May 5, 2024 | Barry Weisleder
A hybrid rally and march celebrated the movement for Palestine liberation and International Workers’ Day in Toronto on Saturday, May 4. The gathering of about 200 members of a range of labour and leftist groups stationed at the south-east corner of Toronto City Hall Square was massively outnumbered by nearly one thousand people summoned by the Palestinian Youth Movement who converged with the May Day event.
J.P. Hornick, newly re-elected President of the 180,000 strong Ontario Public Service Employees’ Union, passionately called for resistance against the system at the root of oppression and exploitation worldwide. An Indigenous leader, Bri Pitawanakat, plus a rep from the PYM, among others, spoke to the crowd at City Hall. The rally chair heralded the presence of a delegation from the Consulate of the Republic of Cuba, which was greeted by boisterous applause.
The loudly chanting assemblage, festooned with a multitude of banners and flags, walked up Bay Street. It occupied the intersection at College Street, next to the Toronto Police headquarters. There, Julius Arscott, a leading union activist, spoke for Socialist Action. The President of CUPE Local 79 Nas Yadollahi, and a member of Samidoun, the Palestine prisoners’ rights organization, also addressed the demonstrators.
The march proceeded along College, past the Ontario Legislature at Queen’s Park, to the site of the protest encampment at U of Toronto, where it concluded.
