‘We all benefited from the difficulties Israel faced,’ says former UK defence chief

The UK’s former Chief of the Defence Staff, General Sir Nicholas Carter, has offered a candid assessment of how Western militaries, including Britain’s, have benefited from Israeli military operations and weapons development, including its current genocide against the Palestinians in Gaza.

“We all benefited from the difficulties Israel faced,” Carter stated in an interview reported by the Jerusalem Post, discussing how Western forces learned from the apartheid state. He claimed that Israel’s onslaught on Gaza since 7 October 2023, which is widely considered to be a genocide, has led to increased global demand for Israeli military products. His comments align with what analysts describe as Israel’s “combat-proven” arsenal, where military technology is field-tested against a largely civilian population.

This relationship exemplifies what Israeli anthropologist and peace activist Jeff Halper describes as “global pacification” in his book War Against the People. Israeli expertise in population control and surveillance, developed through decades of suppressing the people in the occupied Palestinian territories, is exported globally. According to Halper’s research, Israel has established security relationships with 157 states worldwide, as governments seek what he calls ways to “secure insecurity”.

Such technology, from surveillance systems to crowd control weapons and tactics, are particularly attractive to governments facing what Halper calls “restive populations”. This reality is reflected in Carter’s own experience. The former defence chief acknowledged using Israeli military platforms while commanding forces in Afghanistan in 2009-2010, noting that they were “very useful for intelligence and surveillance operations”. He praised Israeli defence companies’ innovation, stating “Israel’s position vis-a-vis its neighbours makes Israeli innovation a necessity.”

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Critics argue that this relationship represents what Antony Loewenstein terms The Palestine Laboratory effect in his book of that name, where Gaza serves as a testing ground for military technology later exported to Western allies and authoritarian states alike. The ongoing onslaught on Gaza has become a showcase for Israeli military technology, with weapons manufacturers highlighting the performance of their products in what are promoted as combat conditions, but are more likely to be wholly or mainly civilian communities.

Despite the UK government’s recent decision to suspend some arms export licences to Israel, defence exports approved by Britain to the occupation state totalled £17 million in 2023. Carter declined to comment on these political decisions, but emphasised the importance of continued military cooperation: “It’s very important for both militaries to work together, share the best training, and understand together the complexity of the modern battlefield.”

The former defence chief’s remarks offer rare public confirmation of how Western militaries study and adapt Israeli military tactics and technology, even as Israel faces mounting criticism over its conduct in Gaza.

Human rights organisations and legal experts have increasingly raised concerns about how Israeli military technology and expertise is being exported globally even as Israel faces mounting accusations of genocide in Gaza. Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and the European Centre for Constitutional and Human Rights have all concluded that Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. Médecins Sans Frontières has reported seeing “clear signs of ethnic cleansing,” while the International Commission of Jurists and the UN have also condemned Israel’s actions.

This comes as monitoring group Airwars has determined that, “By almost every metric, the harm to civilians from the first month of the Israeli campaign in Gaza is incomparable with any 21st-century air campaign.” Despite these findings, and the International Criminal Court issuing arrest warrants for Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant for alleged war crimes, military cooperation and technology transfer between Israel and Western allies, including Britain, continues largely unabated.

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