Tomorrow, July 3rd, Albanese will hold a press conference and attend the 59th Human Rights Council. 

In her newly released report, From Economy of Occupation to Economy of Genocide, UN Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights in the Palestinian territories occupied since 1967, Francesca Albanese, clearly indicts corporate entities for their role in furthering Israel’s occupation and genocide.

Entities that previously enabled and profited from Palestinian elimination and erasure within the economy of occupation, instead of disengaging are now involved in the economy of genocide (para 25).

Albanese focuses on eight key sectors in this report, naming over 45 entities that are implicated in human rights violations and international crimes in the occupied Palestinian territory (oPt). The eight key sectors are:

• Military sector: The business of elimination
• Security and surveillance sector: Surveillance and carcerality, the dark side of the “Start-up Nation”
• Construction sector: Civilian guise, heavy machinery in service of settler-colonial destruction
• Housing sector: Home on stolen land
• Natural resource sector: The grip on natural resources, the incubator of conditions of life calculated to destroy
• Agricultural and tourism sector: Trading the fruits of illegality
• Financial sector: Financing the violations
• Post-secondary education sector: Knowledge production and violation legitimization

Perhaps most importantly, this report explicitly states that corporate entities can be held legally responsible for their involvement in Israel’s illegal occupation, apartheid, and genocide.

[The ICJ decisions] place on corporate entities a prima facie responsibility to not engage and/or to withdraw totally and unconditionally from any associated dealings, and to ensure that any engagement with Palestinians enables their self-determination…Both criminal and civil laws in various jurisdictions can be invoked to hold corporate entities or their executives accountable for violations of human rights and/or crimes under international law (paras 19-21).

Specifically, corporations who continue their activities and/or relationships with Israel (whether through the economy, military, public or private sectors connected to the oPt) may be found to have knowingly contributed to the a) violation of the Palestinian right to self determination; b) annexation of Palestinian territory and the maintenance of an unlawful occupation (and therefore the crime of aggression and associated violations); c) crimes of apartheid and genocide; and d) other ancillary crimes and violations.

This report implicates countless Canadian institutions who are supporting and/or profiting from Israel’s crimes – therefore, making them liable for international crimes themselves.

Caisse de Dépôt et Placement du Québec (CDPQ)

In addition to banks and financial institutions, Albanese specifically names the Caisse de Dépôt et Placement du Québec (CDPQ), which manages CA$473.3 billion ($328.9 billion) in pension funds of six million Canadians. She notes, citing our recent report with Coalition du Québec URGENCE Palestine, that the CDPQ has $9.6 billion invested in companies named in this UN report. More broadly, we found that CDPQ has over $27.4 billion invested in companies complicit in Israel’s crimes.

In 2023–2024, it almost tripled investment in Lockheed Martin, quadrupled investment in Caterpillar and increased 10-fold the investment in HD Hyundai (para 77).

Israel Bonds

Israel Bonds are the main finance source for Israel’s state budget and have been critical to financing the ongoing genocide in Gaza. Over the last 18 months, Israel has only issued more bonds, with an $8 billion issuance in March 2024 and a $5 billion issuance in February 2025.

[T]he Development Corporation for Israel (DCI) (i.e., Israel Bonds) provides a bond solicitation service for the Israeli government for overseas private individuals and other investors. DCI tripled its annual bond sales to funnel nearly $5 billion to Israel since October 2023, while offering investors the option of sending the return on bond investments into charitable organizations supporting the Israeli military and the colonies (para 74).

In Canada, Israel Bonds are Bonds are administered by Canada-Israel Securities, Limited (CISL) – a registered Exempt Marker Dealer (EMD) – originally incorporated in 1952. Israel Bond’s can be added to personal self-directed TFSAs, RRSPs, and RESPs, and may also be used as part of pension plan portfolios. We are currently completing an analysis and report on Israel Bonds that we hope to release soon.

Agribusiness and “Israeli” wine

Israel’s agricultural industry relies and the dispossession and Palestinian land and the displacement of Palestinian people.

Agribusiness has thrived on Israel-led extractivism and land-grabbing – producing goods and technologies serving Israeli settler-colonial interests, expanding market dominance and attracting global investment – while erasing Palestinian food systems and accelerating displacement (para 61).

Canadian public and private corporations actively contribute to maintaining Israel’s unlawful occupation through the exploitation of agricultural. For example, Canadian regulators import hundreds of “Israeli” wines for sale across the country. Despite their obligation to differentiate between products produced in/from the oPt, Canada imports and sells illegal settlement wines as “Product of Israel.”

To dodge growing backlash, companies mask origin through misleading labels, barcodes and supply chain mixing, effectively making occupation shelf-ready (para 65).

Conclusion

UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese concludes with a damning indictment of the corporate machine which has willingly stood with Israel through years of involvement and profiteering. These corporations often enable Israel’s violations in the oPt – they are not separate from Israel’s crimes, but a key party in their commission.

Business continues as usual, but nothing about this system, in which businesses are integral, is neutral. The enduring ideological, political and economic engine of racial capitalism has transformed Israel’s displacement-replacement economy of occupation into an economy of genocide. This is a “joint criminal enterprise”,[316] where the acts of one ultimately contribute to a whole economy that drives, supplies and enables this genocide….Corporate relations with Israel must cease until the occupation and apartheid end, and reparations are made. The corporate sector, including its executives, must be held to account, as a necessary step towards ending the genocide and disassembling the global system of racialized capitalism that underpins it (paras 86-88).

Media Coverage

You can read the press release from the Coalition du Québec URGENCE Palestine on their website. Media nationally and internationally are covering this new report including:

• UN rapporteur: Tech firms and corporations profiting from Israeli ‘economy of genocide’ by Middle East Eye
• UN report lists companies complicit in Israel’s ‘genocide’: Who are they? by Al Jazeera
• Economy of Genocide: UN Report Links Western Firms to Israeli War Crimes by The Palestine Chronicle
• Quebec pension giant participates in the ‘economy of genocide,’ UN report says by CTV News Montreal
• Gaza La Caisse de dépôt épinglée dans un rapport de l’ONU by La Presse