Anti-Israel, Pro-Hamas Montreal Mobs

"What we saw was not peaceful protest. What we saw was actually violence, hate and antisemitism, and this has no place on our streets."

"Of course we believe in the freedom of speech, we believe in the freedom to demonstrate, but where we draw the line is when there's violence."

Foreign Affairs Minister Melanie Joly

 

"It was engagement in violence and hatred on display in the City of Montreal."

"Those behaviours are unacceptable and we can condemn them, and in particular the hatred and antisemitism that was on display, in the strongest possible terms."

Defence Minister Bill Blair 

A protester holds a smoke torch during demonstration by the Collectif Désinvestir pour la Palestine and the Convergence des luttes anticapitalistes (CLAC) in Montreal Friday Nov. 22, 2024. The demonstration was in support of Palestine and in opposition to the meeting of NATO parliamentarians in Montreal. Photo by John Mahoney /Montreal Gazette

A violent crowd of hundreds of pro-Hamas demonstrators rioted in Montreal after a day of province-wide university student demonstrations when thousands took to the streets to demand that Quebec universities divest from investments with firms having connections in any form to Israel. A day later, on Friday a coalition of leftist anti-capitalists and 'pro-Palestinian' groups marched in front of the Palais de Congres de Montreal where some 300 delegates representing NATO member states were attending a high-level summit from November 22 to 25 with a focus on Ukraine, climate change, and the future of the alliance.

At the time of the meeting and the chaotic protest Prime Minister Justin Trudeau was in Toronto, attending the penultimate night's performance of popular celebrity singer Taylor Swift, with his family. He was right royally entertained and did some entertaining of his own, dancing clownishly to the music of the entertainer's sad songs of yearning and regret, disappointment and recovery. Very apt, in that Canadians are yearning to be rid of this quasi-adult foppishly displaying himself while enacting policies whose virtues are the destruction of Canadian values. 

Regret and disappointment are ours; we await recovery in the wake of his electoral defeat.

Demonstrators fill Ste-Catherine St. during Friday’s protest. Photo by John Mahoney /Montreal Gazette

In downtown Montreal havoc reigned on Friday night when protesters exercised their freedom to demonstrate against what they characterized as the "complicity" of NATO member countries in a conflict they claim has cost thousands of Palestinian lives. Their black-and-white portrayal of a nation of Jews fighting back against the terror that has threatened the Jewish State for all its years of existence when it could no longer seek to appease the claims of victimization of challengers for Judaic ancestral territory expressed in the murderous rage of savagely lethal atrocities, forcing it to retaliate and root out its violent tormentors. 

Police found themselves confronted by a raging mob resisting efforts to restore calm and security to the area by a mob fully invested in its anarchic goal of total disruption of civilizational mores. The 'demonstration' of utter lawlessness began in the late afternoon, when violence accelerated and cars were incinerated, smoke bombs thrown and metal barriers tossed into the street. Thugs began smashing the convention centre windows and went on to do the same to windows of nearby businesses.

Riot police line the sidewalk on St-Laurent Blvd. Photo by John Mahoney /Montreal Gazette

 Police stated the arrest of a 22-year-pold woman for having obsrtucted police work and assaulting a police officer. Two men, 22 and 28 were arrested for obstructing police actions, all released, to appear at a later date in court. Police also announced that the technique of facial recognition despite most of the malefactors wearing masks to conceal their identities, would be employed and they have expectations that the identities of the major disrupters and dispensers of violence would be achieved, and further charges brought.

The groups Divest for Palestine and the Convergence of Anti-Capitalist Struggles were identified as the organizers of the protests. Members of Divest for Palestine claimed injuries caused by police physical handling of the protesters, four of them, they claimed, having to be taken to hospital for medical attention. Doubtless, the Jewish General Hospital medical staff would do their utmost to honour their medical calling of service to all regardless of who, what, when and where.

According to one Benoit Allard of Divest for Palestine, the protest purpose was demonstrating against NATO'S "complicity with Israel's military while it's conducting its genocide in Gaza ... war crimes in Lebanon, Syria" and "It's enforcing illegal occupation of Palestinian territories". These are people immune to both reality, reason and history. Their minds set in the ironclad conviction that any situation involving Jewish human rights of survival and resistance are illegal and represent criminal offences.

 

Still from video of an anti-NATO/pro-Palestine protest Friday night shows windows being smashed at the Montreal Convention Centre as a flare releases red smoke. NATO delegates are in the city this weekend to discuss support for Ukraine, climate change and the future of the alliance.

 

The statements by Melanie Joly and Bill Blair fail to hold up to scrutiny, given the fact that the Liberal government that they represent has engaged in its own brand of antisemitism, leaving the Canadian Jewish community to fend for itself when fulminating bands of pro-Hamas defenders of anti-Israel accusations march into Jewish neighbourhoods for the express purpose of intimidation and threats against their security, with demands for a 'Final Solution', and chanting 'From the River to the Sea', code for the elimination of Israel.

A frame grab from video shows a pro-Palestinian protest in downtown Montreal on Friday that police said led to three arrests.  Scopal via Reuters