Israeli defense exports jumped to a record $13.1
billion last year, according to a government report citing contracts signed at
several defense firms.
“Despite the war, 2023 amounted to a new record and
was characterized by significant export deals,” the Israeli Defense Ministry
said.
The report states that 36 percent of exports came
from missile, rocket, and air defense systems. Radar and electronic warfare,
weapon stations, and launchers were also listed at 11 percent each, while
crewed aircraft and avionics were at nine percent, the Israeli Defense Ministry
said.
Defense exports, which stood at 12.5 billion in
2022, have doubled over the last five years.
The Israeli Defense Ministry said defense exports
became a major priority and serve as part of an effort to enhance security and
strategic relations globally, penetrate new markets, remove bureaucratic
limitations, and reduce regulations.
“While our industries are primarily focused on
providing the defense establishment with the capabilities to support our troops
and defend our citizens ... they are also continuing to pursue areas of
cooperation and exports to international partners,” said Israeli Defense
Minister Yoav Gallant.
“Even in a year in which the State of Israel is
fighting against seven different arenas, the defense exports of the State of
Israel succeed in continuing to break records,” Gallant added.
According to the report, the Asia–Pacific region was
the largest buyer of Israeli defense products, purchasing 48 percent of total
exports, followed by Europe at 35 percent.
The UAE, Bahrain, and Morocco, which normalized ties
with Israel in 2020 under the Abraham Accords, made up 3 percent of the arms
sales – down from 24 percent in 2022.
The release of the data comes as several countries
have been under pressure lately to suspend arms trade with Israel over its war
in Gaza, which has killed tens of thousands of Palestinians – the majority
women and children.
Israel’s Security Cabinet is looking
into proposals to boost Jewish settlements in the occupied West Bank as a
response to the recent recognition of Palestinian statehood by Spain, Ireland,
Norway, and Slovenia.
The office of Israeli Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu issued a statement on 16 June saying that the proposals will
be voted on at the next full meeting of the Security Cabinet.
The move is not only a response to the
recognition of Palestinian statehood but to the Palestinian Authority’s (PA)
“hostile” actions against Israel in international bodies, the premier’s office
said, without elaborating further.
The PA requested earlier this month to
join South Africa’s case against Israel at the International Court of Justice
(ICJ).
“Defense Minister Yoav Gallant and
Attorney General Gali Baharav-Miara asked for time to comment further on some
of the proposals in the coming days,” the Times of Israel reported.
Last month, Israeli Finance Minister
Bezalel Smotrich said that Tel Aviv should approve 10,000 settlements in the
occupied West Bank, establish a new settlement for every country that
recognizes Palestine as a state, and cancel travel permits for PA officials.
The rate of settlement expansion has
surged since the start of the war on Gaza on 7 October.
Between October and January, Jewish
settlers in the occupied West Bank built at least 15 illegal outposts and 18
illegal roads, as well as hundreds of meters of fences and multiple roadblocks,
Al Jazeera reported in March.
In April, planning documents reviewed
by the Guardian revealed that Tel Aviv dramatically accelerated the pace of
expanding illegal settlements in occupied East Jerusalem since the start of the
Gaza war.
The documents detailed that over 20
projects totaling thousands of housing units have been “approved or advanced.”
Israel illegally occupied the West
Bank during the 1967 war. Settlement expansion in the territory is deemed
illegal under international law.
The expansion of settlements blocks
any effort toward a two-state solution between Israel and the Palestinians,
which Netanyahu’s government has vehemently stood against.
During a conversation co-hosted by The
Cradle on 16 June, Hezbollah-affiliated Lebanese MP Ibrahim Moussawi shared his
perspectives on the ongoing war between Israel and the Axis of Resistance in
Lebanon and Gaza.
In relation to the possibility of a
larger war erupting on the Israeli–Lebanese border, Moussawi stated that
neither Hezbollah nor Israel wants a wider war but that the Islamic resistance
is ready if Israel decides to invade.
“If they want to come to Lebanon, they
are welcome. We are waiting for them. Ahlan wa Sahlan, as they say in Arabic,”
he stated.
Moussawi noted that Israel is having
difficulty managing the war in Gaza and asked where Israel would get the troops
to launch a much more difficult invasion of Lebanon. “They can’t manage
themselves in Gaza, and they want to come here? In Gaza, they are not fighting.
They are just bombarding and sending drones. But if they do come, we are
anxiously waiting for them. We have made preparations that they can never
imagine,” he added.
Regarding Hezbollah’s accomplishments
in the war against Israel so far, the Lebanese MP pointed out that the party’s
daily attacks against Israeli military positions and settlements have displaced
some 200,000 Israelis and paralyzed economic activity in areas that Israel long
viewed as secure.
Moussawi stated, “In Lebanon, at the
beginning of the war, many started to mock and say our interference was not
helpful. It is not doing anything. But Israelis are the experts. Their leaders
and their intelligence apparatus have admitted that the front in northern
Palestine has caused great suffering for Israelis.”
He added that Hezbollah is fighting a
“war of attrition” against Israel along a 120-kilometer front line that has now
lasted eight months and involved thousands of operations.
