The coalition government shoots in the foot with Israeli bullets | Spain

The news that the Ministry of Interior has formalized the award to an Israeli company of A contract of 6.6 million euros for 15 million of bullets for the Civil Guard, advanced by the chainhas unprecedented storm between the PSOE and add. It is likely that the irritation of the government’s minority partner would not have been so acute if the previous day I had not had to swallow with a plan to increase by 10,471 million euros military expenditure and reach 2% of GDP this year. We can, which disputes to its former candidacy companions the vote to the left of the Socialist Party, has smelled blood and has been launched. In the case of bullets, in addition, the participation of Israel, whose army has been executed for a year and a half, before the passivity of the world, an indiscriminate massacre in Gaza that has already been charged more than 51,000 lives, mostly women and children.

The Government has repeatedly assured that since October 7, 2023, when Hamas’s terrorist attack triggered the current climbing, the shipment of weapons to Israel has not been authorized. There was the doubt of whether the authorized before that date was delivered. When last March, with 10 months of delay, the Government sent to the Congress the statistics on exports of defense and double use material, it was found that, from June 2023 to December 2024, defense equipment to Israel were supplied by almost 50 million. However, the Secretary of State for Commerce, Amparo López Senovilla, said days later before the Defense Commission of the Congress that were temporary shipments for repair or re -export to third countries and that no sale had been authorized with final destination to Israel. In addition, he recalled the prohibition of stopping in Spanish ports of ships with weapons for Israel, which has earned Spain the opening of a sanctioning file by the US maritime agency. His explanations seemed to convince all groups, although the doubt of whether he turned a blind eye with the air traffic of US military teams.

Verting the export of Spanish weapons is relatively easy, since each operation must be authorized by an interministerial board that presides over trade. Licenses are granted case by case and the Law on Control of the Export of Defense and Double Use Material, of 2007, provides that they be denied when they can disturb peace or use to violate human rights, among other reasons. If you want to avoid a diplomatic conflict, just give the quiet response and not process authorization.

The purchase of bullets for the Civil Guard is not regulated by this law, but by that of public sector contracts in the fields of defense and security, of 2011. Its article 2 expressly mentions “the supply of weapons and ammunition destined to the use of the forces, bodies and authorities with security powers”.

The law provides that certain companies can be vetoed in a tender, but does not refer to human rights or the existence of a conflict in the country of origin as exclusion criteria, but to reasons such as having been condemned or sanctioned or not being able to prove the reliability or technical and professional solvency. The rule also provides that contracts may be awarded for the restricted or negotiated procedure, according to which only some bidders are invited to participate in the contest. But this selection must be based on objective criteria, according to current regulations, since otherwise the winners could incur a crime of prevarication, according to legal sources.

On April 10, 2024, in the Plenary of Congress, President Pedro Sánchez responded to the spokesman of ERC Gabriel Rufián: « Stay calm that, since October 7, Spain does not develop any operation of sale of weapons with Israel, none. I want you to have it clear so that it is also clear about the whole of Spanish citizenship. » The country then asked La Moncloa if that meant that Spain expanded to the purchase of weapons of Israel the embargo already announced for sale. He did not get an answer.

When, in October 2024, the award to an Israeli company of the bullet contracts, the head of Social Rights, Pablo Bustinduy, was known in the name of the Ministers of Add, asked his defense colleague, Margarita Robles, the « immediate cancellation » of the purchases of weapons to Israel and not only the sales. Robles responded in a letter in which he assured that « no weapons have been sold or acquired from the state of Israel since October 7 » of 2023, and added that « the pending export licenses do not correspond to weapons, but to spare parts, and at this time they are paralyzed. »

Robler’s letter spoke of the « state of Israel », not its companies, nor of Spanish subsidiaries of Israeli firms or products of Spanish companies with Israeli technology. The truth is that the Armed Forces have important programs linked to the Israel military industry and, until now, it is not possible to have been affected by this supposed embargo. This is the case of the Spike antiacere missiles (287 million euros), the laser designators of the fighters (220 million), the tactical radio of the Army of Earth (340 million) or the Silam Lanzacohetes (714 million). In total, there are dozens of contracts, for a joint value much higher than the .000 million euros, which Defense has in different degrees of processing at this time. To renounce Israeli technology in all these programs, some included in the plan approved on Tuesday by the Government, would force alternative suppliers, which would surely make them more expensive and delay their delivery.

President Pedro Sánchez has ordered to undo the contract of the 15 million bullets and thus give satisfaction to add. Technically, it will not be easy or peaceful, since the Israeli company threatened inside with submitting a lawsuit if it turned back and the State Advocacy warned that it could have to pay strong compensation without receiving in return the ammunition that the Civil Guard needs. The trick of publishing the award in the middle of Holy Week so that no one found out did not work.

However, this contract is just an anecdote. The relevant thing is if the government formally decrees an embargo on the purchase of weapons to Israel and what are its limits. There are reasons against (bullets imported by Spain do not shoot at the Palestinians) and reasons in favor (these contracts strengthen the Israeli military industry). But such a measure would require a reform of the 2011 law or, at least, an express agreement of the Council of Ministers. The contracting bodies of the different ministries, or even of the regional and municipal police, not to mention private security companies, cannot be based on mere verbal statements, more or less ambiguous, to exclude a company from a public tender. Add, which is in the government, can claim that this decision be formally taken, if the matter is serious.