Canadian judge orders Palestinian protesters to clear out of university campus

By Barry Ellsworth

TRENTON, Canada (AA) – A judge in Ontario, Canada ordered pro-Palestinian protesters to tear down their tents and clear out of the University of Toronto (U of T) by 6 p.m. Wednesday.

After the deadline, the judge gave Toronto police the go-ahead to arrest anyone who refuses to leave the campus. The university had gone to court seeking an injunction to have the encampment of about 200 tents and protesters removed. The court also granted the university the use of police to clear the encampment.

The protesters, who began occupying an area known as King’s College Circle in downtown Toronto on May 2, were defiant in the face of the court order.

U of T Occupy for Palestine, the organizers of the encampment, said in an X post that the court has given the university the “immoral right to unleash police violence” on students.

“The university's shameful attempt to use legal force to brutalize its own students — for the crime of protesting genocide— will go down in history as a disgraceful chapter for this institution,” the post said.

University lawyers argued in court that the protest breached school policies, made members of the university community feel unsafe and infringed on the rights of free speech of others, CBC News reported.

The court found the protesters had prevented others from using the campus for 50 days and that amounts to “irreparable harm.”

“In my view, the harm to the university is greater if the injunction is not granted than is the harm to the respondents if the injunction is granted,” the judge said.

The protesters demanded that the university cut ties with Israel, stop dealing with companies that profit from Israel’s war in Gaza and sever relations with any of Israel’s academic institutions that are complicit in the war.