11.11.26
Editorial Note
The European Parliament is set to vote on the next Horizon Europe Framework (2028–2034) over the next few months. Critical decisions are being made regarding the rules that could bar Israel from the upcoming €200B research program.
On November 10, 2026, in the afternoon, the European Parliament’s Committee on Industry, Research and Energy voted on the proposed participation rules. Left-wing factions introduced a draft amendment that would bar Israel, which was blocked. On November 23, 2026, following the committee vote, the proposal would move to the full European Parliament. In late 2026, the European Commission stated it wants to reach a preliminary agreement on non-EU association terms by late 2026 to stay on track for a January 2028 launch. In March 2027, the finalized rules package is expected to face a final legislative vote in the European Parliament plenary session.
Meanwhile, the group Palestine Solidarity Campaign is organizing a National Student and Workplace Day of Action for Palestine on Thursday, 26 November 2026, scheduled to take place in universities across the UK and internationally. Several groups are joining them, including Stop the War Coalition, Friends of Al-Aqsa, Muslim Association of Britain, Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND), and trade unions such as the Trades Union Congress (TUC) and the Scottish Trades Union Congress (STUC).
According to the organizers, “Our universities collectively invest almost £460 million in companies which enable Israel’s occupation and genocide to continue. On 26 November students and workers across the country will be calling for an end to this complicity, whatever form it takes. This day takes place as part of a global call to action from Palestinian trade unions and the BDS movement, calling on trade unionists, students and civil society organizations across the world will take coordinated campaigning actions in solidarity with the Palestinian people.”
The group urges students and workers to organize walkouts, “demanding your university end all complicity. Check out our guide on how to run a successful walkout.” The Student Action Guide which the group produced should be an “inspiration for other actions you could take – from organizing a film screening, to running a stall, launching a petition, organizing a rally or putting up posters around your university. Pass a motion at your Student’s Union to commit them to lobbying the university to divest (use our Template BDS Student’s Union motion – or since Barclays is a priority BDS target in this country, you could use this template SU motion to get your SU to commit to not banking on apartheid).” They also provide a “Student Divestment Guide to learn how to organize for divestment in your university.” The group urges students to “Get in touch with us at PSC if you need materials like flags, banners, lanyards, badges, stickers etc. Get in touch with the European Legal Support Center if you need support against repression on campus; or email our Youth and Student Campaigns Officer.”
The University of Manchester (UoM) has been targeted by anti-Israel activists recently, since, together with Tel Aviv University, it announced a joint institutional research-funding program, supporting collaborative projects across several faculties. Both have now announced a renewed funding initiative for 2026–2027. According to the announcement, the Global Fund supports the development of new and existing research collaborations to generate joint publications in leading academic journals and/or competitive external research funding applications. Projects combine collaborative research with partnership-building activities, such as exchange visits, workshops, networking, or access to specialized research facilities, and demonstrate a clear pathway to long-term research outcomes. Proposals involve a small network of researchers from both institutions. Projects align with one of the research priority areas: Healthier Futures and Creative Industries. These themes are intentionally broad and interdisciplinary, and applicants are encouraged to interpret them in the context of their own research expertise and collaborative project. For 18 months, the University of Manchester will provide up to £5,000 per project, and Tel Aviv University will provide up to NIS 21,000 per project. The proposal submission deadline was October 27, 2026. The funding period starts in February 2027.
The University of Manchester has also been the home to the group UoM Action for Palestine (also known as Action 4 Palestine), an autonomous student and staff activist group campaigning against the university’s institutional ties with Israel. UoM Action 4 Palestine organizes actions and political events around Palestine. For example, in October 2026, the activists disrupted a lecture in Political Philosophy, titled “Politics and Resistance,” delivered by Prof. Duncan Ivison, the University of Manchester’s President and Vice-Chancellor. The activists held banners that read “CUT TIES WITH GENOCIDE.” In October and November 2026, the group led marches across campus to protest the relaunch of the research partnership with Tel Aviv University. The group claims, “Our campaigning is focusing on the University of Manchester’s partnership with Tel Aviv University (TAU), an institution deeply complicit in Israel’s ongoing genocide. TAU is built on stolen Palestinian land, funds killer drones in Gaza and actively trains Israeli soldiers for combat. Join our campaign to get UoM to drop its genocidal ties now!”
