European taxpayers handing billions of euros to Israeli companies

Russia and Israel: a tale of two illegalities

In April, the EU adopted its twentieth set of sanctions targeting Russian government and industry. The sanctions form part of the bloc’s ongoing response to Russia’s invasion and occupation of Ukraine.

The sanctions target the oil and gas trade, the banking sector, the chemicals and metals industries, and more. The Council of the EU described them as “stern, multi-layered economic sanctions, targeting key sectors which fuel Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine.”¹

As of February this year, Russia’s illegal invasion and occupation of Ukrainian territory had resulted in some 15,000 civilian deaths, and the deaths of tens of thousands of military personnel.² Millions of refugees have fled the country, largely to EU member states, which have – broadly speaking – offered a generous welcome.³

A thousand miles south of Ukraine lies Palestine. Israel has been illegally occupying swathes of Palestinian territory since 1967, and the violent expropriation of Palestinian land is ongoing.

Since October 2023, in response to attacks by Palestinian armed groups that left more than 300 Israeli military personnel and over 800 civilians dead, Israel has been engaged in a war against and siege of the Gaza strip – the latest bloody episode in a long history of military assaults on the territory⁴ – and has intensified settlement activity in the West Bank.

This has seen accusations of war crimes, genocide and crimes against humanity levelled at Israeli political leaders and military personnel.⁵ Israeli officials’ contemptuous dismissal of arrest warrants from the International Criminal Court has made eminently clear their disregard for international law.⁶

As if this were not enough, Israel has also recently invaded and occupied Lebanon (a so-called “forward defensive operation”⁷) and Syria,⁸ and has bombed Iran⁹ and Yemen.¹⁰ Its soldiers have abducted, imprisoned and mistreated dozens of foreign citizens travelling in international waters in attempts to bring aid to the people of Gaza.¹¹

While the EU has sought to economically and politically isolate Russia as punishment for its invasion and occupation of Ukraine, it has done nothing of the sort in relation to Israel.

It was only last month that the bloc adopted any sanctions against the country. However, these target particular “extremist” individuals and organisations.¹² They have been criticised by Eldar Mamedov of Responsible Statecraft as “symbolic sanctions on a microscopic fraction of the settler community,” while trade between the EU and Israel “continues to bankroll the settler project.”¹³

“Moral bankruptcy”

Benjamin Netanyahu said in response to the EU’s sanctions that “Israel and the US are ‘doing Europe’s dirty work’ by fighting for civilization against jihadist lunatics in Iran and elsewhere.” He accused the EU of “moral bankruptcy.”¹⁴

Large sections of the European public, however, clearly see the Israeli state as morally bankrupt.

A 2025 poll by YouGov in six western European states found that “only 13-21% in any country have a favourable opinion of Israel,” the lowest ever found by the polling organisation.¹⁵ More than one million people in the EU have backed a citizens’ initiative calling for the suspension of the EU-Israel Association Agreement.¹⁶

Despite some institutions – such as individual universities¹⁷ – cutting ties with their Israeli counterparts, trade between the EU and Israel continues unabated. A report in Al Jazeera notes that:

According to EU data, trade in goods between the bloc and Israel amounted to 42.6 billion euros ($45.3bn) in 2024. A partial suspension of the EU-Israel agreement could directly impact about 5.8 billion euros ($6.1bn) worth of Israeli exports.¹⁸

Part of that trade comes from the purchase of goods and services by public institutions such as universities, government departments, health bodies, energy providers, and the police and military.

The extent of these contracts is laid bare in data published by Statewatch. The data covers the period from January 2022 until July 2025, when some 200 contracts worth almost €2.7 billion were concluded with Israeli companies, or companies ultimately owned by Israeli nationals.

European public contracts with Israeli companies

Between January 2022 and July 2025 (a period of 42 months) public institutions in EU member states signed almost 200 contracts worth nearly €2.7 billion with Israeli companies, according to notices published in the EU’s Tenders Electronic Daily (TED) website.19 The dataset also includes one contract with a UK institution,²⁰ and one with the Democratic Republic of Congo’s finance ministry.²¹

In the first half of that period, between January 2022 and October 2023, the dataset shows 82 contracts worth over €1.2 billion.

In the 21 months following October 2023 (until July 2025), the number of contracts between public institutions in EU member states and Israeli companies grew to 112, with a total value of almost €1.6 billion.

However, the value of many contracts – in particular with German institutions – has been kept secret.²² Others have a listed value of just €1 or even €0.01,²³ amounts that seem too low to be genuine, though this is impossible to verify without further investigation.

