The University of Manchester Students’ Union has voted overwhelmingly in favour of a motion urging the University to end its partnership with Tel Aviv University.
4,831 students casted a vote on the motion officially titled ‘UoM Should End Partnership with TAU’, a very high turnout for an SU referendum.
94% of these voters were in favour of the motion: a significant majority.
The vote is not binding but reflects the position of the student body on the issue.
It followed a Union Assembly where the motion was debated and amended to include a call for the University to form “productive partnerships” with Palestinian universities as an alternative.
A spokesperson from UoM Action 4 Palestine commented:
“The student body stands firmly in support of Palestinian liberation. They reject the University’s blood-soaked ties with Tel Aviv University and call on the University take tangible steps to cease its complicity in genocide. We will be holding the University management accountable to the voice of the students. We say academic boycott now.”
The campaign to end the partnership has been ongoing, with several student-led occupations on campus, including in the Simon Building, Samuel Alexander Building, and Roscoe Building. Student activists argue that Tel Aviv University is complicit in human rights violations against Palestinians.
As of 15 October 2025, UoM has spent £52,622 on the partnership, which funded a total of eighteen joint projects from 2021-2023, with the aim to ‘catalyse new collaborations and- in the longer term-build global teams’.
In response to the vote, a University of Manchester spokesperson has said:
“While we respect the democratic right of students to vote in favour of this motion, our researchers also have the right to pursue their research interests as they see fit, within the law.
“The motion by the Students’ Union is non-binding on the University, and we believe collaboration with international partners is important, alongside our long-standing and widespread activity to provide scholarships and assistance to students and academics from conflict areas around the world.”
