A screenshot from a video shared by Apartheid-Free Network shows destruction in Gaza. (Photo:
American Friends Service Committee on YouTube)

City councillors have inched closer to affirming Brampton as “an apartheid-free community” and make a commitment to “freedom, justice, and equality for the Palestinian People.”

Brampton City Coun. Gurpartap Singh Toorfirst brought the Apartheid-Free Network’s Community Pledge to council in October, with a motion calling out all illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank and across Palestine.

It also called on Canada “to recognize and take immediate action to address the genocide and ethnic cleansing occurring in Gaza,” while demanding an end to “all military operations by Israel in Gaza and facilitating full, unfettered humanitarian aid access to the region.”

The motion was referred back to the Interfaith Council of Peel for input before coming back to Brampton council, with one Jewish-Canadian advocacy group describing the motion as “divisive,” “one-sided,” and “disingenuous virtue signalling.”

But the city has now signed-on to the pledge “in principle” after an updated motion from Toor was passed with unanimous support on Wednesday.

City staff still have to report back on any financial or legal implications that will result from this before formally signing the pledge, and:

Affirm our commitment to freedom, justice, and equality for the Palestinian People
and all people.
Oppose all forms of racism, bigotry, discrimination, and oppression.
Declare ourselves an apartheid-free community.
Pledge to join others in working to end support to all Apartheid Regimes, settler
colonialism and military occupation.

“We pledged to join others in working to end all support to Israel’s Apartheid regime, settler colonialism, and military occupation,” the Apartheid-Free Network’s Community Pledge reads in part.

If the city does officially sign on, it would be the first municipality in Ontario to take the pledge. Only eight communities have taken the pledge, and the only Canadian municipalities on the list are Burnaby, B.C. and Powell River, B.C.

Activist group Brampton4Palestine called the city’s in-principle pledge signing “an important victory.”

The International Court of Justice is years into its probe of genocide allegations against Israeli authorities.

In September, a United Nations Commission of Inquiry concluded that Israel has committed genocide in Gaza, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is subject to an International Criminal Court arrest warrant over war crimes, as were Hamas leaders who have since been killed.

A UN report in January found Israel’s restrictions imposed on Palestinians “constitutes systemic discrimination based on, inter alia, race, religion or ethnic origin.”

– With files from The Canadian Press


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