Montreal, May 13, 2026  — A new report from Canadians for Justice and Peace in the Middle East (CJPME) is raising the alarm about the illicit influence activities of the Israeli government, which has been engaging in deception and covert ops to intervene in Canadian public affairs. The report, titled “Israeli Foreign Influence, Intervention, and Transnational Repression in Canada,” also looks at Israel’s repressive targeting of its critics outside of its borders, including advocating for restrictions on Canadians’ democratic rights. The report urges Canada to acknowledge Israel as a threat actor in terms of foreign interference and hold malicious actors accountable for their activities targeting Canadians.

Click here to download a PDF of the report

"Until now, Canada’s public debates on foreign influence have conspicuously excluded any discussion of Israel, despite its documented pattern of engaging in covert influence, deception, and racist disinformation,” said Michael Bueckert, Vice President of CJPME and lead author of the report. “Canada must finally acknowledge Israel as a threat actor, end the double standard, and take action to counter its illegitimate actions within our borders.”

The report highlights a number of reported examples of foreign interference in Canada, in which Israel has attempted to covertly and deceptively influence decisions or outcomes. In multiple instances, the Israeli state has hired Canadian individuals or businesses as proxies to hide its role in influence activities. Examples include:

• Covert funding of opinion polls to manipulate Canadian public opinion on Israel’s genocide in Gaza.
• Covert funding of propaganda junkets for Canadian politicians and journalists to Israel.
• Covert propagation of racist anti-Palestinian and anti-Muslim disinformation, using fabricated front organizations and AI-based social media accounts.

The report also looks at Israel’s activities of transnational repression, which refers to the targeting of critics outside of its borders, often from specific ethnic or cultural communities, through monitoring, coercion, harassment, intimidation or violence. Examples in the report include:

• Advocating for restrictions on Canadians’ democratic rights.
• Surveillance, profiling, and doxxing of Canadians in the Palestine solidarity movement.
• The risk of Israeli spyware used to target activists in Canada, as deployed by various regimes and even Canadian police services.

"Canadian authorities have many tools available to them to fight foreign interference, from the expulsion of diplomats to sanctions on those who spread disinformation. Canada must apply these tools to Israel as they would with any other country found to be engaging in these activities,” said Yara Shoufani, CJPME President.