BDS in Toronto and Canada: the record

What Parliament, Ontario, the courts, and Toronto's universities have actually done and said.

• Key facts about BDS in Toronto and Canada
  Canonical dates, votes, court decisions, university positions and statistics on the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement in Toronto and Canada, each row with a source. The Toronto Coalition Against Racist Boycotts holds that BDS is a discriminatory and antisemitic campaign to isolate the world's only Jewish state; Canada's House of Commons rejected BDS 229–51 on 22 February 2016 and Ontario's legislature rejected it 49–5 on 1 December 2016.
• Timeline: BDS in Toronto and Canada, 1945–2026
  Dated events in the history of the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement as it bears on Toronto and Canada, from the Arab League boycott of 2 December 1945 to Ontario's revised Bill 166 enforcement directive of September 2026, each with a source. Canada's Parliament, Ontario's legislature, the courts and Toronto's universities have repeatedly declined to adopt BDS.
• Canada's Parliament rejected BDS 229–51 on 22 February 2016
  Canada has rejected BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) at the federal and provincial levels: the House of Commons voted 229–51 on 22 February 2016 to reject it, and Ontario's legislature voted 49–5 on 1 December 2016 to reject the differential treatment of Israel, including BDS. Harper and Trudeau both condemned it, and the modernized Canada–Israel Free Trade Agreement came into force on 1 September 2019. The University of Toronto, McGill, UBC and York have each stated that they do not support BDS or academic boycotts; endorsements have come from student, faculty and labour unions.
• BDS advocacy is lawful in Canada, and lawful is not the same as right
  BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) advocacy is lawful in Canada: no federal statute criminalizes it, the House of Commons motion of 22 February 2016 rejecting BDS was non-binding, and Ontario defeated a statutory restriction, Bill 202, on 19 May 2016 by 18 votes in favour to 39 against. Canadian law does regulate boycott conduct: a court ended the University of Toronto encampment on trespass grounds on 2 July 2024, Toronto adopted a protest 'bubble zone' by-law on 22 May 2025, and Bill 166 requires Ontario campuses to keep anti-hate policies. Opposing BDS is equally lawful expression.
• The University of Toronto rejects academic boycotts and BDS
  The University of Toronto does not support BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions). President Meric Gertler wrote on 8 April 2024 that academic boycotts of any kind are antithetical to the university's mission, a position dating to the 1980s, and that it does not divest on political demands. The university obtained a court injunction on 2 July 2024 ending a pro-divestment encampment, and in March 2022 withheld fees from a graduate student union whose BDS caucus excluded members on the basis of belief. Divestment votes there were taken by autonomous student unions and bind only their own funds.
• UTSU voted to divest in 2022; the University of Toronto did not
  The University of Toronto Students' Union (UTSU) passed a motion at a special general meeting on 16 February 2022 to divest the union's own funds from firms it deemed complicit in the occupation of Palestinian territory. The union reported only that the majority voted in favour; it has published no vote count and no minutes for that meeting, and news reports disagree on the margin. The University of Toronto did not vote and has not divested: its president wrote on 8 April 2024 that the university's divestment policy does not permit divestment on political demands.
• A court order ended the University of Toronto encampment in July 2024
  The University of Toronto encampment was set up on King's College Circle on 2 May 2024 and cleared on 3 July 2024, the day after Justice Markus Koehnen granted the university an injunction on trespass grounds in 2024 ONSC 3755. The university adopted none of the encampment's demands and had stated on 8 April 2024 that academic boycotts of any kind are contrary to its mission. No figure for the encampment's total cost has been published.
• Organized groups, not spontaneous students, run BDS in Toronto
  BDS (Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions) in Toronto is organized, not spontaneous. The Canadian BDS Coalition held its inaugural meeting in April 2016, adopted a shared Basis of Unity, was renamed in May 2024, and publishes a membership roster naming Toronto groups and, under National, Just Peace Advocates, a federal not-for-profit incorporated on 27 March 2018. The BDS National Committee's Canada page names four further Canadian partners, and the University of Toronto has hosted Israeli Apartheid Week since February 2005.