Palestinian groups launch legal bid to shed light on Australian arms export permits to Israel | Australian foreign policy

Three Palestinian human rights groups have launched a legal bid to force Australian defense minister Richard Marles to shed light on whether the government has approved export permits to Israel that could violate international law.

The groups, which include the Palestinian Center for Human Rights, Al-Haq, and Al Mezan Center for Human Rights, will seek to subpoena the arms export documents after filing an affidavit in federal court last week.

The groups, supported by the Australian Center for International Justice (ACIJ), hope the documents will show whether permits were issued in error because of a failure to properly assess the possibility of them being used to facilitate serious human rights abuses.

Guardian Australia contacted Marles’ office for a response.

The Albanian government has repeatedly denied that Australia has supplied arms to Israel since 7 October 2023 and downplayed existing permits as “dual use”; these were permits for parts or technologies that were generally used for commercial or civilian use but “had potential military and weapons of mass destruction application.”

In August, Marles again emphatically stated: “Let’s be clear: We are not supplying weapons to Israel.”

In November 2024, the defense ministry confirmed that it had amended or invalidated at least 16 defense-related export authorizations to Israel as part of a review of 66 “active” exports at the time.

Deputy defense minister Hugh Jeffrey said the department was expiring or amending the permits because “we could not be confident that they would not contravene Australia’s national security or other international obligations”.

By October 2025, the department said there There were a total of 54 active permits. Since October 7, 2023, 22 permits had been issued to Israeli end users, five of which had expired. While 31 warrants issued before the war were deemed not to require action, six were subject to “continuous review”.

The United Nations independent international commission of inquiry, which does not speak on behalf of the UN as a whole, found in September that “genocide has occurred and continues to occur in Gaza,” according to its chairman, Navi Pillay.

International commissioner Chris Sidoti, a former human rights commissioner, said Australia must ensure it is not involved in the arms trade used by Israel, which could breach international law.

Shawan Jabarin, Al-Haq’s general manager, said Palestinians have the right to know who is arming Israel and what is being exported.

“Our efforts to shine a light on Australia’s exports have so far failed, and we should not have to go to court to figure out who is arming the Israeli regime,” Jabarin said.

The groups had previously attempted to subpoena documents from Marles regarding exports to Israel in November 2023, but halted that action due to undisclosed transparency issues.

Rawan Arraf, ACIJ’s lead lawyer, said the Australian arms export regime “operates with minimal public scrutiny and there is no meaningful visibility into which exports are approved by the Australian government and on what basis”.

“Our clients believe they may be entitled to compensation in the form of a judicial review, but due to the secrecy of the process, they cannot be sure until the veil of secrecy is revealed.

“The assurances given by the minister and the government over the last two years have led to public distrust, disappointment and anger. We cannot accept the government’s ‘trust us’ attitude on such a serious issue as Australia’s possible complicity in genocide and other serious international crimes.”

Prof Donald Rothwell, an international law expert at the Australian National University, said the federal government had consistently refused to release the documents through other means, such as through freedom of information laws.

“It has become very difficult to tie together how defense materiel exported from Australia ended up in the hands of the IDF due to the network of supply chains, and some of this defense materiel could end up in the hands of other legitimate actors,” he said.

“So the request for preliminary discovery, which is not uncommon in civil cases involving potentially very extensive documentation, is really part of how the three applicants were able to build their legal case against the state.”

The Greens campaigned against the use of Australian-made parts in the F-35 fighter jets used to strike Gaza areas.

Australia is a party to the Joint Strike Fighter Programme; This means companies within the country are supplying F-35 parts and components as part of a global supply chain agreement.

More than 75 Australian companies have contributed to the global supply chain for the F-35 programme. according to the ministry of defense.

One of these companies, RUAG Australia, is the sole global supplier of F-35s. “Lock actuator system”This allows the jet to quickly open bay doors and fire missiles while maintaining stealth.

Germany stopped exporting materials that Israel could use in its military operations in Gaza. Germany is Israel’s second largest arms supplier after the United States.

Marles said Australia could not announce similar action to Germany because it did not directly supply arms to Israel.