Knesset to scrutinize Iranian holdings in German submarine builder
MK Tzipi Livni says answers sought on whether the defense establishment examined ramifications of Tehran’s stake in company
Lawmakers are set to take a deeper dive into whether the Defense Ministry adequately protected the country’s interests in deals to buy ships and submarines from a firm partly owned by an Iranian government company, as tumult continues over Israel’s relationship with the German shipbuilder ThyssenKrupp.
Zionist Union MK Tzipi Livni gathered signatures of fellow MKs in recent days to force a special debate on the issue in the Knesset Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee.
On Tuesday, the Defense Ministry acknowledged it had known about the Iran Foreign Investment Company’s share in German shipbuilder ThyssenKrupp.
According to reports in Hebrew-language media, the IFIC has earned nearly $100 million from its shares over the past decade with a 4.5 percent stake.
The Defense Ministry had initially told the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper that it had no knowledge of the Iranian holding and a source close to former defense minister Moshe Ya’alon told the tabloid in an article published Thursday that it had only learned of the Iranian connection from the paper’s reporting.
“Due to a thorough examination by the Defense Ministry in recent days… it appears that we have known since 2004 about the IFIC owning 4.5% (as of that time) of the German company ThyssenKrupp, and provided the necessary security envelope,” the ministry said in a statement Tueday, referring to its own unspecified measures to ensure no intelligence could be gleaned by Iran from its involvement in the company.
In a statement to the press Thursday, Livni listed some of the questions the committee would take up: “Was the Iranian stake in ThyssenKrupp examined before the deal was made, and by whom? Was the issue discussed in the relevant cabinet committee or by sanctions officials? What are the defense ramifications of the partnership of Iran, an enemy state, in the company building Israel’s submarines and naval combat vessels, especially considering the heightened sensitivity and purpose of said submarines? Did the Israeli government ensure — and if so, how — that no information leaked to the Iranian shareholders or the Iranian government, or that the Iranian regime did not benefit from the deal?”
At least some of the deals for Israel to purchase submarines from Thyssenkrupp were made when Livni herself served as foreign minister under Ehud Olmert from 2006 to 2009.
Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman said in the Knesset on Tuesday morning that Israel has long known the details of the Iranian investment.
“The issue was already known,” Liberman told a meeting of the Knesset Finance Committee, and downplayed reports of the Iranian ownership, saying that coverage has been sensationalized.
“The facts and the reality are far from what is being portrayed,” Liberman said, adding that “there was no other alternative” to purchasing the vessels from ThyssenKrupp.
In her debate request, Livni noted that Israel has been working assiduously for years to prevent funds from flowing to the Iranian regime, and even IFIC’s small share in the German company would have meant a financial boon for Tehran in the multi-billion-shekel deal.
IFIC was placed on a list of Iranian companies sanctioned by the US government in 2010, Livni wrote to fellow lawmakers.
The furor over the Iranian connection to the submarines came on the heels of revelations last month that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s personal lawyer had a part in pushing Thyssenkrupp’s interests in Israel, in what may constitute a grave conflict of interest.
Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit has ordered the police to look into allegations that David Shimron used his close relationship with the premier to push Israel to purchase several submarines from ThyssenKrupp, award the company a contract for naval vessels to defend Israel’s gas fields, and allow it to run a shipyard in Israel.
Channel 2 television said the police inquiry — which is not yet a full-blown investigation — would focus not on the purchase of three Dolphin submarines from the Germany company, which has dominated the headlines, but rather on a separate 2014 Defense Ministry tender for naval ships, also involving ThyssenKrupp, to protect the Mediterranean natural gas fields.
According to foreign reports, the Dolphin-class submarines afford Israel a nuclear second-strike capability crucial to the small country’s deterrence against potential nuclear aggressors.
Over the last decade, Israel has repeatedly warned that Iran has been seeking to obtain nuclear weapons in order to destroy the Jewish state. It has also opposed the West’s deal to curb Iran’s atomic program in exchange for sanctions, arguing that it would add many billions to Iran’s coffers and only delay, not prevent, its nuclear armament.
The Times of Israel Community.