Conflict in Middle East can never justify vandalism, Montreal mayor says

Montreal’s mayor says no amount of anger or feelings of despair regarding the situation in the Middle East can ever justify vandalism.

Valérie Plante’s comments came two days after demonstrators smashed windows downtown – at Concordia University’s Hall building and at businesses on de la Montagne Street – in what police have described as an impromptu protest.

Protesters also reportedly spray-painted windows, and police say a protester threw an incendiary object toward an officer during a subsequent foot chase. No one was injured.

Four people in their 20s were arrested and later released without charges. An investigation is ongoing and charges could be laid at a later date, authorities say.

“October 7 is just next week and it’s going to be a very sad and tragic anniversary, of course, because since then there’s been a lot of hatred, there’s been a lot of people dying,” Plante said Tuesday after her Chamber of Commerce talk at Club de Golf Metropolitain Anjou. “But it has an effect on Montrealers, whatever communities they are, I mean we’re all affected by this, what is happening over there.

“But my message is to say that first of all in Montreal, we are a place of peace, inclusion. People can protest maybe how they feel, the despair, how they are angry or sad, but that being said it doesn’t allow anyone to break anything or to do vandalism.

“We will never accept that, and this is why the SPVM is on the ground.”

Sunday’s vandalism came against the backdrop of escalating tensions in the Middle East, nearly a year after Hamas’ attack on Israel on Oct. 7, 2023. That conflict recently spilled into Lebanon between Israel and Hezbollah, and Iran fired missiles into Israel as of Tuesday.

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“Even though this is a difficult time around the world and especially across the board, we have to keep Montreal a place where anti-Semitism is not accepted,” Mayor Plante added. “We will not tolerate it, we will not tolerate Islamophobic acts or gestures as well.

“We should be walking for peace, that should be what we should be doing right now, coming to October 7.”