April 8, 2025
MONTREAL – With antisemitism spiralling out of control on McGill University’s campus, B’nai Brith Canada is supporting a class-action lawsuit to hold the institution accountable.
An Application for Authorization to Institute a Class Action was filed in the Superior Court of Montreal Tuesday by Fishman Flanz Meland Paquin LLP, one of Quebec’s top litigation law firms.
If authorized by the Court, the lawsuit would be pursued for the benefit of “all Jewish students registered at McGill since Oct. 8, 2023, including undergraduate, masters, continuing education, doctoral, and post-doctoral students.”
Oct. 8 is significant because it was the day after Hamas’ brutal terrorist attacks on Israel in 2023, the worst massacre of Jewish people since the Holocaust.
Citing an environment of “overt anti-Zionist and antisemitic sentiment and activity,” the filing argues that McGill should reimburse plaintiffs for having breached its obligation to protect its students from harassment and discrimination under its Code of Conduct and other policies. The lawsuit also asks the Court to compel McGill to enforce its policies so that they protect Jewish students and address antisemitism and to recognize anti-Zionism as a manifestation of antisemitism.
“B’nai Brith Canada is supporting McGill’s Jewish students because the university has allowed the situation to get out of hand,” said Henry Topas, B’nai Brith Canada’s Regional Director for Quebec and Atlantic Canada. “Radicalized individuals, both students and non-students, are preventing Jewish students from obtaining the university experience to which they are entitled. Since Oct. 7, 2023, McGill’s student union and other university-affiliated groups have been permitted to vilify Israel and exclude or ignore the rights of their Jewish members.
“McGill has policies on the books that should have been used to rectify this situation. This lawsuit is the result of the university’s failure to do so, after having acknowledged that antisemitism has become a growing problem on its campus since Oct. 7.”
The prospective representative plaintiff was physically assaulted when anti-Israel demonstrators blockaded the school’s Bronfman Building during a February 2024 protest. McGill has failed to hold anyone accountable for the assault – even though it was reported to McGill security and the police – but acknowledged that it constituted a violation of its policies. As a result of this incident and others, the student felt unsafe participating in Jewish life at McGill.
On Oct. 8, Students in Solidarity with Palestinian Human Rights (SPHR), a then-official student club, called Hamas’ rampage “heroic” in a social-media post urging students to rally on campus to celebrate the “success” of the “resistance.”
SPHR’s brazen post prompted McGill to compel the Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) to dissociate itself from SPHR. Yet it continued to incite violence and often antisemitic rhetoric, while associating itself with McGill. During an undergraduate referendum weeks later, the SSMU attempted to pass a policy accusing Israel of genocide, among other things, which McGill described as unconstitutional and discriminatory. In a legal challenge supported by B’nai Brith Canada, a student subsequently obtained a court order preventing the SSMU from implementing the results of the referendum.
In November 2023, on the anniversary of Kristallnacht, known widely as the “night of broken glass,” SPHR distributed flyers and social media posts depicting keffiyeh-clad individuals shattering glass. On the same day, it shared a video of protesters celebrating the fact that they had, according to a speaker identified as an associate of SPHR, “terrified” students.
Later, during the spring of 2024, SPHR participated in an encampment on McGill’s Lower Field. During the occupation, the group held what it called a “Revolutionary Youth Program” on McGill’s property, which it advertised in a social-media graphic that contained images of fighters holding machine guns.
“Over the years, B’nai Brith Canada has supported several lawsuits to hold McGill and its student clubs or associations accountable for violating the rights of Jewish students,” said Richard Robertson, B’nai Brith Canada’s Director of Research and Advocacy. “Since Oct. 7, we have warned McGill, repeatedly, of the consequences of failing to act in the face of an unacceptable wave of antisemitic activity on its campus.
“This lawsuit must serve as a wake-up call to all universities in Canada. B’nai Brith will do everything in its power to protect the rights of Jewish students, from coast to coast.”
