A suggestion by a University of Toronto Governing Council member to deploy drones and facial recognition on encampment participants and seek financial reparations from "bad actors" within the movement has sparked concern among protesters and privacy advocates. The meeting, held on June 27, allowed council members to discuss the administration’s response to the action as it awaited a decision from the courts on the injunction that eventually brought an end to the encampment. In the days leading up to the forum, protest organizers had called on council members to urge the university to publicly disclose and divest from any investments with ties to the Israeli military.
Though the live stream of the forum is no longer publicly available and the university has yet to upload the minutes, CTV News Toronto has reviewed a recording of the meeting, during which members did not discuss pathways to fulfilling the outlined demands with the administration. Instead, a number of council members called upon the university to employ enforcement measures or disband the encampment altogether, citing concerns of antisemitic rhetoric stemming from the encampment. “It's my belief that you really can't have healing unless you also have justice,” alumni member Brian Madden told the council as part of a suggestion that the university seek financial reparations from participants that had broken the school's code of conduct.
“I understand that it's difficult and challenging to identify those in.
