In an extraordinary move that raises more questions than answers, the Palestinian envoy in Dhaka, Yousef S. Y. Ramadan, has accused Western universities – and now Bangladesh’s Asian University for Women (AUW) – of being infiltrated by “Israeli interests”. Ramadan’s sudden August 14, 2025 press conference, held nearly two years after AUW awarded scholarships to 200 Palestinian students, suggests not merely a concern for student safety but a calculated political maneuver. His sweeping denunciation of US institutions as “all connected to Israel” and his attempt to block Palestinian students from studying in Bangladesh appear to serve a wider agenda – one that aligns suspiciously with the narratives of the Yunus regime, currently seeking to discredit the government of former Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.

At a sudden press conference held at the so-called Palestinian embassy in Dhaka, Ramadan claimed that many Western and Bangladeshi educational institutions maintain hidden ties with Israel. For this reason, he said, Palestinian authorities have instructed Bangladesh that female students from Palestine will not be studying at AUW.

According to Prothom Alo, about 200 students from Gaza had been granted scholarships by AUW roughly a year and a half ago. Bangladesh’s Ministry of Home Affairs initially granted visa-on-arrival permission to 189 of them in October last year. They were expected to travel via Jordan and arrive in Chattogram by mid-2025. However, in June this year, Chattogram police informed AUW that the visa-on-arrival........

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