danger to the security of Canada, [is not] engaging in acts of violence that would or might endanger the lives or safety of persons in Canada."

"Which Liberal Minister gave this extremist sanctuary in Canada?"

Conservative immigration critic Michelle Rempel Garner 

"[The police report was] absolutely chilling to read."

"Not only how heinous and horrific the motivation of these individuals was, but the means that they had at their disposal to act out that hate is very scary indeed."

"We need greater investment in measures to keep communities safe, and in the prioritization of resources to support intelligence and law enforcement focusing in on this problem of extremism."

Noah Shack, CEO, Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs (CIJA)  

Waleed Khan, Osman Azizov and Fahad Sadaat are facing a combined total of 79 charges according to police, including attempted kidnapping with a firearm and sexual assault with a weapon, police say. Khan is also accused of funding ISIS and aiding terrorist activity, the RCMP said. (Toronto Police Service/YouTube)

 

Three Toronto men were recently taken into police custody, accused of plotting kidnappings of Jewish women off the streets of Toronto, with a view to raping them. One of the three was revealed to be in Canada illegally, his claim for refugee status having been denied in 2018. Azerbaijani national Osman Azizov has remained in Canada nevertheless for an additional six years. Having allied himself with an ISIS sympathizer, random women plucked from the streets of Toronto, along with plots to target the Jewish community with violence became his aspirational agenda.

 

The 19-year-old Azizov had received bail days previously after an August arrest as an accomplice in "armed co-ordinated attempts to kidnap women", according to police. Since then, documents discovered by an investigative reporter revealed the man's  entry to Canada alongside his family in 2017, through illegally crossing the border from the United States into Canada, during a flood of "irregular border-crossers", the result of President Trump's ban on refugee admissions from six Muslim-majority nations.

 

In response to which, then-Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau issued his reaction with a declaration: "To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of  your faith"; a sanctimonious demonstration of the man's 'progressive' credentials. That statement had its effect with a steady stream of foreign nationals taking the opportunity to illegally enter Canada from the United States to claim asylum.

 

Statistics maintained by the Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada reflect that a mere fifty percent of the total asylum claims were reviewed by authorities having been approved; the remaining half "abandoned" or "rejected". Azizov's family was placed in the "rejected" category in 2018 and by 2018 appeals to the Refugee Appeal Division and the Federal Court had gained them nothing. Even so, Azizov held status as a permanent resident, after which obtaining full citizenship potentially follows.

 

Not himself charged with terrorism, Azizov is accused of being part of a trio engaged in a pursuit to kidnap and rape Jewish women, in the company of an individual, Waleed Khan -- in an attempted armed kidnapping of random Toronto women -- a man accused by police of having ties to Islamic State. Khan is accused of a conspiracy to commit murder, for the benefit of, at the direction of, or in association with a terrorist group. 

Fahad Sadaat, left, Osman Azizov, centre and Waleed Khan, above police photos of the suspect’s vehicle, seized firearms and, on the right, the suspects. Peel Police

 

Altogether, Khan, Azizov and co-accused Farad Sadaat, 19, face no fewer than 79 criminal charges.

Waleed Khan, 26, Osman Azizov, 18, Fahad Sadaat, 19, all of Toronto, have each been charged with the following:

1. Disguise With Intent to Commit Indictable Offence
2. Theft Of Motor Vehicle
3. Utter Forged Document
4. Conspiracy to Commit Kidnapping, Hostage Taking, Impersonating Police, Sexual Assault and Sexual Assault with a Weapon
5. Possession of Weapons for a Dangerous Purpose
6. Firearm(s) – Unauthorized Possession
7. Firearm(s) – Knowledge of Unauthorized Possession
8. Firearm(s) in a Motor Vehicle
9. Possession of Prohibited or Restricted Firearm: with ammunition
10. two counts of Sexual Assault with a Weapon
11. two counts of Sexual Assault
12. two counts of Point Firearm
13. two counts of Prohibited Device – Knowledge of Unauthorized Possession
14. two counts of Attempted Kidnapping with Firearm

They will appear in court at the Ontario Court of Justice, 10 Armoury Street, on Thursday, January 29, 2026.  Toronto Police Service

This Is Not Paranoia -- It Is Terror

"I feel that I'm in Germany in 1937. I know for sure I've been targeted. Somebody came just for my car. And for us, obviously."

"We're all in shock. When I came to Canada over twenty years ago I couldn't realize we would face a real pogrom ... in Canada, where everybody used to talk about multiculturalism and love to each other. Never ever have I experienced so much antisemitism as I'm experiencing now."

