Toronto police investigate ad truck with anti-Muslim messaging

The Toronto police hate crimes unit is investigating after video surfaced online of a mobile advertising truck displaying anti-Muslim digital images and messages.

In videos posted to social media, the truck appears to display a series of questions that say: "Is this Lebanon? Is this Yemen? Is this Syria? Is this Iraq?"

The truck then displays images of what appears to be Muslims praying and protesting in Nathan Phillips Square in Toronto. Palestinian flags and the square's concrete arches are visible in the images.

The messages on the truck then say: "No. This is Canada. Wake up Canada. You are under siege."

The lettering is in blue on a white background and clearly visible from several metres away.

Police are urging members of the public to come forward if they have information or video footage of the truck.

"We recognize the community's concern about a truck displaying Islamophobic messaging in Toronto," police said in a post on X, formerly Twitter, on Wednesday.

Advocates have slammed the messaging as racist.

Amira Elghawaby, Canada's Special Representative on Combatting Islamophobia, said in an interview on Wednesday that she was surprised and disappointed when she heard about the messaging on the truck and believes it should be condemned widely.

"This type of messaging really does send quite an unfortunate message of division and hate," she said, adding it has no place in Canada.

"Sadly, Islamophobia and now anti-Palestinian racism, anti-Arab racism, these are not new phenomena. The forms that they can take can differ. What is most alarming, of course, is when they lead to Islamophobic, anti-Palestinian, anti-Arab violence." 

In a post on X, formerly Twitter, on Wednesday, Elghawaby said she spoke to Toronto police's Muslim liaison officers to let them know she received several reports from Toronto residents expressing "deep concern, fear and anxiety" about the truck.

"This clear incitement to hate Muslims is deeply worrisome given the ongoing violence that our communities continue to experience, including most recently an arson in London, Ontario, as well as physical assaults of visibly Muslim women in Scarborough, Halifax, Ottawa, and elsewhere," Elghawaby said earlier on X.

"We do not want to see another Quebec mosque massacre, or Our London Family attack. We have already lost too many of our community members to deadly Islamophobic hate."