u/Pitiful_Equal_2689

Kudos to the Toronto police.

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The Toronto Police Service is making the public aware of an arrest made in a suspected hate-motivated Assault with a Weapon investigation.

It is alleged that:

on Tuesday, June 30, 2026, at approximately 12:10 p.m., the accused, without provocation, approached the victim in the Jane Street and Lawrence Avenue West area the accused yelled anti-Israeli slurs and then picked up rocks and other items from the street and repeatedly threw them at the victim while uttering death threats the victim sustained minor injuries.

It is believed that the victim was targeted because of their religious attire

On Tuesday, June 30, 2026, at approximately 12:20 p.m., Abdulkadir Al-Jelani, 58, of Toronto, was arrested and charged with: 

Three counts of Assault with a Weapon
One count of Uttering Death Threats

He is scheduled to appear in court at the Toronto Regional Bail Centre, at 2201 Finch Avenue West, on Wednesday, July 1, 2026, at 10 a.m., in courtroom 105.

Anyone with information is asked to contact police at 416-808-3505, Crime Stoppers anonymously at 416-222-TIPS (8477), or at www.222tips.com.

When suspected hate-motivated offences are reported to police, the investigation is led by the Hate Crime Unit (HCU).

If it is alleged a criminal offence was committed (such as assault or mischief) and it is believed to have been motivated by bias, prejudice or hate, the officer-in-charge may consult with the Crown. If a person is charged and convicted of the offence, the Judge will take into consideration hate as an aggravating factor when imposing a sentence.

Wilful promotion of hatred and advocating genocide are hate propaganda (hate speech) offences which require the Attorney General’s consent to lay charges. These charges are often laid at a later time.

Corporate Communications for Hate Crime Unit

There was a shooter in the very Jewish Cote-des-Neiges neighborhood of Montreal, Quebec, Canada a short while ago.

Three are reported dead: Rabbi Michael Moshe Mizrahi is the civilian killed, a police officer who fell in the line of duty, and the shooter themselves. Others are wounded.

The shooter apparently sent a manifesto before the shooting to various media outlets. I have not seen a copy yet.

Rabbi Motti Seligson, the Chabad spokesman in New York, said that the shooting may not have been related to the Jewish community.

There are some other reports that the shooter wanted to ambush the police.

There is not known to be a second shooter but the investigation is ongoing, according to the police.

My question is basically the title of the post:

I am intensely curious as to what kinds/styles/designs of sword would be best for lethal dueling (one on one) and small-mid size group combat if most parties involved are heavily armoured, and why? What would it be like - how long, heavy, tapered a point, curved/straight, etc.?

For the sake of example, by heavily armoured, I do not mean articulated plate, but perhaps chainmail, steel/iron lamellar, or brigandine - something like 12th-13th century Europe or China.

Let's also assume that such swords could be made out of the best suited steel or metallic alloy (regardless of how anachronistic that would be - so, in theory, even if the alloy only became possible to make in the 21st century with ultra-modern metallurgy, it would still be fair game for our example). Similarly, let us assume that the cost of the sword was not an issue or limitation. This would not be a weapon for mass use.

I thought I would ask here since I am routinely impressed by the depth of knowledge about swords displayed in this reddit.

As a few caveats:

1. I understand that no sword is the outright 'best' overall, and that designs were made/evolved to fulfill specific functions in specific environments.

2. I understand that designs were limited by economic, technical, material, and technologic constraints (quality of steel, knowledge of alloys, availability, cost of input materials, technical difficulty/complexity of forging, etc. etc.).

3. I understand that the strengths of polearms as primary weapons are often misunderstood, greatly underestimated, and greatly underappreciated and that they may in fact be better in certain/many contexts. I understand that as plate armour developed and was able to deflect direct slashing blows and penetration of the plate armour itself, other weapons and techniques evolved in response to this (polearms, warhammers, murderblows, half-swording, etc. etc.).

Nonetheless, I am specifically interested in swords.

4. I am not sure how the prevalence of shields would impact the design of the sword in the scenario I gave, so if someone could explain that to me too, I would appreciate it. :)

We had a huge turnout this year. Estimates are in excess of 60,000 people. To put this in perspective, the entire Greater Toronto Area Jewish community is about 200,000 people.

We had tons of people from centenarians to newborns, and allies in the thousands from many communities - first and foremost the Iranians by the hundreds at least, but also chiefs and elders of multiple First Nations tribes, Filipino communities, Caribbean communities, Indians, Nigerians, South Koreans, and I saw other flags as well.

