Toronto police chief reverses course, identifies 'terrorist flag' waved at demonstration

A dayafter refusing to identifythe "terrorist flag" held at a demonstration last weekendthat led to charges being laid against a man for public incitement of hatred, Toronto's police chief said the flag belongs to thePopular Front for the Liberation of Palestine.

On its website, Public Safety Canada lists both thePopular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine General Command (PFLP-GC) as "terrorist entities."

"The goals of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) are the destruction of the State of Israel and the establishment of a communist government in Palestine," the federal website reads.

"The concern we have and what we're alleging is that this individual displayed that flag and that [it] constitutes evidence of an offence of public incitement of hatred under the Criminal Code," Chief Myron Demkiw told CBC Radio'sMetro MorningFriday.

At a Toronto Police Services Board meeting Thursday, police announced that a 41-year-old man was charged with public incitement of hatred for allegedly waving the flag while marching through the city's downtown Sunday.

Demkiwcalled the charge "unprecedented," noting the "very high threshold" to charge anyone with a hate propaganda offence.

LISTEN | Demkiw reverses course, identifies'terrorist flag':

Metro Morning11:04Chief Myron Demkiw on hate crime charge and why police are banning protests on the Avenue Road overpass

Myron Demkiw is Chief of the Toronto Police Service.

Friday'sabout-face came after Demkiw refused to saywhat the flag depicts and which group it is associated withat the Thursday meeting.

"What I'm very conscious of is not inadvertently doing anything to in any way promote or otherwise send a message that these kinds ofimages are trying to send," he told Metro MorningFriday.

"I did not want to show the imagery of the flag at all under any circumstances. I'll take steps not to do that."

It's "too early" to tell if Demkiw'smove to reverse course and identify the group was a result of miscommunication or miscalculation, Barbara Perry, the director of the Centre on Hate, Bias and Extremism at Ontario Tech University, told CBC News.

"Will this increase the problem? Will this increase their aggressiveness? ... I think that the next couple of days will tell the tale."

Avenue Road bridge demonstrations now prohibited

Police also announced Thursday that demonstrations on the Avenue Road bridge over Highway 401 are nowprohibited as they pose a threat to public safety and have made many in the surrounding Jewish community feel intimidated, Demkiw said Thursday.

The recurrent demonstration has been criticized by some city councillors and Jewish groups for its location in a neighbourhood with a large Jewish population.

Perry said the move to ban demonstrations on the Avenue Road bridge over Highway 401 has "real potential to enhance the polarization rather than decrease it.

"It can actually have a boomerang effect or create backlash against that and further enhance hostilities I think, because this will be understood as an unfair infringement. You know, one side is being protected, the other isn't," she said in an interview.

Asked what police can do to ensure they are not adding to the polarization, Perry said the issue is "not something we can police our way out of.

"What's needed is open dialogue and finding a way, to reduce the tension and the anxiety in a way that allows [both] Jewish communities and and pro-Palestinian communities to both feel safe and both feel heard."

WATCH | Trudeau on the banning of demonstrations on a Toronto overpass:

Federal government has no 'direct line' to decisions made by Toronto police: Trudeau

9 months ago

Duration 1:25

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau met with Toronto Police Chief Myron Demkiw Wednesday about the increase in antisemitic incidents in the city. The next day, Demkiw said protests on the Avenue Road bridge over Hwy. 401 would no longer be allowed. Trudeau told reporters Friday his job is to make sure all Canadians are safe, and feel safe, and that Ottawa has no command over decisions made by local police.

Earlier this week, Demkiw publicly apologized after an officer was filmed handing coffee to a protester at a pro-Palestinian demonstration, adding questions had been raised about a particular interaction on Saturday between officers and a person at the Avenue Road bridge demonstration.

"Whether consciously or not, I think that [police] are trying to find that balance and perhaps this is a reaction," Perry said, referring to the demonstration ban on the overpass.

"I suspect that there's been lots of pressure brought to bear on police services, whether it's from the police board or perhaps Jewish organizations in the area. So I think that they're probably responding to that pressure as well."

A "deep sense of concern," has been expressedby a number of people in the Jewish community living in the Avenue Road area, said Daniel Panneton, director of allyship and community engagement at the Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Centerfor Holocaust Studies (FSWC).

"We can't separate these protests from the wider context of arson attacks happening on grocery stores in Toronto," Pannetontold CBC News.

"There's been physical assaults, there's been buildings targeted, and this has created a real environment of anxiety, tension and fear. And so these protests happening in a very Jewish neighborhood [have] only amplified those feelings of tension."

Palestinian, Jewish groups respond to charge

Dania Majid, president of the Arab Canadian Lawyers Association, said police "tactics" and "messaging" are re-enforcing anti-Palestinian racism and creating a public perception that Palestinians and Arabs are a threat to public safety.

"As police themselves have noted, the numerous large-scale protests in support of Palestinians have passed peacefully without incident," Majid said in an email Friday.

"Yet, police are increasingly taking a heavy-handed approach towards anti-genocide protesters, and criminalizing Palestinian freedom of expression and assembly."

Majid added that a long-standing distrust of police authorities by Palestinians, Arabs and Muslims has resulted in the under-reporting of hate crimes.

"They are, in fact, victimized at a significantly higher rate than what the data published by the police indicates," she said.

Toronto police have also said that hate crimestend to be under-reportedin general.

In a statement Friday, FSWCsaid it welcomes the police'smove to lay charges.

"These latest actions taken by the Toronto Police Service come at a critical point, as theJewishcommunity deals with an extreme surge in antisemitic incidents and acts of intimidation," said FSWC President and CEO Michael Levitt.

"Day after day,Jewsin Toronto and across the country have been targeted, harassed and intimidated."