The dataset is comprised of notices published on the EU’s public procurement notice site, Tenders Electronic Daily (TED),²⁴ between January 2022 and July 2025.

Some of those notices concern contracts signed or dated prior to January 2022. These appear in the dataset because not all notices are published at the time of signature. When these are taken into account, the dataset shows 207 contracts worth almost €2.8 billion between November 2019 and July 2025.

Israel’s strategic niche

The Israeli state, businesses and lobby groups often promote the country as a “start-up nation,” with a highly active and productive high-tech sector.²⁵ The dataset demonstrates clearly this strategic niche that Israeli companies have carved out.

The vast majority of the contracts are for advanced technologies and other goods that require precision engineering, extensive technical expertise and specialised manufacturing facilities: weapons systems, computer chips, laboratory equipment and pharmaceutical goods, amongst other things.

The highly specialised nature of these products may give rise to questions about the extent to which certain sectors and industries in EU member states are dependent on goods produced in Israel. They should provoke thinking about how certain sectors can disentangle themselves from a state that is in flagrant violation of international law.

European governments voice opposition, the money keeps flowing

Spanish institutions agreed 14 contracts worth almost €227 million in the period covered by the dataset. The vast majority of that total stems from an April 2024 contract between the Spanish defence ministry and the arms company Rafael for “aerial combat systems”.26

Other contracts signed by Spanish institutions with Israeli firms include:

• a March 2022 contract worth €140,000 between Source Vagabond Systems and the Guardia Civil for bullet-proof vests;²⁷
• a June 2022 agreement worth almost €5 million between Emtan-Karmiel and the Guardia Civil for the supply of rifles;²⁸
• an October 2022 agreement worth almost €7.8 million between IMI Systems and the military for 120mm shells for Leopard tanks;²⁹
• an April 2024 contract between A.V.X Technologies and authorities in the Basque country for software to automatically detect tax fraud;³⁰ and
• two contracts worth almost €300,000 between the Polytechnic University of Madrid and Heqapl for quantum computing equipment, signed in August 2024.³¹

The dataset shows three contracts between Belgian institutions and Israeli companies worth a total of more than €6.7 million.

In 2021, the Belgian military signed a contract for ammunition with IMI Systems worth more than €1.8 million.³² In April 2024, University Hospital Leuven signed a €1.2 million contract for genome sequencing software with GNX Data Systems.³³ ORES, a major gas and electricity supplier in the Belgian region of Wallonia, holds a contract worth more than €3.7 million with the information technology company SysAid Technologies.³⁴

Other EU governments have been more circumspect with their criticism of Israel’s recent actions, or have declined to criticise them at all.

The German authorities are notable for their support for the Israeli state, and German public institutions have purchased a multitude of products and services from Israeli companies. The dataset includes 37 contracts between German institutions and Israeli companies for military equipment, cybersecurity software, laboratory tools and medical equipment, amongst other things.

European police with Israeli equipment

Like Spain’s Guardia Civil, German police have also purchased bullet-proof vests from an Israeli company (Marom Dolphin), as part of a joint November 2024 contract with the German company Messer Waffenhandel und Sicherheitsgesellschaft.

The German police have gained notoriety for the violence with which they have repressed pro-Palestinian protests.³⁵ There is a grim irony in the possibility that they may be wearing Israeli-made bullet-proof vests while they attack peaceful protesters.

The value of the German police’s contract is unknown, unlike a March 2024 contract between the Italian interior ministry and Source Vagabond Systems, also for bullet-proof vests. The deal was worth almost €4 million.

If governments will not act, people must

European governments have resolutely failed to meet the demands of large swathes of the public, who want to see an end to support for a state that routinely commits war crimes, conducts wars of aggression, and stands accused of crimes against humanity, genocide and apartheid.

This is not only a failure to stand in support of the Palestinian people, who continue to face dispossession, occupation and death. It will also likely be looked back on as a key moment in the ongoing collapse of the post-World War II international legal order.

Public institutions should be responsive to the demands of the public. The data published here makes clear the wide range of public institutions across the EU that hold contracts with Israeli companies, many of which have close ties to the Israeli state, and all of which are in some way complicit in the actions of that state.

European taxpayers should be demanding that their money is spent in other ways, and that public institutions uphold basic principles of justice and legality.

