Outsourcing the occupation, Rod Such The Electronic Intifada 29 November 2018

The Privatization of Israeli Security by Shir Hever, Pluto Press (2017)

Shir Hever’s The Privatization of Israeli Security is a study of the emergence of private military-security companies that began in Israel in the 1990s and continues today. That trend has implications for the future of both the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza and for the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement.

An economic researcher and author of The Political Economy of Israel’s Occupation (2010), Hever draws on the work of Israeli political scientist Neve Gordon, particularly Gordon’s book, Israel’s Occupation (2008), and the more recent analysis of Israel’s military-industrial complex by anthropologist Jeff Halper in his book, War Against the People (2015). Unlike these studies, however, Hever is singularly focused on privatization.

Between 1994 and 2006, five large military industries owned by the Israeli government were sold to private investors. During the same period, government strategists were developing a “core vs. periphery” concept in which they envisioned the government retaining ownership of functions central to the military while outsourcing responsibilities considered peripheral, such as the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza.

Hever acknowledges that his most controversial conclusion is that Israel’s political leadership outsourced the occupation, which had been a core function of the Israeli military, to the Palestinian Authority following the 1993 Oslo accords. He recognizes the difficulties of characterizing the PA as a private firm. In addition, he notes that the Israeli military originally opposed outsourcing the occupation to the PA and has routinely attempted to discredit it as a security ally of Israel.

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