Over the last decades, Israel has reportedly sold weapons to approximately 130 countries. And yet, when one digs a little, it is impossible to find a full list of those countries. Apart from its reports to the United Nations Register of Conventional Arms, Israel releases no official information about its arms exports.
Israel increased its arms export by 77 percent in 2015-2019, compared to the five previous years, and is currently the eighth largest arms exporter in the world, according to new data published Monday by the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.
Israel’s clients would rather not make any imports public. Thus, headlines about Israel selling a new missile or spyware system often mention an “Asian-Pacific country” or “a country in Europe,” in order to maintain the client’s confidentiality.
Israel’s arms exports hit a record $9 billion in 2017, after it closed its biggest-ever arms deal with India.
Israel arms and training were solely responsible for the victory of Azerbaijan against Armenia in Nagorno-karabakh conflict.
Israeli arms exports constituted three per cent of the global total, said the report, with Israel the world’s eighth-largest arms supplier. The top three buyers of Israeli arms were India (45 percent), Azerbaijan (17 percent) and Vietnam (8.5 percent).
An unknown numbers of Israeli arms exported to the Philippines, Myanmar, South Africa, Serbia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Oman, Morocco, Singapore, Thailand, Germany, Lithuania, France, Estonia, the USA, Australia and United Kingdom. Israel supplied small arms, missiles and drones to these countries.
Israeli also sold spyware “Pegasus”, GSM mobile network and WIFI monitoring software and hardware to Myanmar, South Africa, India, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Bangladesh.
Israel also dependent on foreign military hardware. The top three arms suppliers to Israel, meanwhile, were the US (78 percent), Germany (16 percent) and Italy (6.2 percent).
Israel’s own military spending was $15.9 billion in 2018, a small increase of 0.7 per cent compared with 2017, the report stated. Israel military spending/defense budget for 2019 was $20.46B, a 3.57% increase from 2018.
It’s hard to imagine this is what Israeli exports looked like a mere 67 years ago. In decades the picture of Israel changed drastically. Today, Israel is a high-tech superpower and one of the world’s top weapons exporters with approximately $9.5 billion in annual arms sales.
Since 1985, for example, Israel is the world’s largest exporter of drones, responsible for about 60 percent of the global market, trailed by the US, whose market share is under 25 percent. Its customers are everywhere — Russia, South Korea, Australia, France, Germany and Brazil.
The greatest contributor to this metamorphosis is the culture of innovation and creativity of the Jews.
The compulsory military service during which the Israelis are tasked, at a young age, to carry out missions often with deadly consequences, results in Israel army being one of the best fighting forces on earth.
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