The mayor of Vaughan, Ont., is seeking a sweeping bylaw that would restrict protests near places of worship, schools and other sites.
Steven Del Duca said Monday that he was reacting to local acts of violence and intimidation related to the Israel-Hamas war. His proposed member’s resolution seeks fines of up to $100,000 for actions “intended to intimidate, incite hatred, violence or discrimination” within 100 metres of these places.
“A line has been crossed,” he said in an interview. “People seem to feel like they have incredible licence, regardless of one’s stance on a particular issue, to be very aggressive.”
Mr. Del Duca needs the support of Vaughan council for his member’s resolution to become a bylaw in the city immediately north of Toronto, beginning with a committee meeting next month and then again later. For procedural reasons, such a bylaw would not come into force for several months at the soonest.
The Canadian Civil Liberties Association panned the proposal for being overly broad.
“You’re pushing people out of the public square,” CCLA executive director and general counsel Noa Mendelsohn Aviv said.
“What they’re proposing to do is to create these very, very large zones around many, many, many different institutions throughout the city in which people cannot peacefully assemble and raise their voices on any number of political issues.”
But the proposal was welcomed by the Centre for Israel and Jewish Affairs, which said such rules would give protection to the community,
Shimon Koffler Fogel, president of the advocacy organization, praised the proposed bylaw and said it was important to draw a line against aggressive behaviour. He said that people in his community have had antisemitic and violent slurs thrown at them during protests.
“These are intimidating, they are generating fear and anxiety within the community,” he said. “I think any relief that the city is able to provide, so that they don’t feel that they under assault, is welcome and does represent a constructive way forward.”
Street protests have become a feature of Canadian cities since the Hamas attacks in Israel on Oct. 7, which killed 1,200 people, and Israel’s counterattack in Gaza that has killed tens of thousands.
On Monday, Toronto police Chief Myron Demkiw said his officers had monitored more than 500 protests about the war in that city alone. He said police had made 24 protest-related arrests and laid 30 charges.
He also said reports of hate crimes since Oct. 7 were nearly double that of the same period a year earlier. Most of the complaints were related to antisemitism, though the chief said he was concerned about underreporting of Islamophobic incidents.
Some of the protests over the past five months have prompted pushback from the Jewish community, which argues it is being targeted. This month, a Montreal synagogue and the Federation CJA, a Jewish community organization, obtained an injunction keeping protesters at least 50 metres from their buildings.
While the final wording of any bylaw in Vaughan would be subject to the wishes of councillors and the advice of the city’s legal counsel, Mr. Del Duca would go further than that injunction. The press release announcing his proposed member’s resolution cites the need to prohibit “demonstrations of a nature that are intended to intimidate, incite hatred, violence or discrimination within 100 metres of a religious institution, schools, childcare centre, hospital, congregate care settings or other vulnerable social infrastructure.”
A recent demonstration at a synagogue in Thornhill, which lies partly within Vaughan, was timed to co-ordinate with a real estate presentation there on land sales in Israel and in the occupied West Bank. Mr. Del Duca argued that a place of worship’s protection should not be negated by a non-religious event being held there.
“Does that mean that there’s nobody in the building who’s praying? Does that mean that there’s nobody in the building who’s worshipping? Does that mean there’s no rabbi or imam or priest who’s in there doing anything religious?” he said. “It’s still a place of worship.”
Oliver Moore