A controversial inter-university walkout and demonstration against Israel’s actions in Palestine began at Strand Campus on Tuesday, the second anniversary of the Hamas-led 7 October attacks on Israeli territory.
Despite tensions between King’s College London (KCL) security staff, police, and over 100 protesters and counter-protesters, the demonstration was held without significant violence.
Students from several London universities – including KCL, SOAS, UCL and LSE – took part in the protest, which later marched between the campuses.
The demonstration took place despite widespread condemnation from Jewish organisations and the prime minister, Sir Keir Starmer, who said in an opinion piece in The Times that the protests were “un-British” in the wake of last week’s horrific attack on a synagogue in Manchester, in which two worshipers were killed.
The prime minister said, “This is not who we are as a country. It’s un-British to have so little respect for others. And that’s before some of them decide to start chanting hatred towards Jewish people all over again.”
Starmer also criticised the decision to hold the protests on the second anniversary of a Hamas-led terrorist attack on Israeli territory, during which some 1,200 were killed and 250 hostages were taken to Gaza, according to Israeli figures.
The attacks by Hamas triggered a new phase in the decades-long conflict in Israel and the Palestinian territories, which remain under Israeli occupation. Since 2023, at least 64,964 people have been killed by the Israeli military, including at least 18,457 children, according to the Hamas-run Ministry of Health, whose statistics are recognised by the UN as reliable.
After a two-year investigation, a UN Commission found in September that Israel’s actions in Gaza constitute a genocide.
The Commission’s chair, Navi Pillay affirmed, “Israeli authorities have persisted and continued with their genocidal campaign in Gaza for almost two years now,” urging Israel to “immediately end the genocide” and “comply fully with the orders for provisional measures of the International Court of Justice.”
During the action, members of KCL Students for Justice for Palestine (KCL SJP) held a banner listing the names and ages of children killed by the Israeli military in Gaza.
One attendee told Roar that KCL staff lifted the banner to allow people to enter the Strand Building, but a masked participant in the demonstration tried to pull it back down.
Drawing a large police presence, the protest was reported on by various international outlets including Al Jazeera, AFP and Reuters.
Tuesday also saw a small counter-protest, whose members shouted “this should not be allowed” and condemned the demonstrations as “despicable behaviour.”
Most of the counter-protesters outside Strand Campus did not follow the march to its destination outside SOAS, apart from one man who repeatedly shouted “there is no genocide” and “free Gaza from Hamas.”
When Roar requested a comment, he responded, “Free Gaza from Hamas.”
He was later escorted away by police without resistance but remained nearby as the march continued.
A representative from Students Supporting Israel at King’s (SSI at King’s), told Roar, “For university students to protest and walk out on 7 October, a day of mourning and pain for the Jewish people, right after the terror attack in Manchester on the holiest day in the Jewish calendar, is outrageous and incredibly disrespectful.
“It leaves Jewish and Israeli students feeling undermined, disrespected, hurt and shows that their safety and right to exist on campus is compromised and worse, disregarded.”
The walkout on Tuesday also saw King’s students chanting controversial slogans including “Israel is a terrorist state” and “KCL: shut it down! The UK Government: shut it down!”
The march proceeded through the LSE campus and later the UCL campus, where attendance had grown to several hundred, including both university students and members of the public. Multiple banners were visible in the crowd, inscribed “LSE pick a side: justice or scholasticide” and “Goldsmith’s for Palestine”.
When asked why they chose to attend the rally, one student told Roar, “It is only right to come to a protest like this. We are still here for the Palestinians, and they haven’t been abandoned.”
Another student added, “This is something everyone should be doing. To me, it feels like the minimum – the only thing that must be done right now is protesting.”
Several attendees voiced their anger over Starmer’s remarks in The Times.
“This man does not have the interests of the British people or the Palestinian people. We have no trust and no faith in Keir Starmer”, one student told Roar.
Another asserted, “There is nothing un-British about having a protest. This feels like a smear campaign against the Palestinian movement.
“It has always been about being against the colonial movement and not about being against the Jewish people,” they continued.
Writing in The Guardian, columnist Jonathan Freedland acknowledged the “horrific past two years in Gaza,” while urging readers to recognise that “there are others for whom the line is not so clear, whose rage against Israel manifests itself as, and may be driven by, hatred of Jews.” His remarks echoed wider concerns that Starmer’s conflation of anti-Zionism with antisemitism risks further blurring that line at a time of deep tension.
Grace Holloway is Roar's editor-in-chief managing the editorial side of our operation as well. She has gained valuable experience from Bloomberg as well as writing for Breaking Media, the Non-League Paper and Politics UK.
