Press for Conversion! (Issue # 66) Spring 201236

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(IAI). HP lists IMI as a client, and IAI’sElta Systems uses HP hardware andsoftware in its L-8356 Electronic War-fare Analysis Station. (See “State-own-ed Israeli War Industries,” pp.48-49.)

In January 2011, HP began pro-viding the secret IT unit of Israel’sArmy with a Configuration Manage-ment Database. Then, in May, HP be-gan providing an Enterprise ResourcePlanning System to Israel’s Army “es-timated in the hundreds of millions” ofIsraeli shekels. (Note: A hundred mil-lion shekels is worth US$26 million.)

Israel’s business paper, Globes,reported in 2009 that HP won a US$15million, three-year contract (with a two-year option) to install visualisation sys-tems on Israeli military computers.These programs, which allow “a singlecomputer ...[to] obtain all network re-sources,” are made by VMWare. (Seetable, “CPP Investments,” p.53.)

HP owns Electronic Data Sys-tems (EDS) Israel. It led the consortiumthat won a US$8-10 million contractin 1999 to develop, install and main-

tain the “Basel System” for Israel’sMinistry of Defense and the Israeli po-lice. Financed by the US government,this automated biometric access-con-trol system uses facial dimensions andhand geometry. This biometric infor-mation, and other personal data, isstored on magnetic ID cards that Pal-estinians must use to get through ma-jor checkpoints into Israel and to moveabout within the occupied territories.

Israel’s Coalition of Women forPeace (CWP) says Israeli checkpointsare “isolating Palestinians from eachother, separating communities.” Thecheckpoints make many Palestiniantowns and cities “almost inaccessible”from each other. The UN Office forthe Coordination of Humanitarian Af-fairs reported in 2007, that 2.4 millionWest Bank residents “are affected byphysical impediments to movement.”Chief among these are 100 checkpoints.

The “Basel System” is part of adiscriminatory system applied only toPalestinians, and not to Israelis. As theCoalition of Women for Peace point out

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With assets of US$120 bil-lion, this US multinationalis one of the world’s largest

companies. Although HP’s annual mili-tary revenues in 2010 totalled US$972million, this was a trifling 0.8% of itstotal revenues. Nevertheless, HP’s mili-tary sales were large enough to put thisinformation technology (IT) giant into65th place among the world’s top warindustries. In 2008, HP ranked evenhigher, reaching 45th place.

Between 2000 and 2009, HPhad about US$18.35 billion worth ofcontracts with the US federal govern-ment. About 70% of these (US$12.7billion) were with departments andagencies of the US military, primarilythe Navy (US$8.84 billion). The com-pany was among the Pentagon’s topcontractors in 2008 and 2009, when itranked 32nd and 25th, respectively.

Tom Hogan, HP’s senior VicePresident of Software, has said that “Is-rael is the company’s winning ticket.”In the early-2000s alone, HP investedUS$5.5 billion in Israel’s high-technol-ogy sector. This, said Israel’s onlineynetnews in 2006, was “the largest in-vestment by any firm in Israeli hi-tech.”

With 900 employees, HP Israelhas an impressive client list which in-cludes Israel’s Police and the Ministriesof Defence, Justice and the Interior.Among HP Israel’s corporate custom-ers are several providing key servicesto Israel’s military, such as Cellcom(pp.17-18), Bank Leumi, Bank Hapoa-lim, the Israel Discount Bank and theMizrahi Tefahot Bank. (See table, “CPPInvestments,” p.53.) Another customerof HP Israel is Comverse Technologies,the parent company of Verint. (See “Is-raeli Spy Companies,” pp.43-47.)

HP also supplies state-ownedarms makers: Israel Military Industries(IMI) and Israel Aerospace Industries

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Spring 2012 (Issue # 66) Press for Conversion! 37

“The quarter of a million Israelisettlers in the West Bank do nothave to pass through the check-points. They travel using bypassroads, available only to them,which connect West Bank settle-ments to each other and to Is-rael.”

HP’s “Basel System” isalso used at checkpoints control-ling the access of 25,000-30,000 Palestinians with“work permits” who enterIsrael from Gaza and theWest Bank. Checkpoints between theWest Bank and occupied East Jerusa-lem also use the “Basel System.”

