On May 4, Students for Palestine’s Honour and Resistance (SPHR) at McGill hosted a community gathering and fundraiser for Gaza on McGill’s Lower Field. These eight hours of programming marked the anniversary of the Palestinian Solidarity Encampment, established by student protestors on the Lower Field one year prior. 

In an interview with The Tribune, a representative of SPHR at McGill who wished to remain unnamed explained how the gathering reaffirmed the encampment’s project of solidarity with the broader global movement for Palestine.

“We’re seeing students again gather on Lower Field […] to bring the [city-wide] community, and the student base, together again,” they said. “To again take up space on our campus, reclaim our campus, but also engage in these cultural and political activities that should be making up our education.”

A Concordia student attending the gathering who wished to remain anonymous echoed the impact the encampment had beyond McGill’s campus.

“Concordia students have their own demands towards Concordia,” the student said in an interview with The Tribune. “Many actions have been at Concordia, and it’s actually thanks to the encampment. The encampment really sparked that student protest.”

Along with creating solidarity across different pro-Palestine activist groups, the encampment strove to push McGill to disclose and divest from all companies complicit in the genocide in Palestine, to drop disciplinary charges against student protestors for Palestine, and to publicly denounce the genocide. The encampment stood for 75 days, despite facing repeated legal contestation, before McGill-employed private security and police forces ultimately dismantled it on July 10, 2024. 

The SPHR fundraiser marking the encampment’s anniversary began with an art build, during which attendees helped paint a banner for an upcoming Palestinian Youth Movement Montreal demonstration. The day’s programming, designed similarly to educational events held during the encampment, also included letter writing to Palestinians killed in the genocide, a film screening of The Time That Remains, and a tatreez—Palestinian embroidery—circle. 

The SPHR representative told The Tribune how the gathering also intended to commemorate the ongoing fight for Palestine that the encampment has inspired, citing recent Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) victories—such as its strike for Palestine and its ratification of the Policy Against Genocide in Palestine (PAGIP)—as examples of its effect.

“Of course, it’s hard to celebrate anything when there’s an ongoing genocide, but it’s incredible to see how much our movement has been able to achieve,” the SPHR representative said. “We’ve been really able to show since the encampment how steadfast the students have been.”

The PAGIP was approved by 78.7 per cent of non-abstaining student voters well before the encampment’s inception, in the SSMU Fall 2023 Referendum. Once ratified, the PAGIP would require SSMU to lobby McGill to denounce Israel’s siege on Gaza, divest from companies complicit in the genocide, and cut academic ties with Israeli universities. 

However, the Policy was suspended via injunction on Nov. 21, 2023, as an anonymous student plaintiff, with the support of B’nai Brith Canada, argued to the Superior Court of Quebec that PAGIP posed a threat to Jewish students on campus. On May 22, 2024, the Superior Court again granted a demand for an injunction against PAGIP’s ratification. SSMU’s legal team has sought to appeal the injunction since.

On April 17, the Court of Appeal of Quebec unanimously overturned the injunction against PAGIP, noting that it is not the role of courts to resolve political debates within a student association. SSMU officially ratified PAGIP on April 22 through May 1, 2028. 

In a press conference outside the University Centre on April 25, SSMU Vice-President External Hugo-Victor Solomon alleged that McGill committed a “sustained campaign of repression” against student organizers for Palestine leading up to the Court of Appeal’s decision.

“Nearly 80 per cent of 8,000 student voters supported this policy,” Solomon reported during the conference. “That’s not fringe. That’s not exceptional. That’s not controversial. That is the outcome of democracy [….] This victory belongs to every student, Jewish, Palestinian, Muslim, Arab, and allied, who stood firm in the face of repression, [and] who refused to let silence be the price of their education.”

Solomon also directly affirmed SSMU’s commitment to upholding their obligations under PAGIP.

“On behalf of the 25,000 members of the SSMU, and pursuant to Section 2.4 of the Policy, I unequivocally condemn the ongoing genocide, war crimes, and human rights violations endured by the steadfast people of Gaza,” Solomon stated. “We affirm, once and for all, that the Students’ Society of McGill University stands in unambiguous solidarity with our Palestinian and Arab peers.”

At the fundraiser, the SPHR representative commented on PAGIP’s historic adoption by SSMU.

“Our student union has for the first time […] condemned the genocide in Gaza and finally taken a political stance that the student body has continuously reiterated,” they said. “Next year, we don’t know what things will look like, but our student union now has ratified a policy that ensures it’s taking a stance for the Palestinian struggle and for divestment, and so we’ll hopefully see SSMU represent the demands of the student body.”