An injunction notice at the University of Toronto on July 3.Carlos Osorio/Reuters
There was something for every group to latch onto in Ontario Superior Court Justice Markus Koehnen’s decision granting an injunction to clear out the pro-Palestinian encampment at the University of Toronto. For the university, as well as for Jewish groups, Jewish students, and members of the wider U of T community, there was the obvious: students and their allies had to pack up their tents and move out by 6 p.m. Wednesday. The decision was unsurprising. King’s College Circle, where the activists had set up camp for the past two months, is U of T property.
“In our society we have decided that the owner of property generally gets to decide what happens on the property,” Justice Koehnen wrote, stating the obvious. “If the protesters can take that power for themselves by seizing Front Campus, there is nothing to stop a stronger group from coming and taking the space over from the current protesters. That leads to chaos.”
For those who had participated in the encampments, there was an exoneration, of sorts, against claims of antisemitism and hate speech. Though Justice Koehnen acknowledged “there have clearly been instances of antisemitic hate speech outside of the encampment,” he found “no evidence that the named respondents or encampment occupants are associated with any of those instances.” Of course, that is only an exoneration insofar as the university was not able to prove that encampment participants were engaging in antisemitism, but it’s something the students and their allies have since seized upon regardless.
And for onlookers who don’t necessarily have a stake in this fight, but have been watching with trepidation as violence erupted on campuses elsewhere, Justice Koehnen’s decision provided a necessary path to a peaceful resolution. The dismantling of the encampment Wednesday afternoon was surprisingly – but thankfully – uneventful, initiated by students well before the deadline for police to move in. They puffed out their chests in doing so, saying they were evacuating to deprive “the Toronto Police Service any opportunity to brutalize us.” But it was still the right call, especially seeing as they resisted goading by the adults at the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Ontario, who ostensibly have full-time, protected jobs, to defy the injunction and risk academic and legal penalties that could affect their future career prospects.
The encampment left behind a series of yet-unmet goals from the pro-Palestinian protesters, a sense of resentment among Jewish staff and students that the university was too slow to act, and a bunch of dead grass. In the U.S., some encampments were able to squeeze small concessions from their respective university administrations – the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, for example, agreed to call for a ceasefire in Gaza, and the University of California, Berkeley said it will conduct a “rigorous examination” of its investments – but no such concessions were made at U of T. The encampment at U of T ended not with a bang, or even a whimper, but a shrug. What was all that for? Why did it take two months for a resolution? How does the university now repair its reputation with students on both sides of the encampment gates?
Upon their departure, the students who had occupied King’s College Circle declared victory, as anyone who has spent months sleeping in their shoes for a cause will do. “Let us be clear,” they wrote. “The University of Toronto will disclose its investments, divest from companies profiting from Palestinian suffering and death, and cut ties with academic institutions tied to the Israeli war machine. The question is not if, but when.” The pressure on the university to actually do that, however, has been considerably lessened now that the encampment has packed up and gone home.
In time, some of these students may recognize that setting up ideological checkpoints and barring entry to those who didn’t pledge fealty to their cause was a rather ironic way for a self-declared peaceful and inclusive movement to go about achieving these goals. They may also recognize something of an incongruity between their previous convictions and beliefs around oppression – that is, that “effect” matters more than “intention,” meaning it doesn’t really matter if you weren’t trying to be hurtful – and their defence of slogans that Jews have clearly stated they find offensive.
Other students will go on to join CUPE Ontario, and goad the next generation of ideological young people to defy a court injunction at the risk of personal and professional repercussions.
No doubt that, for now, many feel as though they contributed in a small way to resisting what they see as a massive international injustice. Perhaps that is true. And though one might abhor their methods, it is understandable why they would feel they need to do something – anything – to protest this war, and speak for the Palestinian citizens under Israeli bombardment daily. Indeed, as long as young people have existed, they have rebelled, occupied, marched and demanded change. But not every rebellion comes at the perceived safety of an already marginalized group. Despite the encampment’s confidence about eventual divestment, that might end up being the group’s lasting legacy.