Pro-Palestine students have established an encampment outside Magdalene College, claiming that the College is leveraging “plausible deniability” in “Israeli genocide”.

Activists set up tents on the College’s riverbanks at 10 AM this morning (21/06), after approaching the College on rubber dinghies to enter the grounds.

Cambridge for Palestine (C4P), the group responsible for the encampment, claimed that Magdalene has several indirect “holdings in several companies complicit in the Israeli genocide including major arms companies such as Elbit Systems, Leonardo, BAE Systems and Palantir”.

These investments come through funds with shares in companies on the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) list, a movement set on challenging companies associated with Israel’s occupation of Palestinian territories.

C4P also claimed that Magdalene had refused to disclose other investments in boycotted companies, citing a “lack of information” on the investments.

The encampment comes four days ahead of the College’s May Ball. As the camp was set up, committee members were seen attempting to transport drinks and equipment across the site. It is unclear whether the May Ball would be affected by the action.

This comes after C4P set up successive encampments in Trinity and St John's College at the start of the month. The group targeted both Colleges over their investments in companies involved in the manufacture of arms used by the Israeli government, including Boeing, Catapillar, and Elbit Systems. 

The encampments were both evicted within three days of their establishments, after the Colleges acquired interim injunctions preventing an occupation of their grounds, amid concerns that the encampments could disturb exams. A high court hearing has been scheduled for the injunctions in the coming weeks. 

It is currently unclear whether Magdalene is planning on pursuing injunctions to evict the current encampment. 

A spokesperson for C4P stated that the group “demands transparency and accountability from Magdalene College, and demands that the University of Cambridge take urgent steps towards divestment from the University’s moral and material complicity in Israel’s genocide of Palestinians.

“We have been advocating under the banner of these demands for over a year, through sustained, principled protest. We know that divestment - the termination of material complicity in genocide - is a bare minimum step in undoing the colonial violence faced by Palestinians,” they continued. 

Magdalene College and Magdalene May Ball were contacted for comment.