For Immediate Release
Toronto, November 28, 2003… The Jewish human rights group B’nai Brith Canada has condemned the University of Toronto’s decision to allow Al-Awda space for a Palestinian Solidarity Conference predicated on the endorsement of violence and terrorism.
“We have been in touch with the university on numerous occasions for more than a week now,” stated Rochelle Wilner, National President of B’nai Brith Canada, “to urge them to disallow incitement to violence and terrorism on campus, under the guise of free speech. It’s a sad day for Canada when a university caves into pressure, to the extent that protecting the conference from disruption becomes a more important priority than stopping a group that operates on these principles from creating a ‘poisoned environment’ on campus.”
“It’s clear that the organizers have merely engaged in semantics with the university,” commented Frank Dimant, Executive Vice President. “They have not renounced their underlying principles which endorse violence as a solution to conflict, and the purpose of the conference is still to put these principles into action. Whether or not they require participants to agree with this manifesto beforehand is not the key question in our opinion. We believe that these principles violate the laws of Canada, Ontario and the University. We will continue to look at all options to ensure our campuses can be kept free from incitement to hatred and violence.”
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For more information call Joseph Ben Ami, Director of Communications at (613) 294-7313
B’nai Brith has been active in Canada since 1875 as the Jewish community’s foremost human rights agency.
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