An early refugee support group helped open Canada to victims of Nazi persecution Canadians tend to think of Canada as a compassionate, hospitable country that has always welcomed refugees and immigrants. If so, they are wrong. In the 1930s, for example, Canada closed its doors to thousands of desperate refugees, many of them Jews fleeing persecution and danger at the hands of the Nazis. One example of such danger was Kristallnacht, the night of broken glass, when the Nazis unleashed their worst pogrom to date. On that infamous night, Nov. 9, 1938, hundreds of synagogues, Jewish shops and homes throughout Germany were torched. Scores of Jewish men, women and children were killed—shot or beaten—while trying to escape death by flames. Following Kristallnacht, some 30,000 Jews were sent t...