Both Ireland and Luxembourg have stopped facilitating the sale of Israel bonds in the European Union in 2026, and as a result Israel bonds have not been sold in the EU since September 1st. BDS salutes this important development and calls for sustained and intensified pressure on all EU member states now to end complicity in Israel’s genocide and atrocity crimes against the Palestinian people.
The Palestinian-led BDS movement salutes the relentless efforts of the Ireland-Palestine Solidarity Campaign (IPSC) and Luxemburg-based Collectives for Palestine, who alongside trade unions, civil society organisations, artists, political representatives, local authorities and legal experts in Ireland and Luxembourg, have sustained this strategic campaign against Israel Bonds from the streets to parliamentary committees since September 2024.
This hard-won victory in Europe must be defended and built upon. We call for sustained and intensified pressure on all EU member states to refuse any future transfers or approvals related to Development Corporation for Israel (DCI) bonds and its sovereign debt facilitation. The solidarity movement must remain vigilant, monitoring the DCI's activities closely and preparing to mobilise wherever an attempt is made to re-establish this financial lifeline in some other European state.
Israel Bonds directly fund Israel’s ongoing genocide, apartheid, and illegal military occupation against Palestinians. According to the DCI itself, Israel Bonds “ranks [sic] among Israel’s most valued economic and strategic resources” and “are a reliable and independent financial pipeline.” Israel Bonds have raised over $7 billion dollars globally since the beginning of Israel’s genocide in Gaza in October 2023. They provide unrestricted loans to the Israeli military and government to weather the economic fallout of Israel’s growing isolation worldwide.
The DCI website states: “Each and every Israel Bond investment has the added value of sending an unmistakable message to BDS advocates: Israel’s economy will remain strong.”
Background
In September 2024, the Central Bank of Ireland renewed approval for the State of Israel Bond Issuance Programme eleven months into the genocide in Gaza. This was brought to public attention by The Ditch. The bonds, known as Israel Bonds and issued by the Development Corporation for Israel (DCI), were explicitly marketed and sold from October 2023 as war bonds accompanied by the slogan "Israel is at war – we stand with Israel” for sale in the European Union. To be sold the bonds require a “home member state” within the EU. Ireland became the “home member state” for Israel Bonds in 2021 following Brexit. The bonds prospectus (a detailed legal and disclosure document prepared by a bond issuer that explains the exact terms, conditions, and financial risks of a bond offering) are typically approved on an annual basis.
Following sustained pressure from parliamentary and civil society groups over Israel’s genocide against the Palestinian people in Gaza, Ireland’s Central Bank Governor Gabriel Makhlouf confirmed last September that his bank would not renew its approval. Luxembourg then took over approval of the prospectus for the bonds to be sold in the European Union.
The solidarity movement in Luxembourg opposed the Commission de Surveillance du Secteur Financiers approval of the bonds with immediate and strong collaboration between the campaigns in Ireland and Luxembourg. A conference on Luxembourg’s obligations under international law was organised in May 2026.
The Finance Minister of Luxembourg announced on the 21st of July that Luxembourg was ending its involvement with Israel Bonds, refusing to transfer the 2026 prospectus from Ireland, which remains the “home member state” for Israel Bonds.
The coordinated pressure has for now severed a financial pipeline that contributes to funding Israel’s ongoing genocide and apartheid regime against the Indigenous Palestinian people.
In a statement following the decision to return the Israel Bonds prospectus to Ireland, the Irish Congress of Trade Unions (ICTU) made its position clear on August 31st 2026 calling on the Irish Government to direct the Central Bank of Ireland (CBI) not to renew or approve the 2026 Israel Bonds prospectus, and not to facilitate the transfer of the prospectus to any other EU member state. ICTU General Secretary Owen Reidy said: "The (Irish) Government has rightly recognised that what is happening in Gaza is a genocide. It cannot in the same breath allow the Central Bank to wave through the very bonds that help fund it.”
The Central Bank of Ireland did not approve or transfer any prospectus on the 1st September 2026 commencement date, or subsequently.
Israel Bonds have not been sold in the EU since 1 September
This is an unprecedented disruption: The Development Corporation for Israel (DCI) has never before failed to roll over its bond offering from one year to the next without a break.
Blocking their sale in the EU is therefore not only a matter of limiting fundraising–it is a major blow to the business-as-usual impunity enjoyed by the state of Israel.
In July of this year, Amnesty International published a statement titled Approval of Israel Bonds in the European Market Risks State Complicity in Israel's Ongoing Genocide, calling on all EU states not to approve the Israel Bonds prospectus, warning that such approval constitutes financial facilitation which could amount to a failure to prevent genocide and carries the risk of aiding or assisting in genocide.
What does this mean now?
Ireland is the EU’s "home member state" for Israel Bonds since 2021. Under the Prospectus Regulation the "home member state" cannot be changed unless the bonds offered are all over €1000. Israel Bonds range from €37 to €25,000 in starting values as offered up to 31 August mirroring the bonds offered in the United States.
If the Central Bank of Ireland is unwilling to transfer a prospectus, then Israel could change what it offers, amending the prospectus to take out bonds under €1000 and, on this basis, it could seek an alternative home member state.
As of now, Israel has not found an EU state willing to approve an amended prospectus for Israel Bonds offering a narrower range of bonds, which under EU law would allow a state other than Ireland to approve the bonds. We are aware that the DCI may continue to seek another home member state to approve its prospectus, and in that case that state will be met with opposition supported by grassroots and civil society movements in Luxembourg, Ireland and across Europe.
NYC Rejects Israel Bonds
Earlier this month, after over a year of growing pressure from the Break the Bonds NYC campaign, even New York City Comptroller Mark Levine, a radical Zionist, was compelled to back down from his dangerous and irresponsible pledge to reinvest the city pension fund in Israel Bonds. The scale of this win is immense - New York City’s municipal budget (around $116 billion to $127 billion) is larger than the national budgets of many sovereign countries.
The BDS movement is having a real impact
Our struggle continues until every avenue of financial support for Israel's regime of occupation, settler-colonialism, apartheid and genocide is permanently severed, and until Palestinians enjoy freedom, justice and equality.
Continue to escalate BDS pressure worldwide against apartheid Israel’s Genocide Bonds.