Ontario’s largest school board has voted to codify a new category of racism to its human rights code: anti-Palestinian racism. The decision follows a report led by activist bureaucrat, Patrick Case, commissioned by the Ministry of Education to investigate the Toronto District School Board’s involvement in sending students to a politically charged protest.
Billed as a school field trip, the Grassy Narrows River Run event quickly turned into an anti-Israel protest in downtown Toronto last fall. The Case report dismissed concerns over the trip as “right-wing media” misinformation and accused the board of engaging in the “erasure of Palestinian identity.”
Following the release of its 2023–2024 Human Rights Annual Report, the TDSB opened the floor to public delegations. Activists used the opportunity to advocate for the formal inclusion of anti-Palestinian racism in board policy, shifting the focus of the meeting from educational oversight to political advocacy.
Ontario Education Minister Paul Calandra recently pledged to address the politicization of schools echoing comments made by his predecessor, Jill Dunlop, who also criticized the handling of the Grassy Narrows incident. Undeterred, the TDSB forged ahead passing a motion to add anti-Palestinian racism into anti-racism policy in June 2024.
At the board meeting following Case’s report, a parent wearing a keffiyeh told trustees: “Palestinians remain invisible in every policy update, every metric of harm, every commitment to transformation that the Human Rights Office speaks of.” While compelling, the claim overlooks the fact that the TDSB’s census already includes a separate category for Palestinians. The board’s racism, bias, and hate portal doesn’t track anti-Palestinian racism as a distinct category, but it does include “Arab” as a demographic.
Despite assertions by the speaker that the agenda wasn’t political the Human Rights Office operates within a deeply political framework, referencing politically-coded terms like “solidarity.”
York University delegate Peter Flaherty urged trustees to adopt the Arab Canadian Lawyers Association definition of the term, which encompasses disagreeing with “Palestinian narratives” as racist. The same definition of anti-Palestinian racism was proposed by the National Council of Canadian Muslims as they lobbied MPs to pass a “Nakba Bill.” The group recently celebrated the board’s decision as a significant victory in their broader campaign.
Delegates who praised the Case report didn’t deny that the Grassy Narrows event was political. They celebrated it. One parent praised the report for defending the protest, while accusing “right-wing media” of stoking outrage and linking the plight of First Nations to the Palestinian cause.
Social media posts from Toronto Palestinian Families reinforce this narrative. The group welcomed the Case report for acknowledging the “institutional erasure” of Palestinians and referred to Toronto as “Tkaronto,” a nod to the traditional Mohawk word for the region. Not all Indigenous leaders supported the protest. Some condemned it outright, calling it a cynical co-opting of Indigenous suffering.
TDSB teacher Michelle Munk defended the politicization of classroom content: “If in my math class, I use an example of Palestinian embroidery to teach patterning and algebra, this is absolutely not antisemitic. It’s culturally relevant and responsive pedagogy.” She added, “Might someone feel uncomfortable when they see a Palestinian flag or keffiyeh? Yes. In fact, discomfort is an important step in the learning process.”
Unsurprisingly, that standard doesn’t cut both ways. Another parent, also wearing a keffiyeh, bristled at the suggestion that opposing views should be welcomed in schools. When asked whether Israeli-Canadian perspectives should be included, she said the question “deeply distressed” her and would “erase and invalidate the lived experience of Palestinians.”
One delegate declared that rejecting the addition of anti-Palestinian racism equated to endorsing genocide. In his view, turning away from diversity, equity, and inclusion would mirror the United States, where “anti-DEI, anti-woke arguments, and weaponized antisemitism” are allegedly being used to “enable the rise of fascism.”
Imam Annab of Toronto Palestinian Families argued that Palestinian families lack harm protection and have been crying about “erasure” since October 7, 2023. But the data doesn’t back the claims. The Toronto Police Service’s 2023–2024 Hate Crime Report shows that Jews — who make up under four per cent of the city — were the targets of 40 per cent of all hate crimes and 81 per cent of religiously motivated incidents in 2023. Since October 7th, antisemitic incidents have risen sharply, up 144 per cent since 2021.
The claim of Palestinian invisibility doesn’t hold. Since October 7, the anti-Israel protests on Toronto’s streets have been loud, frequent, and highly visible. Despite frequent disturbances, police rarely intervene.
The Ontario government has voiced concerns about politicization in schools, but words alone haven’t stemmed the tide. Despite Minister Calandra’s declaration that “politics should not be in school,” political ideology is now policy. The government commissioned the Case report but has shown no appetite for challenging its conclusions or curbing the ideological machinery driving these changes. For all the talk of neutrality, Queen’s Park remains on the sidelines.