Cambridge University Opts Not to Suspend Students Over Alleged Threats to Peer After Israel Trip

Cambridge University has declined to suspend students who allegedly made death threats against Bradley Smart, a 21-year-old third-year student at Homerton College, GB News reported. Smart participated in a trip organized by the Pinsker Centre think tank, which brought Oxbridge student leaders to meet Israelis and Palestinians for insight into the Gaza conflict.

Upon his return, identifiable students posted threatening messages in a group chat, including phrases such as 'I'm going to kill him' and 'he needs to die,' according to Smart.

The group chat messages also contained slurs, degrading language, and antisemitic material drawing comparisons between Israel and Nazi Germany, Smart said. He reported the threats through official harassment procedures at Homerton College. The college advised Smart to contact welfare services or consider relocating to different accommodation after the report.

Smart vacated his Homerton accommodation approximately one month after the incidents began. He approached police about the threats, but officers informed him that the matter constituted an 'academic matter' and declined to pursue an investigation, Smart stated. 'As a Cambridge student, I expected my university to be a place where opinions could be refined through dialogue.

The reality, however, was that this trip was enough to trigger a campaign of cancellation, including explicit death threats and being banned from a college club,' Smart told The Telegraph. Lord Walney, who previously served as the Government's counter-extremism tsar, criticized the response.

He said: 'It is entirely unacceptable that students at one of our leading universities would threaten to kill one of their peers for visiting Israel.

The college's response is wholly inadequate, and sets a dangerous precedent that intimidation and threats of political violence will be tolerated. Ben Freeman, executive director of the Pinsker Centre, addressed the broader implications. He said: 'Jewish students and their allies are in fear for their lives.

After recent attacks, this fear is all the more justified. Threats of violence cannot be normalised. Gabrielle Apfel, president of the Cambridge Israel Society, described the environment at the university.

She said: 'The university has become a lion's den with regard to Israel and Zionism over the past two and a half years. Jewish and Israeli students feel like they have to keep their connections to Israel and their identities to themselves. The Cambridge Israel Society has hosted progressive speakers, including former Labour MPs.

The society considers it necessary to keep event locations confidential, Apfel noted. Two Jewish men were stabbed in Golders Green, north London, last week, adding to concerns about rising violent incidents targeting British Jews.