Holding the academic thread in Gaza: rethinking postgraduate supervision as continuity infrastructure during war

Introduction Conventional models of postgraduate supervision assume functioning institutions, reliable communication, stable research sites and sufficient continuity for feedback to accumulate over time. During war, these are not minor contextual variables. Their loss changes what supervision must do. Applied insights Through a UK-Gaza academic collaboration, we supported approximately 35 postgraduate students in health, public health, nursing and related healthcare disciplines between June 2024 and July 2026. We argue that supervision under severe disruption is not ordinary supervision delivered through weaker technology. It is a distinct mode of practice in which the immediate purpose shifts from optimising project progress to preserving the learner’s capacity to make the next ethically and academically defensible decision. We call this continuity-oriented supervision. It is enacted through four wartime shifts: maintaining contact rather than requiring attendance; adapting the project rather than lowering the standard; recording only what continuity requires; and supporting the student without taking over the work. Conclusions Academic rigour depends on defensible standards, not identical procedures under radically unequal conditions. Treating supervision as continuity infrastructure requires institutions, not only individual supervisors, to provide low-bandwidth communication, ongoing ethical review, flexible routes through disrupted projects and safeguards for learner ownership.