Inside King’s College London’s crackdown on pro-Palestine students

Published 9 July 2026 · education

The university, which has ties to the defence industry, has disciplined more students than most other British campuses. Names marked with an asterisk* have been

The university, which has ties to the defence industry, has disciplined more students than most other British campuses. Names marked with an asterisk* have been changed to protect identities London, United Kingdom – Khadija* was just seven weeks into her degree when she received an early-morning phone call from her university, King’s College London, that left her scared and confused. The then-18-year-old was told she had made “inappropriate and offensive remarks” about one of her lecturers, who had served in the Israeli army. Over the next five months she would go through a disciplinary process that would see her banned from attending the lecturer’s classes and ordered to write a 2,000-word “reflective” essay. She would also be considered for referral to the UK government’s “counterterrorism” programme, Prevent, which rights groups have criticised for disproportionately targeting Muslims and lacking transparency. This all took place last year after the teenager posted in a pro-Gaza student WhatsApp group, saying she had come across her lecturer’s public LinkedIn profile and felt “sick” to discover they had spent four years in the Israeli army and had reposted and liked content defending Israel’s treatment of the Palestinians. At that time, Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza had killed at least 67,194 people. Other students responded with protest suggestions, such as attending their lectures wearing Palestinian scarves or carrying flags, questioning the academic “intellectually” about Gaza, and showing images of slaughtered infants on the projector, according to messages seen by Al Jazeera and Liberty Investigates. Ten days later – without any of these protests transpiring – Khadija was banned from attending campus during the hours of her lecturer’s classes after the messages were reported to the university. “It felt like a humiliation ritual,” said Khadija. “I didn’t know many people, it was the start of the year … my peers would be like: ‘Why didn’t you come to class when you were literally on campus two hours ago?’” She is one of at least 26 students at the university who have faced disciplinary investigations after engaging in pro-Palestine protest activity between October 2023 and November 2025. That is the highest of most British universities, this joint investigation by Al Jazeera and Liberty Investigates has found. We submitted Freedom of Information (FOI) requests to 156 universities. A total of 42 have launched investigations into as many as 236 pro-Gaza students and staff, data obtained from FOI laws and documents shared by those affected show. University College London opened at least 24 disciplinary cases, the second highest amount, the University of Oxford is third with 18 and Cardiff University has opened 12. As at King’s, the true figure may be higher than officially disclosed via information requests. Student union leader: King’s tries to ‘weaponise arbitrary investigations’ King’s is home to an active student protest movement, with demonstrations often erupting over the university’s links to weapons companies.