November 13, 2025
TORONTO – B’nai Brith Canada is adamantly urging Toronto to cancel its scheduled Palestinian Independence Day event at City Hall on the grounds that it violates the city’s prohibition against flag raisings that promote hatred, violence, or racism.
In a letter to the City of Toronto’s Chief of Protocol and External Relations, B’nai Brith Canada warned that commemorating Palestinian independence in this way – as it was self-declared by then-Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) chairman Yasser Arafat on Nov. 15, 1988 – would sanitize the PLO’s antisemitic ideology and acts of terror.
“Canada recognized the PLO as a terrorist organization during the 1980s,” said Richard Robertson, B’nai Brith Canada’s Director of Research and Advocacy. “Why would Toronto want to honour that legacy?”
In 1972, terrorists affiliated with the PLO kidnapped 11 Israeli athletes representing the country at the Olympic Games in Munich, slaughtered them, and mutilated their bodies. While Arafat delivered what he called the Palestinian Declaration of Independence in the PLO’s name, its supporters and operatives were carrying out unspeakable violence targeting Israeli and Jewish civilians amid what is remembered as the First Intifada (1987-1993). During this period, PLO-linked terrorists hijacked planes, bombed buses and schools, and targeted Jewish institutions around the world.
“The PLO’s ideology, as espoused in the Declaration, precluded the notion of Jewish self-determination, promoted antisemitism, glorified hate-motivated violence, and perpetuated hostilities in the region,” Robertson said. “Commemorating this moment, in the context of rising antisemitism in Canada, is not only insensitive but also reckless and irresponsible.”
B’nai Brith Canada offered a similar criticism of the Federal Government’s decision to recognize Palestinian statehood at the United Nations (UN) in September – a diplomatic move Robertson described as “premature and dangerous” because it rested on assurances from the Palestinian Authority, a PLO-associated administration that has supported terrorism in the West Bank and Israel.
“Our leaders should be working to bring people together,” Robertson said. “This event would not foster inclusion – it would glorify violence. The Mayor of Toronto has an obligation to represent Torontonians equitably and fairly, including Jewish Torontonians.”
B’nai Brith Canada is calling on all concerned citizens to follow its lead and contact Toronto City Hall.