The anti-Israel groups adopted a two-pronged approach. The first targets relevant organizations at the highest institutional level, as illustrated by the Horizon Europe barring attempts. The second focuses on persuading individual universities to reconsider or abandon their institutional ties and commitments.
Israel Academia Monitor will follow further developments.
REFERENCES:
When:
26/11/2026
All Day
Take action at your university on Thursday 26 November!
Our universities collectively invest almost £460 million in companies which enable Israel’s occupation and genocide to continue. On 26 November students and workers across the country will be calling for an end to this complicity, whatever form it takes.
This day takes place as part of a global call to action from Palestinian trade unions and the BDS movement, calling on trade unionists, students and civil society organisations across the world will take co-ordinated campaigning actions in solidarity with the Palestinian people.
Join us on 26 November for the national student and workplace day of action!
- Organise a walk out on 26 November demanding your university end all complicity. Check out our guide on how to run a successful walkout.
- Use our Student Action Guide for inspiration for other actions you could take – from organising a film screening, to running a stall, launching a petition, organising a rally or putting up posters around your university.
- Pass a motion at your Student’s Union to commit them to lobbying the university to divest (use our Template BDS Student’s Union motion – or since Barclays is a priority BDS target in this country, you could use this template SU motion to get your SU to commit to not banking on apartheid)
- Use our Student Divestment Guide to learn how to organise for divestment in your university.
- Get in touch with us at PSC if you need materials like flags, banners, lanyards, badges, stickers etc.
- Get in touch with the European Legal Support Centre if you need support against repression on campus; or email our Youth and Student Campaigns Officer
Need more resources? Check out our Apartheid Off Campus campaign page.
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Action 4 Palestine
Campaigning & Political
UoM Action 4 Palestine organises actions and political events around Palestine.
We campaign around boycott targets and engage students in political education around the Palestinian cause and reality, the centrality of Palestine globally, and we build solidarity with Palestine across borders.
Our campaigning is focussing on the University of Manchester’s partnership with Tel Aviv University (TAU), an institution deeply complicit in Israel’s ongoing genocide. TAU is built on stolen Palestinian land, funds killer drones in Gaza and actively trains Israeli soldiers for combat. Join our campaign to get UoM to drop its genocidal ties now!
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Action 4 Palestine activists disrupted a lecture given by Vice Chancellor Duncan Ivison, calling for an end to the academic partnership with Tel Aviv University
Published 23 October 2026 Updated 26 October 2026
By Obi Lazarus, Caitlin Embradura
Action 4 Palestine activists disrupting the Vice Chancellor’s lectureObi Lazarus
A second year Politics lecture on ‘Injustice and Resistance’ in the Samuel Alexander building, delivered by University of Manchester Vice Chancellor Duncan Ivison was disrupted by UoM Action 4 Palestine activists.
They called for the university to end its academic partnership with Tel Aviv University amidst ongoing settlements in the West Bank, and death and destruction in the Gaza Strip, which an inquiry by the UN Commission has ruled a genocide.
Members of the group came into the lecture alongside students, sitting at the front before disrupting Ivison’s presentation around ten minutes in.
Banners were unveiled at the front of the auditorium with messages like “CUT TIES WITH GENOCIDE” and “94% OF STUDENTS VOTED TO CUT TIES WITH TEL AVIV UNIVERSITY”.
The interruption has come following the University of Manchester’s continued academic partnership with TAU despite a 2025 Student Union vote yielding 94% in favour of ending the partnership, with 4,831 ballots cast.
Protestors stood at the front, chanting “UoM, shame, shame! All the crimes in your name!” and “Duncan Ivison we know you, we see you’re complicit too!”
A security team were also present at the lecture, and encouraged the protesters to leave the lecture hall. UoM Action 4 Palestine representatives handed out leaflets to students in the lecture, with information about TAU and the Defense Universities Alliance.
Ivison engaged in debate with students and activists in a discussion that spanned the principle of academic freedom and the conflation of TAU with the Israeli state.
Students in the lecture were also able to pose questions to the Vice Chancellor about the Union Assembly vote and why the University has not adhered to the apparent majority student position.
