Israeli arms firms threaten journalists at UK airshow

Israel’s largest arms firms angrily refused to answer questions from independent media at an arms fair in England on Monday.

They had been invited to the Farnborough International Airshow despite being required by French authorities to cover their stands in black drapes at the Paris airshow last year.

One company at Farnborough, Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI), even threatened to report journalists to police for asking questions about its role in the Gaza genocide.

IAI makes the Heron surveillance drone which its chief executive Boaz Levy said played a “pivotal role” in Israel’s latest assault on Gaza.

The Israeli-state owned firm had a two-storey chalet at Farnborough as well as a stand, which was located next to a UK government space exhibition.

Staff outside the IAI chalet refused entry to journalists and became intimidating when asked about the firm’s role in Gaza.

One IAI security guard followed Declassified and demanded to see our media passes so he could “report us to the police”.

Facial recognition software indicates that the security guard, who was not displaying his own pass, resembles a man who has worked for Israel’s version of MI5, the Shin Bet.

Watch our report from Farnborough airshow

‘Walk away’

Staff at the Elbit Systems UK stand also did not want to speak to independent media when asked about the work of its Israeli parent company in Gaza.

Elbit’s Hermes drone killed three British military veterans – John Chapman, James Kirby and James ‘Jim’ Henderson – who were delivering aid along a coastal road in Gaza in 2024.

Footage of what appeared to be a Hermes drone flying above a coastline was being played on a large screen at Elbit’s stand, as well as air-to-ground missiles.

When asked by Declassified if this was insensitive to the veteran’s families, they repeatedly denied an Elbit drone was responsible for the deaths, saying “You’re very misinformed” before telling us to “walk away”.

Elbit’s private security guards – some of whom appear to be British military veterans – then began to usher our team away

Canary journalist Cameron Baillie was also bundled away from Elbit’s stand when he asked about the company’s role in the Gaza genocide.

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Rafael makes the Spike missile which is believed to have killed the British aid workers in Gaza.

Rafael security staff barred access to Byline Times journalist Iain Overton as well as Declassified .

Overton said of his encounter with Rafael at Farnborough, “They went into their building and then started filming us from inside…as if we were being surveilled.”

He added: “The real question has to be to British ministers as to why they allow Israeli firms to be peddling their goods on UK soil in the face of repeated embargos, [and] the UN representing what’s happening in Gaza as a genocide.

“The UK’s imports of arms from Israel have increased by 10,500% since 2023 to the current day. It’s as if the trauma and horror of Gaza has had no impact on business here. The cheque books are open. There’s lots of business and meetings being had.

“We’ve seen people go both into Rafael and into Elbit. It’s as if there’s no link between what these systems were trained to do in Gaza – the Palestine Laboratory – and what we’re buying as the UK.”

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) said that the arms revenues of Elbit, Rafael and IAI “reached unprecedented levels in 2023 on the back of the demand for weapons fuelled by the war in Gaza.”

Campaign Against Arms Trade (CAAT) spokesperson Kirsten Bayes said: “So many of the companies exhibiting, from Elbit to Rafael, are mired in the Israeli military’s deliberate killing and maiming of the tens of thousands of Palestinian children, as a UN Commission of Inquiry recently found.

“The UK should never host such a depraved group of suffering-profiteers.”

Farnborough International Airshow was asked to comment.

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