Sonali Naik KC, Maha Sardar and Maria Moodie of Garden Court Chambers, along with Finnian Clarke of Doughty Street Chambers, who secured success on behalf of 40 Gazan students recently evacuated to the UK, have achieved a further important legal development in the case of R (Manar al-Houbi) v SSHD and SSFCDO.
Ms Al-Houbi, a PhD student who has been awarded a fully funded scholarship to pursue post-doctoral studies at the University of Glasgow, was informed by the Home Office and Foreign Office that her husband and three minor children would receive no assistance under the UK Government’s evacuation arrangements for Gazan students with exit and travel from Gaza to the UK.
This left the family facing the risk of permanent separation, with her children left behind in a conflict zone. The UK Government applied this refusal to other eligible Gazan students seeking support with evacuation for their dependants.
Judicial review proceedings were issued to challenge the lawfulness of this refusal to facilitate the evacuation of Ms Al-Houbi’s dependent family members.
As a result, on 27 October 2025, the Home Office updated their guidance ‘Support for students travelling to the UK from Gaza’ to include a new section on “Eligibility of dependants”. The guidance now states that the UK Government will seek to support the dependants of Chevening and other fully funded scholarship students to apply to leave Gaza and travel to the UK.
This outcome achieved by the legal team extends beyond Ms Al-Houbi’s individual case and benefits a wider cohort. The new section of the guidance applies to the dependants of students who are either studying a PhD, doctoral qualification or research-based higher degree, or hold a financial sponsorship or scholarship from a government as defined in the Immigration Rules.
Dependant family members of students who do not meet that criteria remain ineligible, as matters currently stand.
The legal challenge was supported and strengthened by the work of the Gaza Scholarship Initiative (GSI), led by Dr Nora Parr, representatives of the Gaza students, and the UK Gaza community, who coordinated the students and worked exhaustively on their behalf.
The new guidance is available here.
Manar’s story has been extensively reported in the press in recent weeks, including in BBC News, The Guardian, and The Telegraph.
Garden Court Chambers was instructed by Nazia Khan (Director), Raman Kumar (Solicitor), Jessie Shepherd (Trainee Solicitor) and Auhona Majumdar (Caseworker) at Duncan Lewis Solicitors.
