"Although I'm disappointed by the outcome, I respect the court's decision and I appreciate the chance to participate in the process."

"We come from a very resilient community, and I'm very thankful for all the strong support I've received."

"I've gotten support from basically all across the spectrum."

 Rachel Harroche, law student, McGill University 

Anti-Israel protesters gather on McGill University's campus in Montreal on the two-year anniversary of October 7, 2023. The McGill campus has become a focal point of anti-Israel activism since the Hamas attacks on Israel. Photo by Terry Newman/National Post

"[The proposal by the Law Students' Association (LSA) is] objectionable and regrettable."

"The effort to respond to this by-law has fallen so heavily on the Jewish Law Students' Association."

"This by-law has the effect of targeting a minority group on a specific global political issue rather than the basic functioning of the LSA and its broader mission." 

Law Faculty interim dean Tina Piper and faculty provost Angela Campbell  

McGill University's Law Students' Association held a referendum on March 21, on an amendment to the group's constitution to enshrine a boycott of Israeli cultural and educational bodies, that saw 57 percent of McGill law students voting to support the amendment. The association's constitution requires a two-thirds majority for any such vote to pass and this one failed that supermajority requirement. The LSA handily got past that hurdle by having "subsequently stated that only a simple majority of fifty percent plus one was needed".

 

Two days later, Israeli-born McGill law student Rachel Harroche filed a request for an injunction to stop implementation of the boycott amendment by the LSA. In filing her request, Ms. Harroche specifically named campus group Law Students 4 Palestine. Harroche, a Jewish student of Israeli heritage, pointed out the application's effect on her would be "directly and personally affected by its [amendment's] operative provisions".

 

Should McGill University sever ties with Israeli schools and the creation of a standing enforcement committee to police compliance with the boycott, Ms. Harroche's student tenure at McGill could be affected in that it would prohibit her from taking part in exchange programs with Tel Aviv University, along with other Israeli institutions. The application points out that the referendum is in violation of anti-discrimination policies passed by the university and by the Students' Society of McGill University.

Instagram, Law Students for Palestine

 

An example given was that the boycott committee "would have a mandate to monitor and enforce compliance with the boycott across all" student association activities thus "creating an ongoing surveillance mechanism affecting her academic choices". The consequence of which would be that the Jewish student would then be exposed "to naming, shaming, and social sanctions for her academic choices", which would create "a hostile and stigmatizing environment".

 

The Superior Court ruled against the provisional injunction; Ms. Harroche's application, it ruled, failed to meet the threshold demonstrating urgency and irreparable harm requiring immediate relief. "It's the first stage of this type of litigation process, so on our end, we're gonna review the judgment carefully, evaluate our opinions, and we'll be taking a position in the coming future", responded Nicholas Chine, Harroche's lawyer. 

 

If the Law Students’ Association formally adopts its anti-Israel measure, it could lose the rights to use the McGill name, access campus space and distribute publications, university president Deep Saini said. John Mahoney / Montreal Gazette

 

"Please accept this letter as my formal resignation from my positions as Chair of the Law Faculty Advisory Board and a Course Lecturer, effective immediately. I am no longer willing or able to participate in fundraising activities on behalf of the Faculty. Accordingly, I am withdrawing all current and future pledges and donations to the Faculty of Law and the University, on behalf of both myself and the Amiel Foundation." 

"Conduct that directly contravenes the university’s stated policies has proceeded without meaningful consequence. This includes the normalization, and at times glorification, of events marking acts of mass violence, the obstruction of students’ access to classrooms and university facilities, and the use of academic platforms to legitimize or advance extremist ideologies."

"There are also indications that conduct involving harassment or intimidation is not being treated with the seriousness it warrants within admissions and disciplinary frameworks."

McGill Law School Faculty Board Advisor Chairman Jonathan Amiel resignation letter  

"While this referendum was supported by a majority of those who voted, I make no assumptions about their intent. But in matters of discrimination, impact — not intent — governs."

"The effects here are antisemitic, and that plain fact must guide McGill's response."

"Accordingly, McGill cannot and will not remain in a contractual relationship with a student association that incorporates such amendments into its governance framework."
McGill University President Deep Saini 

Students for Palestine's Honour and Resistance, was one of the groups that started a months-long encampment on the MCGill's downtown campus last year. (Ryan Remiorz/The Canadian Press

And The Winner Is : A Dynastic Scion

"There's so much love out there for Jagmeet out there in our base, in our party and beyond."

