Elbit

All of this fits the pattern of Elbit’s British operations: profiting two-fold from Israeli occupation and from the export opportunities from Israeli occupation technologies. Elbit Systems is Israel’s largest arms company, with their broad range of activities generating a broad influence in Israel’s militarised, securitised occupation of Palestine. Elbit supplies the Israeli military with 85% of their drones and 85% of their land-based equipment. The company’s surveillance equipment monitors Palestinians through drone operations, at border points, and across Israel’s apartheid wall. Elbit supplies the IDF with all of its small calibre munitions through subsidiary IMI Systems, while its armed remote-control boats which have attacked Palestinian fishermen. Their Hermes drones have been used for extrajudical killings in foreign countries such as Sudan and operations in Egypt, while enabling the slaughter of Palestinians inside Gaza. They were used extensively in the 2008 and 2014 assaults on Gaza, in which Israel killed 1,417 and 2,202 Palestinians respectively, including four boys killed by a Hermes attack while playing on a beach in Gaza in 2014.

Elbit’s business model is then to sell these technologies on to fuel imperialism elsewhere. Its drones have not only been deployed by British military and border operations, but are employed by the EU’s militarised border agency Frontex. The same technologies outfitting Israel’s apartheid wall run along the US’ border wall with Mexico, and are used for monitoring of indigenous lands. Elbit drones have been puchased in major volumes by India, in turn deploying them in violent military campaigns perpetuating the repression of Kashmiri populations.

The company formerly hosted 10 sites across Britain. As of 2023, with Elbit forced to close its Oldham factory and London headquarters, this has been reduced to 8 sites. Soon they’ll only have 7.