Union leaders back U of T encampment
`Consequences' urged for dissenters
Public union leaders across the province have pledged their unwavering support for the anti-israel encampment established at the University of Toronto last week.
On Thursday, U of T administrators notified activists that any demonstrations on private school property after 10 p.m. could result in legal consequences. The warning prompted the Canadian Union of Public Employees (CUPE) Ontario and three local chapters to release a solidarity statement.
“We fully reject the administration's attempt to deny them their constitutional right to peaceful assembly,” the union wrote in a public statement.
“Administration says they are protesting on private property, a claim we reject entirely. They are protesting on stolen land.”
Footage circulating on social media late Thursday showed CUPE Ontario President Fred Hahn, whose organization represents nearly 300,000 public sector employees in the province, shaking hands with anti-israel protesters while clutching union flags and wearing a keffiyeh, a traditional Palestinian garb adopted as a political symbol.
Later in the day, CUPE Ontario called on members to participate in an anti-israel rally outside the American consulate in Toronto on Saturday led by the Palestinian Youth Movement, a group whose members have celebrated the Oct. 7 atrocities committed by Hamas and supported the designated terror group, the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP).
During the rally, marchers carried banners proclaiming “long live armed resistance to occupation” as chants of “Rafah! Rafah!” resounded in the background.
CUPE Ontario did not respond to the National Post's request for comment.
Kevin Bryan, a University of Toronto business professor who visited the encampment and spoke with activists on Thursday, said he found that the “majority of people I talked to are neither students nor affiliated with our university.”
He said “security” and a “spokesperson” he spoke with “both explicitly said that if you don't support the collective's view on Palestine, you aren't welcome and they will remove you. Actually, I was specifically told to leave now or `it would become more uncomfortable,'” Bryan wrote in a series of posts on X recounting his experience.
“I did see a large group (50 people or so) surround a different woman who'd gotten in and start chanting `all Zionists are evil,' ” he added. “In terms of posters, honestly, it was just a general mélange of far-left policy.”
Bryan's tweets highlighting the non-student element of the anti-israel encampment prompted Vic Wojciechowska, a communications officer with the Ontario Public Service Employees Union (OPSEU), to threaten the professor with “consequences.”
“There need to be streetbased consequences for clumsy buffoons like Kevin. I can confidently (say) that the encampment is predominantly students — students I PERSONALLY know & recognize. Kevin knows this & knows what he does as a spinner of dangerous yarns. Watch your back, Kevin,” Wojciechowska wrote on X.
Wojciechowska, a former Antifa activist, has been arrested multiple times for violence committed while protesting. Within days of the Hamas massacre on Oct. 7, which left over 1,000 Israelis dead, the OPSEU communications leader was on the front lines orchestrating anti-israel protests across Ontario.
OPSEU, an Ontario union representing nearly 200,000 members, did not respond to the Post's request for comment in time for publication.
WE FULLY REJECT THE ... ATTEMPT TO DENY THEM THEIR ... RIGHT TO PEACEFUL
ASSEMBLY.