UK government launches effort to help Palestinian students leaving Gaza

Nine Chevening scholars' departures will be speeded up but dozens are left behind

Palestinian researcher Nevin Yassin 'defended' her master's thesis from the ruins of Al Azhar University in Gaza city in May. Getty.

The UK government is looking to expand support for students in Gaza who hold scholarships at British universities, as it works for the safe exit of its Chevening scholars.

Nine students from Gaza who were awarded the UK government’s Chevening Scholarship will be evacuated to Amman or Cairo, where they can have their biometric details processed before coming to Britain. Around 40 students are likely to be eligible for support to travel to the UK.

“We are working urgently to support Chevening scholars in Gaza who have offers from British universities to leave and take up their places in the UK,” a Foreign Commonwealth and Development Office representative said.

“We are doing everything we can to support their safe exit and onward travel to the UK, but the situation on the ground in Gaza makes this extremely challenging.”

But some students with scholarships to UK universities from private foundations and the British Council risk being left behind, campaigners said, because it is unclear how their biometric details will be processed.

Chevening Scholars. Nine students from Gaza who were awarded the scholarship will be evacuated to Amman or Cairo for biometric checks. Photo: British High Commission in Bangladesh / X

The Israeli government would need to agree to each student leaving Gaza, as diplomatic relations with London deteriorate.

Prime Minister Keir Starmer announced last month that the UK will recognise a Palestinian state if Israel does not take a series of steps, including agreeing to a truce in its war with the militant group Hamas.

Travel blocked

Palestinian academics on fellowships from Cara, the Council for At Risk Academics, as well as sanctuary scholars, have been unable to complete the journey from Gaza for the same reason.

“These are not refugees, these are students who have made the cut in an international competition,” said Alison Phipps, a professor at the University of Glasgow who has been involved in the campaign.

The fact that the students had gone through the process of applying despite the war and displacement, made them “extraordinary”, Prof Phipps told The National, “We know we’ve got outstanding people.”

She said she received messages last week from the Chevening scholars who were celebrating the news they had received from the Foreign Office. Others were “devastated” by a lack of clarity over what is on offer for them.

While other European countries such as France and Ireland had arranged biometric processing outside Gaza, the British government is “dragging its feet”, said Bill Williamson, a trustee of Durham Palestine Educational Trust.

The trust is one of the UK’s oldest scholarships for Palestinian students, and it is hoping to bring four students from Gaza to the University of Durham this year. Two of those students had been awarded a scholarship in the previous year, but this was deferred as they could not leave Gaza then.

The four students had been granted a place at the university and the trust had paid for their visa applications and NHS health surcharges. “We are hoping that the government will agree to do the biometrics in a third country,” said Mr Williamson.

“There might be a good reason for biometric control, but there’s no reason they need to do it before they travel,” he said.

The delays are one of the reasons that UK academics and MPs are campaigning for biometric requirements to be deferred as they were in the case of Ukrainian students after Russia’s invasion in 2022.

Labour MP Abtisam Mohamed and Barry Gardiner co-wrote a letter this month to the Prime Minister asking for biometric checking in Egypt or Jordan to be allowed.

“Within the first 100 days of war, every single university in Gaza has been bombed, leaving more than 90,000 students without access to higher education,” the letter said.

Gaza city's Al Azhar University in February last year, after it suffered severe damage from Israeli air strikes. AFP.

“We ask you to co-ordinate an urgent evacuations route for this group of students, who have lost everything, and yet have achieved scholarships to study, so that they may return to rebuild Palestine for the future.”

But shadow home secretary Chris Philp commented that biometric checks should be done in Israel as they are an “essential part of our security arrangements”.

“One of the reasons [biometric checks] are done is to then check the photograph and check the fingerprints against various databases.”

The British Council was contacted for comment.