"It's hard to verbalize my feelings, my fear. And I've never been a fearful person. I've always stood for the right thing on the right side of history. But today I am scared."

"Because they know my address, I don't know what to expect tomorrow. Maybe somebody will come during the night and set my house on fire. Maybe somebody will wait for me in the park when I'm walking the dog. Honestly I'm shaken."

"I don't know how can we leave the house, how can we go somewhere. I don't know how to live, how to breathe. We are in shock."

Victoria Adamov, Toronto resident

A clip from a home security camera shows one of two vandals breaking the car's windows. Photo by Victoria Adamov

Victoria Adamov lives not in a particularly Jewish section of Toronto but one she describes as a "mixed-culture" neighbourhood. All the more convenient for anyone out to harass and terrify Jews to distinguish her family's presence, particularly with the declaration on her bumper of her alliance with and  allegiance to, Israel as the sticker of an Israeli flag attests. Originally an immigrant from Ukraine, she and her family moved to Israel were they lived for a decade before moving again, to Canada. Where fully half of Canada's Jewish population lives.

And where an ongoing 'pro-Palestinian' protest parked itself over the Avenue Road 401 bridge leading to police closing down access while monitoring a clearly illegal presence of protesters interfering with free access on municipal property to tax-paying citizens. A protest where calls to destroy Israel could be chanted through the phrase  'From the river to the sea' with its transparent message. And where signage could be seen with not only the Palestinian flag, but one of the criminally outlawed PFLP (Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine) terrorist group was also on view.

This was no 'pro-Palestinian' protest but an anti-Jew provocation that the Toronto Police Services allowed to go unchecked day after day. A mere one-kilometre distance from nine synagogues serving the Jewish community that was targeted by these hate groups. There also are a number of Jewish schools, community centres, day-cares and Jewish owned businesses close to the bridge location. Where recently one nearby deli-grocery was torched, the message 'Free Palestine' grafitied over its front entrance. One Temple is clearly visible from the overpass.

Ms. Adamov lives near Dufferin and Steele Streets north of Toronto on a quiet cul-de-sac along with her husband, 13-year-old son and two of their pets. Not a Jewish neighbourhood. Their home security camera revealed a dark car driving up at 3:27 a.m. and two masked figures with gloves and hoods leaving their vehicle to approach that of the Adamovs where they smashed the windows of the Toyota in the driveway, then punctured its tires before leaving. None of the house residents were alerted to anything amiss.

 

The vandals broke all the windows on the car but took nothing   Screen shot

 

A neighbour walking by the next morning texted Victoria after noticing the damage to the family car. York Regional Police were alerted and an investigation is now underway. Police, according to a media release, are searching for three suspects, one the driver of a dark-coloured Jeep Grand Cherokee. "The Hate Crime Prevention Unit has been notified and a hate crime investigator is on the case", notes the police release, including a link to the security camera video.

When Russia invaded Ukraine in 2022, Adamov explained, she placed a Ukrainian flag on her car in solidarity. "And it was absolutely no problem. But as soon as I identify myself as belonging to Israel, here is the problem." She feels singled out as a result of the attack, although she has never argued with anyone online, nor has she ever done anything, she points out, that would make enemies. "I think it's pointless to argue with people who have different opinions." Canada, she feels, is lax in safeguarding the safety of its Jewish citizens.

"I didn't have any conflicts I just had an Israeli flag sticker on the back of my car."

"As long as our prime minister doesn't say anything, it will be worse, and it's getting worse by the minute. They used to talk about Islamophobia all the time but nobody's talking about antisemitism, nobody says it's zero tolerance to antisemitism. What are they waiting for? Till somebody will be murdered?"

"I want my voice to be heard. This nonsense must be stopped. High levels of government must act now. Tomorrow it's going to be too late."

Victoria Adamov

Photo by Buongiorno Principessa/Twitter

Pro-Hamas Protests Target Toronto's Jewish Community

Photo by the group Palesign documenting a blockade of the Avenue Road Bridge in north Toronto. Photo by Veronika Sykorova

 

"[There have been] brazen attacks on synagogues, Jewish schools and businesses [across the the city]."

"This hate-motivated arson is yet another direct assault on Canadian values, pluralism and the rule of law -- inciting violence singularly because of one's faith."

"Call it what it is: antisemitism."

MPP Stephen Lecce, Education Minister, Ontario

"Based on the quality of circumstances, we believe that it was committed with bias or prejudice."

