Data shared with Euronews shows that several European countries have supplied key weapons and equipment that the Israeli army is likely to use in its attack on the Gaza Strip.
In a recent four-page letter, former UN official Craig Mokhiber criticized the international community for failing to stop the genocide unfolding before its eyes in Gaza.
A US human rights lawyer has accused the US, the UK and much of Europe of being fully complicit in the horrific assault on the Palestinian enclave by Israeli forces, which began on October 7 when Hamas launched an attack on Israel that Israel says killed around 1,400 people including soldiers and civilians.
Israel retaliated with relentless attacks on Gaza and sent troops and tanks, killing more than 9,000 people so far, many of them children, and wounding more than 30,000, Euronews writes.
Now information shared with Euronews indicates that European states are likely directly aiding the Israeli offensive.
The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) provided data on European arms sales to Israel between 2013 and 2022, showing that Italy and Germany supplied the Israeli military with key weapons and equipment it now uses on the ground in Gaza.
The UK, meanwhile, has a lucrative business supplying the Israeli air force, according to the Campaign Against the Arms Trade (CAAT).
However, the group told Euronews that opaque licensing agreements mean it can be difficult to determine exactly what has been transferred.
SIPRI, an independent research institute based in Sweden, detailed that Germany sent more than 1,000 tank engines to Israel. According to the 2000 export permit, they were claimed to be used in Merkava-4 tanks and Namer armored personnel carriers (APCs). German-made diesel engines are also used in the Israeli-made Eitan combat vehicle.
“According to our estimates, some of them are probably ready for use on the ground in Gaza,” SIPRI researcher Zain Hussain told Euronews.
Over the past decade, the institute said, Germany has supplied, and financed in part with taxpayers’ money, Dolphin-class submarines and Sa’ar corvettes for the Israeli navy, even though they are equipped with Israeli weapons and missiles.
As for the ships, Hussain says some have been commissioned and likely used to shell targets in Gaza.
“Germany financed part of Israel’s procurement of submarines and corvettes as a form of military aid to Israel, to support Israel in its defense and as a kind of compensation for Nazi crimes,” he added in a statement sent to Euronews.
There is significant defense industry cooperation between Germany and Israel, including the development of missiles and other munitions, involving companies such as Rheinmetall, MBDA Deutschland and Krauss-Maffei Wegmann, among others, according to SIPRI.
In October, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz told his country’s parliament that he had offered military aid to Israel.
“At this moment there is only one place for Germany – a place on the side of Israel. Our own history, our responsibility arising from the Holocaust, makes it a constant task for us to stand up for the security of the state of Israel,” said Scholz.
Although to a lesser extent than Germany, Italy supplied parts for training and combat aircraft, including the M-346 Master and the AW-119 light helicopter, according to SIPRI.
Although Rome has not yet pledged military support to Israel, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has expressed support and closeness to the Israeli population following the Hamas attack.
Between 2013 and 2022, Italian companies sold almost 120 million euros worth of arms to Israel: an average of about 12 million euros per year, according to Pagella Politica.
Figures shared with Euronews by the Campaign Against the Arms Trade (CAAT) show that the UK is also a significant arms supplier to Israel.
It provides components that make up 15 percent of the F-35 stealth fighter jets that Israel currently uses to relentlessly bombard Gaza, hitting schools, hospitals and residential areas.
They conservatively estimated this trade to be worth €336,386 million as of 2016.
However, the group said the most significant exports are through open licenses, which make it difficult to determine exactly what is being transferred due to a lack of transparency.
CAAT pointed to several worrying open licenses that could easily include military items that could be used in Gaza, such as equipment, software and technology for fighter jets and helicopters, plus components for artillery, naval weapons and combat vessels, missiles and equipment for ammunition and military radars.
“Arms sales to Israel must stop immediately. Israel is committing war crimes against the Palestinian people in its ongoing siege and bombing of Gaza, causing a humanitarian disaster and killing thousands of civilians,” Emily Apple, CAAT’s media coordinator, said in a statement to Euronews.
By sending vital parts that enable Israel’s bombing campaign, she claimed that the British government and industry were complicit in these war crimes.
In a statement sent to Euronews, Amnesty International said it had long called for a comprehensive arms embargo on Israel, Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups.
“We have adopted this position because of patterns of serious violations of international human rights and humanitarian law stretching back years across many conflicts,” Patrick Wilcken, military, security and policing researcher at Amnesty International, told Euronews.
He said Amnesty has documented evidence of war crimes by Israeli forces, as well as Hamas and other armed groups.
“For Israeli forces, this included failing to take practicable precautions to spare civilians, conducting indiscriminate attacks that did not distinguish civilians from military targets, or conducting attacks that may have been directed against civilian objects,” according to Wilcken.
“Hamas has committed mass murders, hostage-taking and launching indiscriminate rocket attacks on Israel,” he added.
Sending military equipment to Israel is contrary to EU policy, which requires respect for human rights in the country of final destination as well as respect for international humanitarian law from that country, warns Amnesty.
Articles 6 and 7 of the Arms Trade Treaty also prohibit transfers where there is a greater risk that the arms could be used to commit or facilitate serious violations of international humanitarian law.
“States that continue to transfer weapons to Israel or Hamas and other Palestinian armed groups with the knowledge that the receiving state or group is using those weapons to commit ‘internationally wrongful acts’, which include crimes under international law such as war crimes and crimes against humanity, are themselves at risk of aiding and abetting those wrongdoings,” Wilcken added.
