Tell LSHTM: Disclose and Divest from Israeli Investments *NOW*

*Logo of the BDS movement. Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) is a Palestinian-led movement for freedom, justice and equality. BDS upholds the simple principle that Palestinians are entitled to the same rights as the rest of humanity. See BDSmovement.net for details.

In 2020, the Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) calculated that LSHTM had invested £693,029 in Israeli companies linked to violations of international law. 

We contacted the Executive Team on 08 March 2024 with a request for updated information on the status of LSHTM’s investments in Israeli companies, and companies complicit in Israel’s violations of international law (see email below). 

We have not received a response. 

It has now been almost three years since Mervat Alhaffar and Layth Hanbali sent a letter to the LSHTM Executive Team inquiring about the school’s free speech, advocacy and ethical investment policies in order to understand their potential impact on LSHTM research in Palestine and beyond. 

That letter also received no response. 

We find ourselves in different circumstances today as the Palestinian people face genocide and ethnic cleansing. Since 7th October 2023, more than 34,000 Palestinians have been killed by Israel’s military campaign in and starvation of Gaza. A recent report done by researchers at LSHTM shows that with the current pace, laid out within the “escalation,” scenario, we may see that number rise to more than 100,000 by this Summer if an epidemic occurs. 

In recent weeks, there has been a call amongst students and faculty across the globe demanding that their institutions disclose and accordingly divest their current investments that support the state of Israel. Encampments have consequently commenced across 33 institutions in the United States, including Columbia University, New York University, Yale University, and the University of Michigan. These calls for divestment have even now reached the American University of Cairo in Egypt. 

Student divestment campaigns work. In 2020, following campaigns, Manchester University divested nearly £2m from companies complicit in Israel’s oppression of the Palestinian people. Student movements for divestments have a long history. From the 1960-1980s, divestment campaigns led by students played an important role in pressuring their institutions to cut financial ties with companies that supported the apartheid regime in South Africa. 

We need to demand LSHTM disclose and divest from Israel and those complicit with Israel's war crimes, now. 

In September 2021, LSHTM adopted a “Socially Responsible Investment Policy” This policy, most recently reviewed in July 2022, relays that its purpose is to “balance an investor’s ethical beliefs with financial performance considerations, and typically seeks to achieve a trade-off between social and financial objectives.” The policy further states that “[t]he School will not make direct or, as far as possible, indirect investments in equities or bonds issued by companies, the major part of whose business activities include:...arms manufacture.” Presuming that military occupation, ethnic cleansing and genocide do not fall within the School’s ethical beliefs, divesting from the state enacting the Palestinian genocide in Gaza would surely fall squarely within the social category of “human rights,” laid out in the policy. 

LSHTM has divested before, even before the adopting of its socially responsible investment policy. In 2015, LSHTM divested from coal companies due to their known significant contribution to the climate crisis. This was a response to campaigners' demands, who say that the school was the first health research institution to do so. 

Our urgent calls for the School to disclose and divest from Israeli companies and companies complicit in Israel’s violations of international law equally deserve the highest level of attention and action.

Please sign your name (or anonymous details) using this form to demand that LSHTM disclose and divest from Israeli investments NOW.

Please sign before 07 May 2024 when we will send this list to the Executive Team and ask to meet with them urgently to discuss a divestment plan. 

The FAIR Network 

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[Email sent to the Executive Team on 08 March 2024]

Dear Executive Team, 

We are writing to request updated information on the status of LSHTM’s ethical investment policy, and details of any investments we have in Israeli companies, and companies complicit in Israel’s violations of international law.

There has been much conversation amongst the LSHTM community about the financial complicity of UK universities in Israeli crimes against humanity. A letter was sent to the Executive Team in May 2021 highlighting LSHTM’s complicity and calling for divestment, which was published as a FAIR Network blog post. Unfortunately, the Executive Team did not acknowledge or respond to this letter at the time. In light of Israel's escalating violence against the Palestinian people, many members of staff and students are requesting updated information regarding LSHTM’s current investments. 

Israel’s system of institutionalised racist discrimination against Palestinians, amounting to the crime against humanity of apartheid, coupled with the ongoing genocide against the Palestinian people in Gaza, can only be sustained with weapons, technologies and other forms of economic, political and epistemic support it receives from companies and institutions around the world. 

Palestine Solidarity Campaign (PSC) research found that UK universities collectively invest nearly £430m in companies complicit in Israeli violations of international law. Divestment by UK universities from companies complicit in Israel’s oppression of the Palestinian people has been done, for example by Manchester University in 2020. Staff and students at LSHTM are rightly demanding that LSHTM do the same. 

In 2020, the PSC calculated that LSHTM had invested £693,029 in Israeli companies linked to violations of international law. In September 2021, LSHTM adopted an ethical investment policy. Currently, PSC’s University Complicity Database states that LSHTM ‘did not provide us with the necessary information on their investments’. 

As a matter of the utmost urgency, please provide updated information on any companies in Israel, or linked with the Israeli apartheid regime, that LSHTM has financial links with at present, as well as the details of any partnerships the university maintains with Israeli academic institutions.

With thanks, 

The FAIR Network