Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau attends the third session of the G20 Leaders’ Meeting in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, on November 19, 2024. FILE PHOTO/Agence France-Presse
MONTREAL — Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau on Saturday denounced violence and “acts of anti-Semitism” during protests outside a Nato meeting in Montreal.
“There must be consequences, and rioters held accountable,” he posted on social media platform X, echoing criticism by other politicians.
“What we saw on the streets of Montreal last night was appalling,” Trudeau said. “Acts of anti-Semitism, intimidation, and violence must be condemned wherever we see them.”
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The North Atlantic Treaty Organization was holding its parliamentary assembly Friday in the Quebec metropolis, with the demonstrations organized that day by pro-Palestinian and anti-capitalist groups aimed at denouncing the trans-Atlantic alliance.
Vehicles were set ablaze, shop windows were smashed, and protesters set off smoke bombs and threw metal objects, said police, who reported three arrests.
Tensions escalated when demonstrators burned an effigy of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the crowd, local media reported.
Officers used chemical irritants and truncheons to disperse the demonstration, which numbered about 800 people.
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Quebec Premier Francois Legault posted on X that “the violent and hateful scenes we witnessed last night in the streets of Montreal, with attacks specifically targeting the Jewish community, are unacceptable.”
One of the demonstrators, speaking on public broadcaster Radio-Canada, accused the police of a violent response and said there were multiple injuries.
He said the protest was aimed in part at denouncing “Nato’s complicity with the Israeli army while it carries out genocide in Gaza,” launches strikes in Lebanon and Syria and occupies the Palestinian territories.