Howard Levitt: Students who signed petition condoning Hamas should have to answer for their decision

financialpost.com:

One of my partners sent me the following note this week:

“I trust that the first question that we will ask any potential new hire or student from Toronto Metropolitan University is whether or not they signed the letter condoning Hamas. They should also be advised that if they lie in response to that question it is grounds for dismissal for cause.”

Some law firms are cancelling job interviews with students who signed the anti-Semitic letter in question, an Oct. 20 petition directed at TMU’s Lincoln Alexander School of Law that declared support for of “all forms” of Palestinian resistance and denied Israel’s right to exist. After all, what law firm would want to hire a racist, let alone a student whose name would now feature prominently when it is searched on Google, thereby causing embarrassment to the firm that employs them?

Many of these 74 TMU students are deleting their social media presences, hoping they will not be found out. But if they are not clearly identified, all other students at the law school risk being tarred with the same brush, with law firms fearing that they might have been one of the signatories.

TMU, whose milquetoast initial response enraged much of the legal and broader community, is now saying that it will hire an investigator and follow that person‘s recommendations.

That is unsatisfactory. I have discussed the scam of workplace investigations many times in these pages, and there are three salient points. First, it is often merely an excuse to punt the matter months down the road, hoping the story will be forgotten and the scandal averted. Second, those ordering investigations often hope the probe provides the appearance of actually doing something, when nothing significant is done. Finally, all