McGill students reject Israel divestment motion

MONTREAL — McGill University students rejected a divestment motion against Israel.

Sunday’s vote of the Students’ Society was 276 against the nonbinding motion and 212 in favor. McGill has some 23,000 full-time undergraduate students.

The motion called on the Montreal university’s administration to stop doing business with companies “contributing to the continuation and profitability of the illegal occupation of the Palestinian territories.”

The motion was put forward by the campus group Solidarity for Palestinian Human Rights, or SPHR.

Critics including McGill’s Israel on Campus group linked the motion to the worldwide Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement, while supporters said it did not reject Israel’s right to exist or advocate a cultural or academic boycott.

In October, an SPHR motion condemning Israel’s “siege” of Gaza was tabled indefinitely.