Japanese business giant Itochu's surprise announcement on February 5 that it was terminating its agreement with Israeli defense contractor Elbit Systems has sent shockwaves across corporate Japan. Itochu specifically stated that they based their decision on the ruling of the International Court of Justice that Israel may be committing genocide in Gaza, and on the Japanese government's position that the ICJ decision must be implemented “in good faith.”
Itochu matters; is a well-known name in Japan, being the third largest trading company and one of the titans of the country's economy with 2023 revenues of more than $104 billion. Prominent trading companies like Itochu are also politically important, as they have historically been considered the captains of Japan's trade-based economy. Itochu's decision sends a very clear message about the acceptability of doing business with Israel.
The decision puts Itochu in a different league from the many Western states and companies that have ignored the ICJ ruling or dismissed genocide charges as “meritless.” The governments of the United States, the United Kingdom, France and Germany, just to name a few, have continued to shower Israel with weapons and political support to continue the senseless killing of innocent civilians, in flagrant violation of the ICJ's preliminary decision. Some Western governments have begun to backtrack on their support, but words are cheap and the flow of arms continues.
In fact, those governments have taken their criminal complicity to a new level by suspending funding to UNRWA, the main UN agency serving Palestinian refugees, based on admittedly spurious Israeli accusations that a A handful of the organization's 13,000 employees may have been involved in the October 7 attacks on Israel. One cannot help but question the timing of Israel's presentation of the “dubious dossier” to its Western accomplices, literally hours after the ICJ issued its ruling that Israel was plausibly committing genocide.
Always recipients of the Israeli narrative, the docile Western media has duly highlighted UNRWA's imagined involvement in terrorism, while virtually ignoring the ICJ ruling. Defunding UNRWA will almost inevitably result in famine among the more than 85 percent of displaced Palestinians in Gaza, a textbook example of “deliberately inflicting living conditions calculated to bring about the physical destruction” of an ethnic group, which qualifies as an act of genocide under international law.
In general, Japan is not an outspoken supporter of Palestinian rights (in fact, the country joined its Western allies in stopping funding for UNRWA) or human rights in general. Itochu, for its part, is one of the first Japanese companies to initiate human rights-based due diligence on its business operations (a process that clearly failed when they signed a deal with Elbit in the first place).
However, in recent years Japanese companies have proven to be increasingly sensitive to public opinion on human rights and environmental issues. The failed 2020 Tokyo Olympics left a legacy of waste of public funds and corruption, but at least served as a catalyst for Japanese companies to adopt the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (which state that Companies have the responsibility to respect international human rights standards). human rights standards) more seriously. This is not to say that Japanese companies are necessarily better than their Western counterparts (they are not), but in this case, the demonstrations that had taken place in front of Itochu's headquarters in Tokyo and the popular boycott of the convenience store owned by Itochu The Family Mart chain in Muslim countries like Malaysia clearly pushed the company over the edge.
According to Itochu, the deal with Elbit was to acquire material for the Japanese military, not for the supply of Japanese technology or weapons to Israel (Itochu also stated that they partnered with Elbit based on a request from the Japanese government, a claim implausibly denied ). by the authorities). Assuming that's true, that makes the severing of ties even more significant. Basically, Itochu has accepted that doing business with Israeli military companies results ipso facto in complicity with Israeli genocide. It logically follows that relations with companies – Israeli or not – that are involved in other Israeli violations of international law must also be terminated. That is exactly what the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) campaign rightly calls for: holding the apartheid state to account for its crimes.
Itochu's decision is surely the harbinger of growing Israeli isolation. The Western world has long been the main front for the BDS movement and Israeli attempts to suppress it. The events in Japan show, if there was ever a doubt, that BDS has truly gone global.
Itochu's decision may also have repercussions far beyond Palestine, as Japanese remilitarization has long been an integral part of the United States' grand strategy in East Asia. After World War II, Japan adopted a pacifist constitution that prohibits the use of force to resolve international disputes. However, U.S. pressure on Japan to play a larger military role in Asia has increased in recent years, as Americans have become increasingly anxious about Chinese challenges to American hegemony.
What until then was a cautious Japanese approach changed dramatically in 2012, with the arrival of ultranationalist Shinzo Abe as prime minister. With little to no regard for public opinion, Abe pushed through extremely controversial bills and policies aimed at remilitarization, in particular giving the military much greater freedom to fight in concert with allied (read: American) forces even outside Japan. Arms exports and international joint development, long taboo, became a government priority overnight. Japan also proactively entered alliances whose overt goal was to keep China in its place in the international pecking order, such as the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue. Abe eventually resigned in 2020, but the general direction remains the same, and in 2022 the government took advantage of the Russian invasion of Ukraine to push for a near doubling of the military budget.
From the beginning, stronger relations with Israel were integral to Japan's further incorporation into the American military alliance. The heavy dependence on oil from Arab countries had made Palestine a traditionally sensitive issue for Japanese foreign policy, but Abe abandoned all inhibitions, visited Israel in 2015 and openly promoted trade and defense agreements with the country. Shady information about joint weapons development with Israel soon emerged, only to be quickly denied. Pro-Israel articles appeared in conservative media, including some praising the supposed virility of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu as a brave man who defended the country against him.
The government also embarked on a campaign to force companies to make deals with Israel. Local chambers of commerce were “strongly encouraged” to visit Israel and forge partnerships. Personally, I received numerous calls from major Japanese companies that felt official pressure and yet were aware of the reputational risk of doing business with Israeli companies involved in the colonization of Palestine. They would beg me to point them to a “clean” Israeli company that they could do business with and not be the target of the BDS movement. Of course, I had to tell them that there was no such thing: the entire Israeli economy is based on the oppression of the Palestinian people and the theft of their land. Many of the companies eventually bowed to government pressure, but it is certain that they are now urgently reviewing their portfolios. Itochu's decision to cut ties with Elbit Systems may mark the beginning of a new trend and a major step back in Japan's remilitarization and its full integration into the US anti-China military group in East Asia.
Itochu's decision should be praised and the BDS movement should continue to boycott companies complicit in Israel's abuses. Still, there is a limit to how much can be expected from private companies, which ultimately exist to maximize profits. It is governments that shape the playing field for businesses, through laws and regulations. Governments must ensure that companies respect human rights and punish them when they fail. In particular, Western governments (and Japan) need to end their blatant support for apartheid and Israeli genocide and ensure that companies in their jurisdictions do the same. This is the only way to save the last vestiges of its declining credibility.
The views expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of Al Jazeera.
