Student organizers at the University of Toronto are asking allies and community members to attend a Solidarity Rally beginning at 7 p.m. tonight inside the established encampment at King College Circle to help prepare against possible police action. Hundreds of students have occupied the area since 4:30 a.m. Thursday morning.
The call for support was voiced Wednesday morning in response to an official letter from the university warning the organizers that “protesting will not be permitted after 10 p.m.”
“These intimidation tactics don’t work on us,” said an unnamed organizer with Occupy4Palestine, the same group that occupied the halls outside University of Toronto President Meric Gertler’s office earlier this year.
“They want us out of here by 10 p.m. Please call every single person you know, because they will try to evict us, and we will not leave. We don’t know what to expect, but we need to prepare for the worst.”
The letter, which was read aloud by an organizer, prohibited a number of items on campus, including camp stoves, megaphones, and “structures of any sort — tents, shelters, etc.”
“Various laws and University policies may apply to your activity, including the Ontario Trespass to Property Act, the U of T Code of Student Conduct, and the Policy on the Temporary Use of Space,” the letter said.
Following the example of several American universities and McGill University in Montreal, the students took over the University of Toronto campus to demand their institution sever ties with Israeli universities and with companies supplying arms to Israel.
“We decided it was time to escalate and join the hundreds of thousands of students around North America and the world who are demanding their university end their complicity in the ongoing genocide that is happening right now,” Erin Mackey, an organizer and media spokesperson, told The Hoser inside the encampment.
“So we are here and will continue to be here until the university divests from Israel.” (more...)
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