Ivison said that the University does take the issue “very seriously” and that they put in “mechanisms to address those concerns”.
“Students asked us to create new Palestinian scholarships which we are doing…[and they have] asked us to think about the post-conflict reconstruction of Palestinian Universities which we are doing”.
The activists called on the Vice Chancellor, who has previously refused cutting ties on the grounds of “academic freedom“, to reconsider the university’s ties.
Ivison responded by stating that the parameters and criteria of several university partnerships are scheduled to be reviewed, stating that:
“At the end of this academic year, we will look at all our partnerships, including the partnership with [TAU], in line with [our] criteria”.
TAU has outlined that proposals for the UoM Global Fund should reflect broader themes of “creative industries, digital futures, healthier futures, or sustainable futures”.
The Mancunion has approached the University of Manchester and Action 4 Palestine for a response.
A University of Manchester spokesperson said: “The University’s research collaborations, including those involving Tel Aviv University, are academic in nature and exist to advance knowledge. They are carried out within UK law and the University’s ethical and research governance frameworks. Decisions on whether to participate in these collaborations are made by individual academics on a voluntary basis and are underpinned by the principle of academic freedom.
Decisions about international research partnerships are taken collectively through the governance of our University committees. The University’s governing bodies, including Senate, have previously debated and voted against ending the partnership with Tel Aviv University. We understand and acknowledge the diverse views and feelings expressed by many of our students and remain committed to supporting lawful, respectful ongoing conversation and debate about these issues.”
A UoM Action 4 Palestine spokesperson said: “Our goal with this action was to highlight to students the hypocrisy of Duncan Ivison lecturing on injustice whilst his administration is actively complicit in injustice through its partnership with TAU. We also wanted to directly confront Ivison and show that students will not allow UoM’s complicity to continue.
Since last year, Ivison’s administration has only doubled down on its backing for genocide. Relaunching the TAU partnership and joining the DUA shows that UoM has only increased its willingness to ignore the overwhelming majority of students.
Today’s action again shows the vast majority of students are united in rejecting Ivison’s lies, and that administration would rather send swarms of campus security to a peaceful protest than listen to them is a damning indication of their current approach.”
Caitlin Embradura
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Students protest University of Manchester’s research partnership with Tel Aviv University
Protestors gathered outside the Manchester Alliance Business School before marching to the National Graphene Institute, intercepting a meeting of University management which included Vice-Chancellor Duncan Ivison
Published 5 November 2026
The protests centred primarily on the University’s continued research partnership with Tel Aviv University and the University management’s indifference towards, what the protesters argue, are the wishes of its university community.
UOM Action 4 Palestine led the march, chanting ‘What does our tuition fund? Labour’s missiles, tanks and guns! What is our tuition fund? Israel’s missiles, tanks and guns!’ and ‘UOM administration, stop supporting occupation!’
On October 21, they marched through the University campus, from the Manchester Alliance Business School up Oxford Road round to the National Graphene Institute.
The group concluded its protest outside a University of Manchester management meeting, where security personnel, who had monitored the protest since the outset, blocked the entrances to the institute.
Protestors walking through University GreenMatthew Bell @ The Mancunion
University of Manchester students and staff have made it clear their opposition to the partnership: in 2021, more than 200 academics signed an open letter against the partnership, and in 2025, 94% of the student body voted for UoM to end its partnership with Tel Aviv.
While the research partnership does not give Tel Aviv University any of the University’s money directly, the University of Manchester does contribute up to £5000 per project, funding research such as ‘Biorobotics Research Network’ and ‘Linguistic imperialism and the demotion of Arabic in Israel’.
The University of Manchester’s direct involvement with the UK government’s Defence Universities Alliance (DUA) in July, was also present in the concerns of the protesters.
Chants of “DUA shut it down, MOD shut it down, IOF shut it down” (IOF refers to the IDF but replaces ‘Defence’ in ‘Israeli Defence Force’ with ‘Occupation’) and “MOD Ministry of Death, you’re in bed with the IOF” made it clear that the protest did not just revolve around the actions of Israel but the militarisation of society generally.
The Mancunion spoke to Jack Newton, the Faculty of Science and Engineering Officer at the Student Union during the protest, to ask if he “would prefer if decisions like these were put to the student body and staff democratically?”.
