Paris
France has banned Israeli companies from participating in this year’s annual Eurosatory arms and defence industry exhibition in Villepinte near Paris next month, the event’s organisers and French authorities have said.
“By decision of the government authorities, there will be no stand for the Israeli defence industry at the Eurosatory 2024 fair,” organisers Coges Events said on Friday.
The French Defence Ministry suggested that the decision was linked to Paris’s opposition to the continuing Israeli assault on Rafah in southern Gaza.
“Conditions are no longer met to host Israeli companies at the show at a time when the President is calling for Israel to cease operations in Rafah,” the ministry told the Reuters news agency.
Seventy-four Israeli firms were set to attend the event from June 17 to 21 at fairgrounds close to Paris’s main international airport, with Coges previously saying about 10 of them were to exhibit weapons.
Last week, a group of activists issued a legal warning and urged Coges to take measures to avoid buying and selling weapons that could be used in “crimes” committed in Gaza or other parts of the occupied Palestinian territory.
ASER, Stop Arming Israel, Urgency Palestine and the France-Palestine Solidarity Association also warned against profits from the fair “reinforcing the economic power of firms likely to participate in these crimes”.
Coges told the AFP news agency that it was “a fair solely for the presentation of defence and security equipment … and in no means a place for deals.”
In a social media post on Friday, Israeli war cabinet minister Benny Gantz said he told the French Prime Minister Gabriel Attal that the decision to forbid an Israeli delegation from participating in the defence fair “ultimately rewards terror”.
