McGill University principal Suzanne Fortier has intervened in a controversy over whether three students were denied seats on the undergraduate student union’s highest body because they are pro-Israel or, as many in the Jewish community allege, simply because one of them is Jewish.

Under mounting pressure from Canadian Jewish groups, Fortier announced on Oct. 25 that she has ordered an investigation to determine the facts in this matter.

“Allegations have arisen suggesting that the votes against one or more of those directors were motivated by anti-Semitism,” she wrote in a memo to students and staff.

“We take such matters very seriously, as it is essential for McGill University to maintain an environment where different views and ideas can be expressed and debated with mutual respect.”

By that day, close to 1,300 had signed an online petition demanding that Fortier act after the nominations for three members of the Students’ Society of McGill University (SSMU) board of directors were not ratified at SSMU’s fall general assembly on Oct. 23.

The signatories allege that was because “they are Jewish or have vocally opposed anti-Jewish discrimination on campus.”

B’nai Brith Canada, which is circulating the petition, charges that the three students were “removed” in “the latest in a long string of anti-Semitic incidents” at McGill.

Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center (FSWC) also made public an Oct. 25 letter to Fortier in which the organization described “blatant anti-Semitism” during and leading up to the SSMU assembly.

In its report on the assembly, The McGill Tribune, an independent, student-run campus newspaper, said the nominations for seven directors were ratified for one-year terms beginning Nov. 15 in separate votes for each.

The nominations of Noah Lew and Alexander Scheffel, who were seeking renewals of their current mandates, failed, as did that of newcomer Josephine Wright O’Manique.

Read More: The Canadian Jewish News (CJN)