Some of Britain's leading universities are becoming no-go zones for Jewish students because anti-Semitism is so rife, the first ever higher education adjudicator has warned.

Baroness Ruth Deech, a cross-bench peer who formerly held the highest office dealing with student complaints, said that institutions may be failing to combat hatred against Jews as they are “afraid of offending” their potential benefactors from Gulf states.

Her comments come after a series of high profile incidents at top universities where Jewish students claim they were verbally abused or physically attacked. The academic community is at the forefront of calls to boycott Israel.

In an interview with The Daily Telegraph, Baroness Deech said that the extreme levels of hostility towards Israel at universities across the country can at times go so far as to equate to anti-Semitism.

“Many universities are in receipt of or are chasing very large donations from Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states and so on, and maybe they are frightened of offending them,” she said. “I don’t know why they aren’t doing anything about it, it really is a bad situation.”