University offices damaged in Gaza protest

The offices were targeted in the early hours of Monday

The administrative offices of the University of Oxford have been damaged and daubed in red paint by a group protesting what it claims are the institution's links to Israel.

The university said three people attacked the building in Wellington Square on Monday with lump hammers, smashing glass doors and windows.

A university spokesperson said it was working with police to identify those responsible, which it claimed had tried to enter the offices, for the "unjustified violent attack".

The Palestine Action group said "locals and students" had worked with it to damage the building.

It said it attacked the university because of continued investments in Israel "despite intense student and community pressure in the last year".

The Oxford Action for Palestine (OA4P) group, which said it had no involvement in the Wellington Square incident, held a 64-day encampment on university land between May and July.

That protest started outside the Museum of Natural History and later included the Radcliffe Camera before it ended in the face of potential legal action.

OA4P said the protests were held to draw attention to "the university's complicity in Israel's genocide in Gaza".

The university said it condemns "antisemitism, Islamophobia, anti-Palestinian discrimination, and hate directed towards any faith, race, nationality or ethnic group".

"The university supports the right to lawful protest, but actions which disrupt aspects of staff or student life for fellow members of the university, in breach of our codes of conduct, are not acceptable," it said in a statement.

Israel launched a campaign to destroy Hamas in response to the group's unprecedented attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023, in which about 1,200 people were killed and 251 others were taken hostage.

More than 42,340 people have been killed in Gaza since then, according to the territory's Hamas-run health ministry.

A Thames Valley Police spokesperson asked anyone with information about Monday's incident in Wellington Square to contact them.