Data: Contracts between European public institutions and Israeli companies, January 2022-July 2025

Find out more by downloading the full dataset:

Credits

Data acquisition and organisation by Ida Flik (data journalist) and Hanaa Dany (independent researcher)

Image credits: Collage created by Statewatch contains a modified version of “31/03/2019 Jantar na Residência do Primeiro-Ministro de Israel” by Palácio do Planalto, CC BY 2.0

1. ‘Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine: 20th round of stern EU sanctions hits energy revenues, military-industrial complex, trade and financial services, including crypto’, Council of the EU, 23 April 2026

2. ‘Ukraine: Four years, 15,172 civilian deaths. None will be forgotten.’, Every Casualty Counts, 23 February 2026

3. ‘Arab refugees see double standards in Europe’s embrace of Ukrainians’, Reuters, 2 March 2022

4. ‘Timeline: Israel’s attacks on Gaza since 2005’, Al Jazeera, 7 August 2022

5. ‘ICC issues arrest warrants for Israel, Hamas leadership: what happens next?’, International Criminal Court, 23 November 2024; ‘IAGS Resolution on the Situation in Gaza’, International Association of Genocide Scholars¸ 31 August 2025

6. Mark Weiss, ‘Widespread condemnation of ICC arrest warrants cross Israeli political spectrum’, Irish Times, 21 November 2024; ‘Far-right Israeli minister Bezalel Smotrich says ICC is seeking his arrest’, The Guardian, 19 May 2026

7. ‘Iran-Israel War 2026 – Live Updates’, IDF, 18 March 2026

8. Reem Aouir, ‘Smart borders, military gates and land seizures: How Israel is encroaching in southern Syria’, Middle East Eye, 5 May 2026

9. Al Jazeera Staff, ‘US, Israel bomb Iran: A timeline of talks and threats leading up to attacks’, Al Jazeera, 28 February 2026

10. David Gritten, ‘Israeli strike on Yemen’s Houthis reportedly kills eight’, BBC News, 25 September 2025

11. ‘Israel must immediately release Gaza-bound Flotilla activists, say UN experts’, UN Human Rights, 8 May 2026

12. Jennifer Rankin, ‘EU announces sanctions against violent Israeli settlers’, The Guardian, 11 May 2026

13. Eldar Mamedov, ‘EU sanctions on violent Israeli settlers are barely a half measure’, Responsible Statecraft, 19 May 2026

14. ‘Netanyahu slams ‘moral bankruptcy’ of EU after Israeli settler sanctions’, Le Monde, 11 May 2026

15. ‘Net favourability towards Israel reaches new lows in key Western European countries’, YouGov¸ 3 June 2025

16. Vincenzo Genovese, ‘One million Europeans ask the EU to suspend association agreement with Israel for ‘crimes in Gaza’’, euronews, 15 April 2026

17. Zev Stub, ‘‘A very bad year’: Despite Gaza truce, academic boycotts pile on, threatening Israel’s future’, Times of Israel, 5 December 2025

18. Mohammad Mansour, ‘A 42bn-euro dilemma: What is stopping EU from holding Israel to account?’, Al Jazeera, 22 April 2026

19. EU’s Tenders Electronic Daily (TED)

20. The contract, entitled “The Provision of Artificial Intelligence (AI) Software in Neuroscience for Stroke Decision Making Support”, was worth €17.1 million (£15 million) and was signed between the National Health Service and Aidoc Medical in July 2021. The notice announcing the contract would have been published at a later date, hence its appearance in the dataset. It can be found in the dataset with the ID CON122.

21. CON123, dated 10 September 2021 and worth more than €8 million. The notice announcing the contract would have been published at a later date, hence its appearance in the dataset.

22. Search the spreadsheet with the contract ID (e.g. CON007) to find more information and a link to the notice: CON007 between the Germany military and Rafael, CON033 between Hamburg Port Authority and XM Cyber, CON073 between the German military and Rafa, CON090 between the Fraunhofer Institute and Cyberbit, CON095 between the German army university and IAI Elta, CON142 between a German police force and Marom Dolphin.

23. Dataset IDs: CON001, CON003, CON009, CON052, CON124, CON125, CON138.

24. EU tenders: Tenders electronic daily (TED), European Union

25. Startup Nation Finder: Access the Israeli Tech Ecosystem

26. Dataset ID: CON083

27. Dataset ID: CON128

28. Dataset ID: CON019

29. Dataset ID: CON031

30. Dataset ID: CON085

31. Dataset IDs: CON092, CON093

32. Dataset ID: CON004

33. Dataset ID: CON082. GNX Data Systems used the trading name Genoox until being acquired by German company Qiagen in May 2025.

34. Dataset ID: CON104

35. ‘UN experts urge Germany to halt criminalisation and police violence against Palestinian solidarity activism’, 16 October 2025