On the same weekend that Prime Minister Anthony Albanese announced Australia’s recognition of a Palestinian state, his government quietly awarded nearly $10 million in taxpayer funds to a company accused of profiting directly from Palestinian suffering. That company is Elbit Systems, Israel’s largest arms manufacturer, whose products have become synonymous with the devastation of Gaza.
Elbit’s Bloody Footprint
Elbit Systems is not just another defence contractor. It is the principal supplier of drones used by the Israeli military in its bombardments of Gaza, including the unmanned aircraft that killed Australian aid worker Zomi Frankcom and her colleagues in April 2024. Its portfolio has included white phosphorus weapons, banned under international conventions, and cluster munitions so egregious that Australia’s own Future Fund divested from the company in 2021. Elbit has also been implicated in breaking sanctions to supply weapons to Myanmar’s junta following the 2021 coup.
This is a company with a record of producing weapons that have killed civilians across multiple continents. Yet it remains a beneficiary of Australian taxpayer largesse.
The New Contract
Defence confirmed last week that it is paying $9.7 million for military radios supplied by Elbit Systems UK, the British subsidiary of the Israeli parent company. The deal followed a tender process that began in December 2024, months after the killing of Frankcom had already become a matter of public record. In effect, the Albanese government made a conscious decision to reward a company tied to the killing of an Australian citizen.
Elbit UK itself has become a lightning rod for protest, with its factories across England regularly targeted by demonstrators demanding an end to the company’s complicity in Israel’s campaign in Gaza. None of this deterred Australia from pressing ahead.
A Pattern of Reward
This $9.7 million contract is not an anomaly. Over the past two years Elbit has been handed a steady stream of Australian contracts. In October 2024, Elbit’s Australian subsidiary received $700,000 for drone support systems. The previous month it secured $38,000 for security equipment. In April 2024, the very month Frankcom was killed, Elbit was awarded $160,000 for explosives. Two months earlier, Defence paid $609,000 for services, while in January 2024 Elbit won two contracts totalling $3.7 million. In November 2023, it was awarded a $14 million deal.
The largest recent transaction, however, dwarfs all others: close to $900 million for Elbit to supply turrets to infantry vehicles built by the South Korean firm Hanwha. At the time, the government denied any role in approving the subcontract. Yet documents obtained by journalists later revealed that Defence had vetted and authorised the process, contradicting public claims of non-involvement.
Beyond Elbit
Elbit is not the only Israeli defence company to profit from Canberra’s procurement. Rafael, another manufacturer accused of complicity in war crimes, recently secured $467,000 for missile systems. Like Elbit, Rafael has been targeted by protests in Australia and abroad for its role in arming the assault on Gaza.
The Theatre of Recognition
This pattern of defence spending stands in stark contrast to the Albanese government’s diplomatic posture. Recognition of Palestine has been presented as a principled stand, attracting criticism from the Coalition and from the Trump administration in Washington. Yet recognition has not been accompanied by sanctions, arms embargoes, or any meaningful steps to restrain Israel’s military machine.
Instead, while rhetoric about Palestinian rights has grown sharper, Australia continues to underwrite the very companies most responsible for Gaza’s destruction. The contradiction is glaring: diplomatic recognition on one hand, financial reward for Israel’s war industry on the other.
Complicity by Contract
The refusal to label Israel’s actions as genocide, despite mounting evidence and expert legal opinion, reinforces the sense that Canberra is engaged in symbolic politics rather than substantive accountability. By continuing to fund Israeli arms companies, the Albanese government is not a neutral bystander. It is complicit.
Each new contract strengthens the profits of firms whose technologies are being deployed in Gaza and the West Bank. Each payment validates an industry that thrives on occupation, displacement, and the denial of Palestinian statehood. And each act of procurement further erodes Australia’s credibility when it claims to support international law and the rights of oppressed peoples.
Conclusion
The recognition of Palestine may prove to be an important diplomatic milestone, but it is hollow if unaccompanied by real consequences for Israel’s ongoing campaign of ethnic cleansing and collective punishment. Until Canberra ceases to funnel taxpayer money to companies like Elbit and Rafael, its gestures of solidarity will remain little more than theatre.
The message is clear: for Palestinians, words of recognition have come cheap, but Australian contracts for the weapons that destroy their homes remain very expensive indeed.
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