“When it comes down to these sorts of things, they completely ignore what students have to say. And so I think as students and staff are the ones that make this university actually function, they should be the ones making decisions about where the money goes and who it works with.”
When asked about the potential of making the University act more democratically in its decisions that impact the academic body, he seemed pessimistic that it could be forced to happen; his idea instead was more pragmatic.
“So I think what students have to do, and alongside staff, alongside the community, is to actually organise, to build power that makes the cost of continuing this partnership too high to continue.”
“We’ve made it impossible for the university to claim what they don’t know about what Tel Aviv University is doing in relation to the genocide in Gaza.”
He called for the University to consider its reputation and whether they wanted it to be “one of partnering with Israel, of partnering with weapons companies, or do they want it to be actually about what university does, about teaching students, about research, about improving the world?”
Jack Newton also voiced support for opposing the DUA, saying “This is, like, directly the British government saying that they want to militarise our universities” and that it reflects a wider militarisation of Society that the government would describe as defence.
Duncan Ivision entering the Graphene InstituteMatthew Bell @ The Mancunion
UOM Action 4 Palestine member Esther echoed Jack Newton’s concerns, saying that “students are against militarisation on campus, and no student wants their tuition to go towards genocide and to go towards defence” and that the focus of the University should be on “improving students’ lives and our study here, because we want degrees, not UAVs”.
In conversations on campus, several students, both home and international, said they were unfamiliar with the partnership, with some reporting that they had first encountered it through protests against the collaboration.
Mayor of Greater Manchester Bev Craig, when asked about the University of Manchester’s partnership with Tel Aviv University, said she did not “know the ins and outs of the partnership” but was “happy to look into [it] in a bit more detail” and speak to the Vice-Chancellor about its implications and whether it reflected student opinion.
Protesters against the partnership and the ‘militarisation of society and education’ vow to continue their vocal opposition and to pressure University management to change their position.
Protestors gather outside the Graphene Institute Matthew Bell @ The Mancunion
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https://mancunion.com/news/exclusive-university-of-manchester-plans-to-relaunch-partnership-with-tel-aviv-universityhttps://mancunion.com/news/exclusive-university-of-manchester-plans-to-relaunch-partnership-with-tel-aviv-universityExclusive: University of Manchester plans to relaunch partnership with Tel Aviv UniversityThe University of Manchester has planned to resume a research partnership with Tel Aviv University after three years, despite student opposition and a previous suspension of the collaboration.
Published 12 August 2026
By Archie Forde
The University of Manchester (UoM) has planned to relaunch its partnership with Tel Aviv University (TAU), less than one year after a motion to cut ties with the Israeli university was backed by 94% of votes cast at Union Assembly. The turnout was 4,831.
Collaboration between the two universities is planned to resume as part of UoM Global Fund, a new twice-yearly scheme that brings five universities under the same funding model to support research.
The initiative was announced on 28 July via a StaffNet post, UoM’s internal staff intranet. The post did not mention the specific ‘partner institutions’ involved in the fund.
A second guidelines document, hyperlinked in the original announcement, did not mention the participating universities either.
The list of universities can be publicly accessed through a link in the UoM Global Fund guidelines document, which leads to an application landing page. The landing page explicitly names Tel Aviv University as one of the five institutions selected for the scheme, meaning The University of Manchester plans to resume the partnership after three years.
For the Global Fund, UoM contributes £5000 per project; the partner institution a similar amount. Applications for the funding open on September 1st. The other universities involved are Germany’s Heidelberg University, India’s Manipal Academy of Higher Education, China’s Peking University, and The United States’ University of Texas at Austin.
In the StaffNet post, Professor Angie Wilson, Associate Vice-President for International at UoM, said that the fund was aimed at ‘Investing in your efforts to build partnerships with our peers across the world will help us deliver our Manchester 2035 strategy, including our ambition to be the partner of choice for those who share our commitment to excellence and turning knowledge into impact for the public good.’
The original UoM-TAU partnership funded a total of eighteen joint projects from 2021-2023, ‘none of which [were] related to defence research or have any military links’.
