A staff member at an Oakville high school is accused of telling a student wearing a keffiyeh, that he reminds her of a terrorist.

The incident is said to have taken place in the school office at Iroquois Ridge High School on Friday April 26th.

A video shared by the Muslim Advisory Council of Canada appears to show a student wearing the black checkered scarf in conversation with the staff member as several students watch the exchange and someone records the interaction.

“In fact, I said, have I ever judged you that way?” the staff member asks, “of course not.”

The student replies, “so I’m not a terrorist and you don’t treat me like a terrorists but I look like one?”

That’s when the staff member replies, “That (the keffiyeh) reminds me of.”

The student then asks, “So I don’t usually look like one but when I put this (the keffiyeh) on?”

The staff member confirms, “that reminds me.”

The keffiyeh is a piece of clothing culturally important to Arabs and Muslims and which has also become a symbol of Palestinian resistance related to the Israel Hamas war which began after the terror attack of October 7th.

A statement from the Halton District School Board says the staff member has been placed on home assignment while an investigation is conducted and calls the incident “harmful and discriminatory” and says the staff member used anti-Palestinian racist language in her comments to the student.

Education Minister Stephen Lecce has weighed in on the video which has gone viral, calling the comments unacceptable and deeply offensive.

Wearing of a keffiyeh in the Ontario Legislature is currently banned, despite two recent attempts by the opposition to overturn the ban.