"This is not graffiti on a bus shelter. This is not a lawful protest protected by constitutional right. This is a criminal act. It is violent. It is targeted. It is organized."

"We will leave no stone unturned."

Staff Superintendent Pauline Gray, Toronto Police Services

"[These types of incidents leave people feeling shaken and] diminish our sense of safety and belonging."

"All residents of Toronto deserve to be safe and feel safe."

"As Mayor, let me be clear: acts of antisemitism, hate and violence are not welcome here."

Toronto Mayor Olivia Chow

"[Politicians must] speak out forcefully, and take action, against the increasing intolerance targeting Jewish-owned businesses and predominantly Jewish neighbourhoods that we are witnessing on a regular basis."

Steven Del Duca, Mayor, Vaughan former leader Ontario Liberal party

"[The graffiti] confirmed [the suspected arson's] links to the anti-Israel mob."

"This escalation of lawlessness in #Toronto must come to an end."

James Pasternak, Toronto city councillor

Toronto firefighters are shown here at the scene of a fire at North York business early Wednesday. (CBC)

 

So very, very heartening for the Jewish community in Toronto and elsewhere across Canada to know that area politicians are aware of and averse to the divisions within society, stemming from the 'pro-Palestinian' mobs that descend day after day on city streets, bridges, in front of government buildings to shout their 'from the river to the sea' slogan, along with 'gas the Jews', 'intifada' and other cries to appeal to the hate festering in the minds of immigrants from Muslim countries and their enablers who set out to vilify Israel for defending its citizens against murderous terrorist groups.

Like the mob that has assembled day after day on the overpass on the city's main traffic artery, the 401 highway, leading to the heart of Jewish Toronto. The Jewish-owned deli-grocery that was firebombed is about a kilometre distant from the overpass. It doesn't take a genius to turn over a rock to understand that the nasty little slugs slithering out from under are part of that raucous hate-filled mob expressing their vocal antisemitism for all to hear. Nor does it make sense for the very police who vow they will leave no stone unturned, helpfully standing alongside the pro-Hamas protesters to ensure their safety.

That politicians are rallying to condemn antisemitism so viral and lethal it sparked a fire and left graffiti identifying the event with the 'pro-Palestinian' protests, is interesting, but thus far no politician, from the mayor to the provincial premier to the police services have made any move to put a stop to the ongoing racially motivated provocations that have interrupted peoples' lives, caused physical harm and created a terrifying situation for the Jewish population.

According to Toronto police statements they are investigating the fire set at International Delicatessen Foods that broke out on Wednesday, as "motivated by hate", and it certainly takes a genius to arrive at that conclusion. This is a grocery business specializing in European foods, quirkally occasionally printing its menus in Russian language. Its windows were smashed and the shop was defaced with "Free Palestine" graffiti. Some might surmise that the sign over the front entrance reading IDF initials signifying the Israel Defense Forces drew the attention of the arsonists.

 

The business's name is displayed as the acronym 'IDF' in large red letters above the building's entrance. (CBC)

 

The shop owner located in north Toronto, informed Mike Colle, deputy mayor for north Toronto that he had concerns for his family's safety. He also spoke of his business set-back where it could take months of restoration before the business could reopen. Leading Mr. Colle to state that the arson strikes at the city's Jewish community's fears of their security in the face of violent antisemitism. Musing on the human cost of "appalling" hate-motivated violence. So city authorities are cognizant of the problem but haven't seen their way through to stemming it.

According to Toronto police, a major increase has been seen in hate-motivated crimes fuelled by tensions related to the Israel-Hamas war, where between October 7 and December 17, ninety-eight hate crimes were reported, in comparison to 48 for the same period a year earlier. Of the total, 56 were antisemitic in nature, 20 considered to be anti-Muslim.

 

Ya'ara Saks, the federal Liberal minister of mental health and addictions, whose own government under Justin Trudeau has done nothing whatever to take steps to put a stop to the Palestinian program of slandering Israel by accusing it of genocide, and chanting provocative slogans whose meanings are all too clear, that Israel should be destroyed, himself said "with each brazen act of incitement and of violence, the cycle of antisemitism and hateful acts increases", and it most certainly does.

"This leaves everyone in the Jewish community feeling unsafe. Am I going to be the next target? Are my family members going to be a target? This is just so unacceptable."

"This is the product of weeks and weeks and weeks of hateful rhetoric being spread by hate groups operating here."

