When a group of students from Students Supporting Israel (SSI) at Toronto Metropolitan University (formerly Ryerson University) hosted an event on November 5, it was invaded by a small group of masked extremists, who smashed windows and forced themselves into the room, forcing its cancellation.

The violent disruption was organized by Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) a radical organization that has been banned on a number of other campuses. When it was banned from Brandeis University in late 2023, the president noted that the group “openly supports Hamas,” a banned terrorist organization.

Nevertheless, SJP remains fully registered at TMU, and prior to the event, SJP had encouraged followers on social media to ensure that the event did not go through.

In its coverage of the mob’s attack, “Police called as anti-Israel protesters disrupt student event featuring IDF speaker near Toronto university,” The National Post’s Stewart Lewis reported that SJP organized the demonstration, and chronicled how at least one person was injured as a result of the riot.

And while The Toronto Star reported on the incident as well, their article, “Multiple arrests after protesters reportedly force their way into TMU off-campus event,” saw reporters Raju Mudhar and Maiai Tustonic omit any mention of SJP’s role in creating and encouraging the anti-Israel mob, and instead simply referred to the demonstrators as “a group of protesters.”

This is about as descriptive and informative as referring to a Ku Klux Klan march as a group of white sheet aficionados.

The Toronto Star’s article did more than fail to share a detail; it avoided identifying the culprit, even though SJP made no effort to hide its role, and thus avoided sharing with readers the name and identity of the extremist group responsible for the violence. Additionally, calling the mob “a group of protesters” also falsely implies that it developed somewhat organically, rather than being an organized and orchestrated violent effort by a registered group at TMU.

Predictably for one of Canada’s most relentlessly anti-Israel newspapers, the article could not simply report on what took place without quoting from one protester, Bria Scott, named as an alumni of TMU who came to the demonstration, in a slick attempt to present ‘both sides’ of a violent and hateful mob.

While Mudhar and Tusconic quoted one of the event’s organizers as saying that the program was meant to promote “open dialogue and communication,” Scott was quoted as complaining that police arrested protesters who just wanted to “show their discontent” at the event.

According to a police press release, five members of the mob were arrested: 25 year-old Nicole Baiton, 22 year-old Kiah Alexis, Fatimah Mugni, 23, Chelsea Wu, 29, and Manal Kamran, 21.

By quoting two students in an attempt at ‘balance,’ The Toronto Star in reality helped to blur the line between a hateful mob and students organizing a peaceful pro-Israel event.

In so doing, this article’s coverage of the anti-Israel mob is somewhat of a microcosm of the last two years, where news media outlets made no distinction between a genocidal Islamic terrorist group, Hamas, and the Israeli military, which took active, even unprecedented, attempts to minimize civilian casualties in Gaza.

The Toronto Star’s article not only created a false balance between peaceful organizers and a violent anti-Israel mob, by failing to mention the name of SJP as the culprit of the riot, it helped to shield this extremist group from scrutiny.