Al Jazeera probe shows extent of UK assistance to Israel

The news outlet’s monitoring and verification agency Sanad used open source flight data to show the scale of American and British involvement in Israel’s military operations between October 2023 and October 2024.

The data shows more than 6000 military flights over the region in a year – more than 16 a day on average – including hundreds of transport missions ferrying arms to Israel.

Israel flew only 20% of the 1600 reconnaissance missions recorded, whereas the UK accounted for nearly half.

The UK suspended some arms export licences to Israel last month, but only around 30 out of a total of approximately 350. 

The report reveals the extent of the weapons air bridge built for Israel. More than 1200 military cargo flights delivered weapons to Israel within the year.

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Several bases in Europe were used with hundreds of flights each from the UK, Germany, Italy, Cyprus and Greece.

Al Jazeera says it’s this air bridge together with the vast number of surveillance flights and air to air refuelling “that has sustained Israel’s brutal war on Gaza and helped it expand its operations into Southern Lebanon”.

A total of 70% of 1900 military transport planes landed at army bases in Cyprus, Greece and Italy.

Asked how surprised he was to hear the extent of US-UK involvement, military and political analyst Elijah Magnier told Al Jazeera: “Given the extensive US-UK support in intelligence, precision bombing, to Israelis, that is illustrating the high level of Western commitment and how they are fully partner in this war.

“There are two main points that emerges here – first the Israeli vulnerability and secondly the ethics of not only Israel but the UK and the US.

“The Israeli vulnerability because the narrative of Israel is the strongest army in the Middle East has fallen to pieces because due to the available data, Israel is not fighting this war alone but seems incapable of fighting a non-state actor in a very small area and requires the support of superpower like the US and NATO.

(Image: Al Jazeera) “With all these reconnaissance missions it shows that only 20% were carried out by Israel, which reflects the scale of intelligence gathering and sharing and that takes me to the second point. Due to the high and significant civilian casualties and broad destruction of cities and critical infrastructure in Gaza and beginning also in Lebanon, the consequences raises serious ethical issues here.”

The report also shows 1800 refuelling missions supported the Israeli military build-up in the region.

Shahd Hammouri, lecturer in international law at the University of Kent, was asked why the US and UK seem so ready to provide extensive support to Israel. 

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She said: “In short, it serves their geopolitical interests in the region. They’re not doing this out of let’s say Israel’s purported right to self defence but rather in ensuring Israel’s dominance within the region.

“This is indeed not just Israel’s war but a war that represents all of these different nations and a war that seeks to ascertain a specific positioning in the region.

“This is completely an illegal war where you have multi-faceted layers of illegality. When you look at the data presented in today’s report, it is as if we are reading a page that comes out of a science fiction movie.”

Israeli attacks have killed more than 42,000 Palestinians in Gaza since October 7, 2023.

Meanwhile, Israeli aerial and ground assaults in Lebanon have displaced 1.2 million people since September 23.