HP is also involved in anothermechanised system of control withinIsrael, namely the country’s ID cardsystem. In 2008, HP landed a US$70million contract to make five millionbiometric ID cards for Israel’s Minis-try of the Interior. HP also won a re-lated US$2 million tender, through itssubsidiary EDS Israel, to collect andsystematise fingerprints and photo-graphs of Israeli citizens.

When it purchased CompaqComputer Corp. in 2002, HP beganproviding and operating the “Aviv Sys-tem” for Israel’s Ministry of Interior.This population registration system in-cludes the “databases for the popula-tion registry.” HP’s contract to admin-ister this system was renewed in 2010for three more years, bringing in an-other US$6 million for HP which hadalready received about US$26 millionfor this work prior to 2009.

Israel’s ID card system, says theCWP, “reflects and reinforces ... [Isra-el’s] political and economic asym-metries, tiered citizenship structure andrestrictions on movement and access.”As the CWP further explains:

“The Israeli ID system, which isused to privilege Jews and differen-tiate among all others, stems from astrategy of stratified citizenship....

“The Israeli ID cards can begrossly categorized by the color oftheir plastic casing: blue for Israelicitizens and permanent residents, or-ange/green for Palestinian in the oPt[occupied Palestinian territories]....

“Until 2003, the blue IDs in-cluded the label of ‘nationality,’ un-der which Israeli citizens were listed

as Jewish, Arab, Druze, Bedouin,etc. In 2003, the nationality labelwas replaced with asterisks. How-ever, the ethnicity is still listed in thepopulation registry and additionalnotations enable distinguishing be-tween Jewish and non-Jewish Israeliidentification card holders.”

Israel’s Globes business paperreported in 2006 that “HP Israel willassume full responsibility for the man-agement and operation of the Navy’sIT infrastructure.” This included “com-puter and communications centers, in-formation security and full end usersupport.” This HP program, “imple-mented at a number of naval bases,”was “the first of [its] kind” in the IsraelDefense Forces (IDF). Israel’s Navyhas shelled civilian areas in Gaza, andattacked Gazan fishermen as well asships carrying aid to Gaza.

Another 2006 contract, to sup-ply 500 laptops “to various [Israeli]government offices” was won by HP.

In 2004, HP finished a three-year contract, financed by US militaryaid, to supply computer servers to Is-rael’s Defense Ministry. This contract,said the Globes newspaper, was “oneof the most prestigious in Israel.”

In 2002, HP Israel won “a ten-der valued at [US]$3 million to becomethe exclusive provider of laser printersto the IDF and Ministry of Defense.”

HP’s military exports to Israelwere mentioned by Israel’s Haaretznewspaper in 2009 when a scandalbroke regarding senior Israeli DefenseMinistry officials who were investi-gated for passing insider informationto help specific US companies winmore than US$100 million in contracts.Haaretz said the “equipment was pro-cured for Military Intelligence units in-

volved in signals intelligence andencryption, as well as for the airforce and other units.” It said Israeliofficials “leaked sensitive informa-tion from the closed bids made bycompanies participating in the ten-ders to companies they favored,helping them win contracts.” Othercompanies involved included

Cisco and EMC. (See Cisco,p.19 and EMC, pp.30-31.)

ReferencesFinancial news

h 3 0 2 6 1 . w w w 3 . h p . c o m / p h o e n i x . z h t m l?c=71087&p=irol-newsArticle&ID= 1461715

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Hewlett Packardwww.whoprofits.org/Company%20Info.php?id=624

“IBM wins $20-30m Defense Ministry tender,”Globes, November 21, 2007.www.globes.co.il/serveen/globes/docview.asp?did=1000277794

“Company briefs,” Globes, March 11, 2002www.globes.co.il/serveen/globes/docview.asp?did=569703

Yossi Melman, “Did Israeli officials help US firmswin security tenders?” Haaretz, Jan. 1, 2009.www.haaretz.com/print-edition/news/did-israeli-offi-cials-help-u-s-firms-win-security-tenders-1.266892