Toronto:

Quebec Premier François Legault said Thursday that the camp at Montreal’s McGill University should be dismantled as more students establish pro-Palestinian camps at some of Canada’s biggest universities, demanding that they get rid of groups with ties to Israel.

The Canadian protests come as police arrest hundreds of people on US campuses and the death toll in Gaza rises.

Although McGill requested police intervention, law enforcement did not intervene Thursday to evacuate the camp and said in a statement Thursday evening that they were monitoring the situation.

Students have also held camps at Canadian schools, including the University of Toronto, the University of British Columbia and the University of Ottawa.

“We want the camp to be dismantled. We trust the police, we let them do their job,” declared a spokesperson for Legault.

There was also a pro-Israeli counter-demonstration in Montreal on Thursday. The two sides remained separate.

University of Toronto students set up camp in a fenced-in grassy area on the school’s downtown campus on Thursday morning, where about 100 protesters gathered in dozens of tents.

According to a statement from organizers, the camp will remain in place until the university reveals its investments, gets rid of anyone who “supports Israeli apartheid, occupation and illegal colonization of Palestine” and ends its activities. partnerships with certain Israeli academic institutions.

Israel says it does not participate in apartheid and that its attack on Gaza does not constitute genocide.

A university spokesperson told Reuters it was “in dialogue with the protesters” and that as of midday the camp “had not disrupted normal university operations.”

Sara Rasikh, a University of Toronto graduate student and spokesperson for the camp, told Reuters she would stay until her demands were met.

“If public disruption is the only way to make our voices heard, then we are prepared to do that,” she said.

Some Jewish groups have accused the protesters of being anti-Semitic. Organizers deny this accusation, pointing out that some demonstrators are Jewish.

Asked to comment on the camps, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s office pointed to a statement he made Tuesday, saying “universities are places of learning, places of free expression… but that only works if people feel safe on campus.” » Right now… Jewish students don’t feel safe.

The protests follow the deadly October 7 attack on southern Israel by Hamas militants from the Gaza Strip, which killed 1,200 people and took dozens hostages, and the Israeli offensive that followed which killed around 34,000 people and created a humanitarian crisis.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)