Toronto Metropolitan University law students didn’t break code of conduct with pro-Palestinian letter, review says

An external review into a pro-Palestinian letter signed by law students at Toronto Metropolitan University that criticized Israel shortly after the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks has concluded the students did not breach the school’s code of conduct, and that any harm caused to the Jewish community was unintended.

The review, led by retired chief justice of Nova Scotia J. Michael MacDonald, criticized the students, who he says hurt the Jewish community; the university, which he said harmed the students by publicly condemning them; and prominent lawyers and other interest groups for calling on the students to be punished.

Mr. MacDonald’s report was dismissed by Jewish advocacy groups that said he failed to hold the students accountable.

Students at TMU’s Lincoln Alexander School of Law issued an open letter on Oct. 20, nearly two weeks after a surprise attack by Hamas left around 1,200 Israelis dead and hundreds taken hostage. The Hamas attack, and Israel’s subsequent assault on Gaza – that has to date killed more than 36,000 Palestinians according to the Gaza Health Ministry – has roiled campuses, most recently as pro-Palestinian protesters set up encampments across the country.

The open letter said the Hamas attack “was a direct result of Israel’s 75-year-long systemic campaign to eradicate Palestinians, and that Israel is therefore responsible for all loss of life in Palestine,” prompting criticism and demands that the students be punished. It also led the school to ask Mr. MacDonald to conduct a review.

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Mr. MacDonald’s 204-page report, released Friday, says the letter was “understandably troubling and offensive to many” and hurt the university’s Jewish community, but he adds that the students’ participation “was nonetheless a valid exercise of student expression” and protected under the university’s statement on freedom of speech. He also concluded that the letter was not antisemitic, as the university had described it in a public statement shortly after it was released.

The report says there is no need to sanction the students, but offers a series of recommendations. They include encouraging students to read petitions and letters in full before signing and for the administration to provide learning opportunities on anti-Palestinian racism, anti-Muslim racism and antisemitism; to communicate regularly with students; and to increase faculty diversity.

The report also says many of the 74 signatories acknowledged the letter could have been better worded, including to clarify that the participants did not seek to justify the Hamas attacks.

“Some participants expressed real regret and remorse that their intentions in signing the statement had been misconstrued as support for the attacks on innocent Israeli civilians. However, the wording of the letter left itself open to that misinterpretation, which invoked true hurt and fear amongst many Jewish students, faculty, staff, and community members,” Mr. MacDonald writes. “Despite this, I am satisfied that the harm caused by the letter was unintended.”

In a statement posted on its website, TMU said it accepted all of the recommendations and posted links to available resources for students and faculty.

“The university understands that the contents of the report and the findings will not be satisfactory to all community members, and may be upsetting to many,” the university said.

Josh Sealy-Harrington, an assistant professor at the Lincoln Alexander School of Law who has been a vocal defender of the students, said the report represents a “clear vindication” of what he described as the students’ legitimate critique of Israel’s policies toward the Palestinian territories.

“I am relieved that these brave students will face no formal sanctions,” he said in an e-mail, adding that many students faced reprisal from the legal community, including death threats, lost jobs and harassment. He also welcomed the report’s conclusion that the letter was not antisemitic.

Richard Robertson, B’nai Brith Canada’s director of research and advocacy, said in a statement that he was alarmed at the report’s conclusion that the students should not face discipline. “It is downright irresponsible to do so at a time when antisemitism is escalating at an unprecedented rate, much of it resulting from exactly the type of incitement contained in this letter,” the statement said.

Mark Sandler, a criminal defence lawyer who was among 23 lawyers who wrote a highly critical letter to the school last fall about the university’s response, said he personally had great difficulty concluding that the letter’s characterization of Israel as a “so-called state” and denying that it is a country “can bear any interpretation other than a call for the eradication of Israel as a homeland for Jewish people.”

Judy Zelikovitz, vice-president at university and local partner services for the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, said the letter was rife with antisemitic content but the reasoning that it does not break the university code “shakes our confidence in the report.”