Up to 8 joint projects every year would receive up to £5,000 from both universities. A paper provided to supplement the Student Union motion notes that ‘each partner pays its own costs’ and there is ‘no transfer of funds between institutions’.
As of October 15, 2025, £52,622 had been used on research projects, which have ranged from a ‘Biorobotics Research Network’ to studies of ‘Linguistic imperialism and the demotion of Arabic in Israel’.
The partnership was postponed in 2023 ‘because of the Israel-Hamas war’, a freedom of information request made to UoM in late 2024 said.
UoM said they hoped to reopen applications in 2025, though a date had not yet been confirmed.
The TUA partnership has drawn criticism from student groups and academics alike since its inception. In 2021, more than 200 academics signed an open letter opposing the venture.
Addressed to Dame Nancy Rothwell and the university’s senate, the open letter argued that TAU was ‘deeply implicated in Israel’s premeditated bombing of civilians and civilian infrastructure in Gaza,’ and that the partnership contravened UoM’s ‘ethical commitment to oppos[ing] racist violence and oppression’.
On campus, student activists led protests and occupations of buildings, such as Samuel Alexander, Roscoe, and Simon. In 2024, students staged a barricade of the Whitworth building on Oxford Road.
In a twelve page document from March 2025, that was cited in Union Assembly, the Youth Front For Palestine Student Society, who helped organise the protests and the Student Union motion, argued that Tel Aviv University was ‘an arm of the Israeli state’s occupation and ethnic cleansing of Palestine’.
A spokesperson from the University of Manchester said, ‘The University’s research collaborations, including those involving Tel Aviv University (TAU), are academic in nature and exist to advance knowledge. They are carried out within UK law and the University’s ethical and research governance frameworks. Decisions on whether to participate in these collaborations are made by individual academics on a voluntary basis and are underpinned by the principle of academic freedom.
The Staffnet announcement was an internal advance notice of the Global Fund and provided a high-level overview of the scheme for colleagues ahead of its formal launch on 1 September. Information on participating institutions, including TAU, was available through the accompanying guidance and application materials. TAU is one of six universities in the first call, with a second call, including different universities, to follow in Spring 2027. These are researcher driven initiatives and future rounds will be determined by the interest in and outcomes achieved through these collaborations.
The fund forms part of our wider approach to international partnerships introduced through the M2035 International Delivery Plan, which will launch in September. This includes an announcement of our new university-wide global initiatives, which operate separately from the more flexible Global Fund collaborations.
Decisions about international research partnerships are taken collectively through the governance of our University committees. The University’s governing bodies, including Senate, have previously debated and voted against ending the partnership with TAU. That decision reflects careful consideration of legal, ethical and academic principles, as well as the importance of international academic collaboration. These principles are summarised in our Statement of Social Responsibility in our Research
We understand and acknowledge the diverse views and feelings expressed by many of our students, and remain committed to supporting lawful, respectful ongoing conversation and debate about these issues’.
A spokesperson from Action 4 Palestine said, ‘This secretive re-launch of the partnership with TAU, Israel’s academic army base, after almost three years of genocide in Gaza represents the university’s complete disdain for both Palestinian life and their own students. Last October, students made it overwhelmingly clear that they oppose this partnership and do not accept bogus justifications for working with TAU.
Student anti-Zionist activists have been campaigning for years for this partnership to be dropped, with widespread student and staff support. To covertly restart this partnership whilst many members of staff and students are away from campus over summer is a cowardly admission of guilt and rejection of public scrutiny.
Since the SU vote, TAU has only deepened its involvement in genocide and occupation. In February, TAU sold its share in its flagship startup XTend, an Israeli quadcopter company which claimed to have “redirected energies to supporting the IDF 100%.”, profiting $25 million from this criminal venture. Student soldiers at TAU have continued to study how to make the genocide more efficient and volunteered their time to support frontline IOF soldiers who are still massacring Palestinians daily. TAU has also announced archaeology work in illegal settlements, further violating the rights of Palestinians and desecrating their land.
Shame on UoM for including TAU in the Global Fund. The students have spoken, drop Israel’s academic army base now.
We call on academics to boycott this partnership and refuse to make themselves complicit in TAU’s crimes. We will continue to escalate our campaign until the university ends this blood-soaked partnership’.