Jamie Kirzner-Roberts, Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs

According to officials, police and firefighters were called to the scene at about 6:00 a.m. on Wednesday. When firefighters arrived, they saw smoke coming from the rear. Fire crews entered the building and quickly extinguished the blaze. (CBC)

Black Orthodox Israelis

"There's African Americans that are walking around saying, 'free Palestine', thinking that they're saying, 'free Black people from racism in America'." 

"They think it's like a heightened sense of racism that ... people are experiencing in another part of the world. And it's the opposite."

"The people who they think are helping the Palestinians are the people who are actually enslaving the Palestinians: Hamas."

Rabbi Mordechai Yosef Ben Avraham

Rabbi Mordechai Yosef Ben Avraham. Photo by Courtesy Rabbi Mordechai Yosef Ben Avraham

The West's Black liberation movement stood foursquare behind the Palestinians in the days following the massacre of 1,200 civilians in southern Israel October 7, near the Gaza border, in vehement opposition to Israel which as far as BLM was concerned is a settler-colonial state oppressing and persecuting the Palestinians. A photo showing a paraglider, a Palestinian flag and the legend: "I stand with Palestine" was posted on the website of BLM's Chicago branch.

Having done so, it is not possible for them, in recognition of the news filling all legacy news sites not to know the extent of the savage bestiality inflicted by Hamas terrorists on the civilian population of Irsraeli border towns and villages in the marauding massacre that took place on that fateful day; the cruelty in remorselessly killing infants and children, the sadistic pleasure taken in mass-raping Israeli girls and women.

The terrorist attack was characterized as a "desperate act of self defense" by BLM Grassroots. BLM Canada, on the other hand, issued a statement to the effect that it was "horrified by the widespread violence, torture and murder inflicted on innocent civilians across Palestinian lands", studiously avoiding any mention of what had occurred in the state of Israel. 

 

Rabbi Mordechai Yosef Ben Avraham takes especial notice and umbrage of the Black community's stance against Israel. And that can be explained by the fact that he is himself an African American Israeli, profoundly disappointed by those of the Black community who feel justified in opposing Israel on the grounds of "liberation". 

His birth name was Shariff Hasan, a native of Los Angeles who converted to Judaism in 2013 and assumed a new name, more fitting to the career he soon found himself engaged in. In 2015 he travelled to Israel for the purpose of study, but he never left. Attracted by the uniting magnetism of a shared national identity with different cultures living together in a Jewish state as citizens.

He was cognizant that in the 1920s, Jewish philanthropy funded Black colleges and the reciprocal fallout in the 1930s and 1940s when Black colleges gave employment to Jewish academics who fled German fascism. That Jews played a lead role in the Civil Rights Movement in the 1960s was not lost on him. Nor the fact that both communities shared a long history of subjugation.

Blacks in the West turned away from Israel when it defeated Egypt, Jordan and Syria in a joint military venture meant to destroy Israel, during the 1967 Six-Day War, leaving Israel in control of land wrenched from Syria and Egypt; the Golan Heights and Sinai respectively. Black student activists supported the Palestinian 'cause'; newsletters described Zionism as a white colonial project. A stance active today.

According to a Wall Street Journal publication by Jason L. Riley, BLM scapegoats Jews, exploiting racial divisions by using an "old but effective playbook to rally others to their cause. And they are counting on the ignorance, complacency and guilt of white liberals to lend the movement credibility and power".

The Apartheid label so beloved of antisemites is an absurdity, with a fifth of Israeli citizens mostly Muslim Arabs. The remaining four-fifths of the population, are majority Jews native to the Middle East and North Africa who were exiled from their millennia-long diaspora in Muslim countries after their Roman-era expulsion from Judaea. A smaller proportion of Jews were mostly refugees from Europe. Additionally, close to 200,000 Black Israeli Jews originated from Ethiopia.

"We never looked to enact violence on white America. You could take the most radical Black groups that have ever existed in American history, and none of them have ever thought about mass murdering the people who they thought were oppressing them. Hamas and their supporters have no justification if they say, 'Oh, well, it's been oppression for 75 years'", stated the Rabbi.

Musician Nissim Black (in black hat and glasses) brings his two children for a visit with Rabbi Chaim Kanievsky in Bnei Brak, Israel. The rabbi told Black, “Being ‘Black’ is your mayla (virtue), not a chesaron (lacking).” Courtesy of Nissim Black

"[Universities] teach this liberation theory, or theology, around the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. So now that this conflict is happening, these people believe that, 'Hey, I'm actually educated  went to classes and my professors taught about this ... I know the truth of what's going on'."

"A lot of it's just the ego of bad, false education."

Rabbi Mordechai Yosef Ben Avraham