And the Toronto police did an amazing job separating the terrorist cheerleaders from everyone marching. Huge police presence and very friendly. Kudos to them. And they even arrested a few people.

The Toronto police limited the protesters to a few areas, major intersections mostly, and then back from the walk proper.

Also, a bunch of people who organized on a Jewish Toronto facebook group had the bright idea of having a giant banner to block sight of one group or protesters.

And we had a wonderful festival at the Prosserman JCC (the middle one) at the end.

It was a lovely time. Cant wait for next year.

Toronto Jews and our allies showing up in the tens of thousands.

This is the front of the group alone.

I’ll post more when I know more numbers.

This is good news, but also disturbing.

The police are saying the attacks were organized well in advance. We can at least be happy that the aspiring terrorists encompassed both men and women.

Interesting. I would love to see a copy of the lawsuit.

Baruch hashem, Esti was found safe.

I do not know about the rest of you, but this feels like a huge relief for me.

"The explosive Department of Justice complaint alleges anti-Israel protesters seized control of UCLA’s main quad in April 2024, setting up barricades and physically blocking Jewish and Israeli students from entering classrooms, libraries and walkways.

One Jewish student was knocked unconscious with an open head wound, while others were kicked, beaten with sticks and blasted with pepper spray. Another victim was assaulted and told “Hitler missed one.”

One Native Jewish woman-who counter protested by holding a sign reading “Hamas supporters are not welcome on native land”-was “violently assaulted,” per the complaint. UCLA police were “directly behind [her] and [did] absolutely nothing,” it added.

Protestors established militia-style checkpoints on UCLA’s campus and refused to allow Jews to traverse public property unless those Jews denounced a core tenet of their religion, per the complaint.

The encampment took over Royce Quad — the heart of campus — with barricades, checkpoints and graffiti including “F*** ALL Jews” and ‘F*** Israel’ scrawled on buildings."

and my favourite part:

"More than 100 complaints were filed by Jewish and Israeli students — many allegedly ignored by the school.

Internal findings cited in the lawsuit say UCLA leadership repeatedly refused to enforce its own rules, allowing the illegal encampment to persist for days."

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This is crazy. Although I do vividly remember the young Jewish woman who was beaten unconscious by pro-Hamas students at UCLA in or around April 2024, and the video of that happening.

I am glad there is a lawsuit, and I am glad the antisemitism at UCLA is coming out again. It should not be swept under the rug and forgotten.

UCLA needs to suffer consequences for not just allowing such attacks on Jews to happen but for enabling it and tacitly encouraging it.

For my garden, I have a lot of 'greens' to compost, but not a lot of 'browns'. I am not sure what I can use for browns until the autumn when leaves fall.

I have a lot of scrap printer paper from an office, but they have been printed on. Would that be a safe and effective source of 'brown' compostable material? Or should I avoid it?

I was wondering if it would be possible to have the international community, or at least numerous western countries, simply rescind diplomatic recognition of the Regime and instead recognize a rival faction or transitional government as the legitimate representative?

Or even recognition of the state of Iran while it is controlled by the Regime?

Or, at a minimum, get more countries to totally sever diplomatic relations with Iran.

At present, Canada, the U.S., Israel, Albania, Bahrain, and Morocco have no diplomatic relations with Iran (since 2012, 1979, 1979, 2022, 2016, and 2018 respectively).

I think it could potentially be good if we could get more countries to sever or suspend diplomatic relations with Iran. Although I can also see a case for why it might be good for countries to have embassies in Iran.

Iran has literally been attacking UAE, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, and other countries.

Ukraine is constantly attacked by Russia with Iranian made drones, and already stripped the accreditation of Iran's ambassador, slashed staff levels at the embassy in Tehran to the bone and instituted a 50 year trade ban. And there was a foreign ministry proposal to permanently cut all ties.

Germany already closed its consulates, and relations are at or close to a breaking point.

The UK, Slovakia, Austria, and Czechia have all evacuated and closed their embassies.

New Zealand and Australia have closed their embassies and the consular staff are evacuated.

Bulgaria closed the Tehran embassy and relocated its staff to Azerbaijan.

Portugal temporarily suspended its physical embassy in Tehran.

My understanding is that Mexico, Colombia, Peru, Chile, Panama, Costa Rica, Jamaica, Bahamas, Iceland, Luxembourg, Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Malta, Moldova, Singapore, Nepal, Cambodia, Bhutan, Mongolia, Zambia, Botswana, Madagascar and more all handle relations with Iran purely remotely.

It would be interesting if we could get the Regime completely isolated.

I think I hit a trifecta of some sort, with Florida woman "Karen Savage".