Canada’s Jewish advocacy groups are condemning Montreal’s McGill University after it allowed a vocal supporter of Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023 attack to give a “Night of Resistance” talk on campus.
B’nai Brith Canada posted on X that the university is allowing Iyad Abu Hamed, a leader of the anti-Israel Montreal4Palestine group and self-identified Human Rights Advocate, to speak at an event hosted by the school’s Muslim Association on Thursday.
“You have betrayed your Jewish students and the broader community by allowing Iyad Abu Hamed, a vocal supporter of terrorism and a purveyor of vile antisemitic hate, to speak on your campus at an event titled ‘A Night of Resistance’ with the theme ‘Al-Aqsa is Our Creed,’” B’nai Brith said on X.
The Jewish rights group said Hamed had glorified Hamas’ Oct. 7 massacre, which killed over 1,400 civilians, and hundreds were kidnapped, leaving countless others injured.
“On the very day of the attack, he shared an image of Hamas terrorists using gliders to invade Israel with the caption: ‘When it rains, men are true to what they promised God #Al-Aqsa Flood,’” B’nai Brith said. “This was an endorsement of mass murder.”
In one post on his Instagram, which is no longer accessible to True North, he said that Israel was to blame for the Oct. 7 terror attack and “blaming Hamas” for the attack was “like blaming a woman for punching her rapist.”
One video shows him telling a crowd in Montreal, “It’s a Jihad!” with the crowd yelling back at him, “Victory or Martyrdom.”
Hamed, in the captions, argued that he didn’t mean a violent holy war, which most people think of when they hear the word “Jihad,” but rather a “relentless civil struggle alongside the oppressed people of Palestine.”
“This declaration is not a call to arms but a profound commitment to persist in our fight for justice until we achieve victory—freedom and human rights for Palestine—or face martyrdom, which in this context symbolizes the ultimate sacrifice in the pursuit of these noble goals,” he said.
In an email responding to questions of why the individual was allowed on the property and what they have to say to the Jewish community and other Canadians concerned about Hamed speaking to students, a spokesperson for McGill University said that it wasn’t the school who hosted him.
“Iyad Abu Hamed’s lecture was organized by the Muslim Student Association, a student group recognized by the Student Society of McGill University,” the spokesperson told True North. “This should not be interpreted as an endorsement by McGill University of this event, or for that fact any other organized event by a student group.”
The University did not respond to True North’s further questions on whether it condemns the speaker’s support for Hamas, a listed terrorist entity in Canada or the Oct. 7 attack on Israel, or whether the school would be speaking to the MSA about speakers it invites onto campus.
B’nai Brith Canada’s regional director for Quebec, Henry Topas, told True North in an interview that McGill University bears “ultimate responsibility” for allowing this speaker onto campus.
“McGill University could have, should have, and still can stop the hate fest that has manifested itself on the McGill campus,” he said.
The Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs also condemned McGill for allowing Hamed on campus.
“There must be no place at McGill for speakers who call for jihad, support terrorist groups and promote a climate of hate,” CIJA said in a post on X. “Our values are under attack and we must defend them.”
Hamed responded to the two Jewish groups and some media organizations on Instagram by threatening legal action against anyone who “participates in campaigns inciting” against him. He warned McGill University and media organizations of “Fueling Islamophobia and anti-Palestinian racism propagated by voices like CIJA.”
Topas told True North that the danger of allowing people such as Hamed to speak on campus is that pro-terrorism and anti-Israel rhetoric can escalate into widespread violence, such as what happened in the last couple of weeks in Amsterdam and Paris, which saw Jewish people get violently attacked by pro-Hamas activists.
“As long as levels of government, starting with Mayor Valerie Plante, do not put their foot down, do not handcuff the police, there is a risk of major escalation by those who are propagating hate against first, the Jewish community and secondly, Canadian society,” he said. “What is happening by Mayors Plante, Olivia Chow, and Mayor Parrish in Mississauga is without excuse a total lack of moral clarity.”