“We are talking about huge losses they
do not admit, but later they will. It is unprecedented. It costs them a lot on
the moral and military levels.”
When asked about recent Israeli
threats to bomb civilians in the Lebanese capital, Beirut, as the Israeli army
did during its invasion of Lebanon in 1982, Moussawi explained, “That was in
the past, not the present. Now, if they destroy, we destroy. If they destroy
our infrastructure, we will destroy their infrastructure. The Israelis know
very well that Hezbollah is capable of targeting in a very precise way any
place in occupied Palestine with our ballistic missiles and drones, from here
in the north to the farthest point in the south. So if they think they can come
to Lebanon, we are ready for it. They are welcome.”
Regarding Hezbollah’s goals, Moussawi
stated that the party must ensure the resistance in Gaza is not crushed and
that this goal has been successful thus far. He said that over 70 percent of
Hamas’ leadership and fighting brigades are intact and that they have
reorganized to overcome the losses Israel has inflicted on them so far.
“I will tell you that Hamas has won
the war. They can fight for months to come, if not for years. They are ready to
fight like on the 8th of October.” Moussawi stated.
He added, “The kind of morale they
have, the kind of belief they have, cannot be defeated. All the Palestinians
fighting for Hamas and Islamic Jihad are heroes, superheroes. And even more so,
the Palestinian women are heroes. They continue to shed their blood and have
never raised the white flag. They never surrender or stab the resistance in the
back.”
The Israeli army is facing significant
difficulties in confronting the Palestinian resistance across the Gaza Strip,
Hebrew news outlet Channel 12 reported on 16 June.
Hamas’ Qassam Brigades and other
groups are “still waging war in the Gaza Strip, and are capable of harming
Israeli army soldiers,” military sources told the outlet.
The sources added that in Gaza’s
southernmost city of Rafah particularly, the army has not been able to
eliminate the Qassam Brigades or its military capabilities, and that Tel Aviv
may end the operation there without achieving its goals.
“Israeli hopes for the battle in Rafah
are misleading the public … Hamas has succeeded in rebuilding itself in the
Gaza Strip,” Israeli commentator on Palestinian affairs, Ohad Hamo, told
Channel 12.
The Hebrew media report coincided with
eleven funerals of Israeli army soldiers across Israel on Sunday, who were
killed in battles with the resistance across Gaza.
Most of the funerals were for the
eight Israeli soldiers who were burned alive inside a Namer armored vehicle
that was struck by the resistance in Rafah on Saturday.
Hebrew media described the attack as
the deadliest in Gaza since January.
Days earlier, on 10 June, the Qassam
Brigades announced that several Israeli soldiers were killed after its fighters
detonated a booby-trapped building in Rafah with troops inside.
As the fighting rages, Tel Aviv’s
enlistment crisis continues to worsen.
An Israeli army radio correspondent,
Doron Kadosh, reported on Monday that the military is setting up a new division
for reservists over the retirement age of 40 in order to meet the “urgent need
for more troops.”
The new division is in “advance
stages” and will call on Israelis who were previously exempt from serving,
according to Kadosh.
The Israeli government has also
supported a draft bill aimed at extending the reservist retirement age despite
opposition from the public.
Due to “a very high volume of deaths
and injuries as a result of the war, the IDF still needs a significant amount
of manpower,” the draft bill reads.
“The extension of the temporary order
is required, at this stage, to allow the IDF to keep in service the reserve
officers who cannot be replaced.”
Israeli media reports on 17 June
revealed that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has formally dissolved the
emergency war cabinet – formed on 11 October to manage the campaigns against
the Palestinian and Lebanese resistance – in a decision made one week after
opposition leader Benny Gantz resigned from the emergency body.
“The cabinet was in the coalition
agreement with [National Unity MK Benny] Gantz at his request. As soon as Gantz
left – there is no need for a cabinet anymore,” Netanyahu reportedly told a
meeting of the political-security cabinet on Sunday night.
According to the reports, the premier
stressed there will not be a new cabinet formed of the leaders of his governing
coalition, an idea put forward by ultranationalist ministers Bezalel Smotrich
and Itamar Ben Gvir.
“In order to reach the goal of
eliminating the capabilities of Hamas, I made decisions that were not always
acceptable to the military echelon,” Netanyahu is quoted as saying, adding: “We
have a country with an army and not an army with a country.”
Reports on Monday morning highlighted
that the premier plans “to make critical decisions on the war during small ad
hoc meetings without Ben Gvir while seeking final approval from the wider
security cabinet.”
Netanyahu’s decision comes as the
Israeli army finds itself in a growing quagmire inside Gaza and at the border
with Lebanon in the north.
“Israeli hopes for the battle in Rafah
are misleading the public … Hamas has succeeded in rebuilding itself in the
Gaza Strip,” Israeli commentator on Palestinian affairs, Ohad Hamo, told
Channel 12 on Sunday.
In the north of Israel, Hezbollah
attacks have become increasingly more precise over recent months after the
resistance managed to take out more than 1,500 Israeli intelligence posts and
devices.
No comments:
Post a Comment