"I would be delighted to get advice from Jagmeet."

"And he's got some kind of magic that I would love a part of."

"If it isn’t already obvious, we are building a new foundation for our party, and we are ready to come roaring back on the Canadian political stage." 

"Of course, we can already hear the howls from the establishment: 'But how will you pay for all this?' Well, let's remind them, this country is awash in wealth, we can have nice things."

"It is time, far past time, to properly tax the corporations and billionaires that have been riding a tidal wave of profits while the 99 per cent have been suffering and struggling."

Avram David Lewis, newly-appointed leader, federal NDP 

Avi Lewis speaks after he was elected leader of the New Democratic Party, on the last day of the party's convention, in Winnipeg on Sunday. (Shannon VanRaes/Reuters)

 

Could that be a death-wish for the New Democratic Party, already wobbling on uncertain legs, with no real official status in the House of Commons given its paltry 7 elected Members of Parliament when the 

'magic' leadership of former head of the NDP Jagmeet Singh led his party to the absolute worst election showing in the party's memory. If Avi Lewis, as new leader, takes any advice from Jagmeet Singh, the party that abandoned its original purpose in favour of supporting the Palestinian 'cause', where at the leadership convention Lewis was backgrounded by supporters in keffiyehs waving a large Palestinian flag to great acclaim, with no flag of Canada in evidence, the party will be buried in inglorious history. 

 

Avi Lewis speaks after winning NDP leadership in front of a waving Palestinian flag. CPAC screenshot

 

The most pressing of the tasks before this man is to find a seat in the House of Commons, to become a Parliamentarian. Not that he hasn't tried on previous occasions and failed. This time the momentum of a new leadership is with him and he will select a 'safe' riding and come galloping into the House to prod the Liberal government to 'tax the rich' and give the honest working family a leg up on the  upward mobility scale of success. He would, after all, know what it's like to live in an ambience of privilege, wealth and security.

 

David Lewis, left, who at the time was federal NDP leader, and former leader Tommy Douglas talk over coffee in Nanaimo, B.C., on Oct. 20, 1972. David Lewis is the grandfather of Avi Lewis. (Doug Ball/The Canadian Press)

 

His grandfather, David Lewis led the party from 1971 to 1975. His son, Stephen Lewis, Avi's father, who passed away the day his son became NDP leader (an omen of some kind, or just misfortune?) attended Oakwood College Institute in Toronto as a teen, and although his well-off family lived in walking distance of the school, Stephen Lewis was driven to school and picked up daily in a chauffeured limousine. Although Oakwood was a fairly prestigious school at the time, son Avi had his education at the private all-boys Upper Canada College.

 

Married to the notoriously uber-left political activist Naomi Klein, his mother progressive columnist and author Michele Landsberg, Avi Lewis is well steeped and marinated in progressive socialism. His background has been in broadcasting, well known to those who compulsively tune in to Canada's broadcaster, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, which itself has turned its programming inside-out in DEI progressive internal politics and decidedly un-neutral reportage. 

 

Avi Lewis even enjoyed a stint co-hosting Fault Lines for Al-Jazeera. He co-wrote A Message from the Future with U.S. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in 2019. What amazing credentials for his current position ... He worked in academia as a lecturer in media studies at Rutgers University in New Jersey, and later became an associate professor at University of British Columbia in their geography department. Places where Critical Race Theory, the inalienable rights of transgenderism, and DEI are held sacred.

 

In 2015 Avi Lewis with wife Naomi Klein launched the Leap Manifesto with other progressives calling for a 'leap' away from fossil fuels in favour of environmentally friendly economic action, along with use of taxes to improve equality, and promotion of greater respect for Indigenous communities. According to one who should know, former NDP leader Thomas Mulcair stated an NDP  under Lewis with a rigid position on fossil fuels would see the party unelectable in remote communities (read: Indigenous) that depend on resource industries for their economic base. 

 

The NDP celebrated the great breakthrough  in New York City with the election of Muslim imperialist Mayor Mamdani with his forward-looking plans for city-subsidized grocery stores, free public transportation, free university approaches, and other people-loving, corporate-hating initiatives to make working peoples' lives less mundane and fraught with failure, to enable them to seamlessly enter the success platform of American prosperity. Now it's the NDP's turn to emulate that superb scheme for the betterment of non-capitalist humanity.

 

NDP Leadership hopefuls with the winner   still from video, CBC