Deputies from Sumar, Podemos, ERC, Bildu and BNG, all of them investiture partners of Pedro Sánchez, gathered this Thursday at the doors of Congress along with representatives of 375 entities including unions and NGOs, supporting the call ‘End Arms Trade with Israel’ with the aim of asking the Government to immediately end the purchase and sale of weapons and security equipment with Israel.

Arms sales are one of Israel’s most important businesses. The Jewish State is among the largest arms dealers in the world: It is ranked ninth in the sale of weapons and tenth in the purchase of these materials. Its main partner in this field is the United States, but Spain also supplies it with important defense supplies.

The weapons that we sell are, basically, ammunition, bombs, torpedoes and missiles, pieces and parts of airplanes and helicopters and fire direction systems, fundamentally. Between 2015 and 2022, according to the latest official data, the Spanish arms exports to Israel exceeded 12 million euros.

In addition, 290 arms export licenses worth more than of 80 million euros. Relevant figures, although far from those of other European partners because we are not among the European Union countries that sell the most weapons to the Israelis. That position is occupied by Germany and Italy, but India also appears at the top and even Muslim-majority countries, such as Turkey. And on that list of merchants is Spain.