I was on this Wiki page when Francesca Albanese put out ‘lucrative’ Gaza report

Oddly enough, I was looking at a Wikipedia page titled “List of companies involved in the Holocaust” not too long before UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese issued a report that named nearly 50 companies as aiding Israel’s military onslaught against the people of Gaza.

Ms Albanese, a lawyer with human rights expertise, issued the report claiming to show “why Israel’s genocide continues: because it is lucrative for many”.

It made me think of that Wiki list on companies that were engaged with Hitler’s Germany. Described as “incomplete”, it still runs to nearly 90 companies. On the list are storied names such as Associated Press (AP), Audi, Bayer, BMW, IBM, Kodak, Maggi (now owned by Nestle), Miele, Porsche and the Volkswagen Group.

Each company’s involvement in the Holocaust is listed.

AP, for instance, is as follows: “Censorship and cooperation with Nazi Germany”.

IBM’s involvement is listed thus: “Produced early computers utilized in the pursuit of the Holocaust by Nazi Germany. Thanks to IBM’s 2,000 punch card machines, the Nazis made 1.5 billion index cards. They help in the modern and efficient management of prison, labor and extermination camps”.

For Miele, German manufacturer of high-end domestic appliances, the listing reads as follows: “Produced aerial torpedoes, mines, grenades for the German war effort, and employed forced labourers. It is estimated that by 1944, 95% of the company’s revenue was derived from producing and selling armaments”.

Many of the companies on the list are said to have used forced labour from Hitler’s concentration camps. So too Maggi, chiefly known today as a bright and buzzy international brand of instant noodles, soups and seasonings.

Without close study of each company’s history, it would be hard to establish the list as 100 per cent accurate. However, it does illustrate a clear point: there is an awful and awfully lucrative economics of war and death.

Indeed, Ms Albanese uses an interesting term to describe the involvement of commercial entities in Israel’s ongoing military operations in Gaza. She calls it “an economy of genocide” and alleges that “companies are no longer merely implicated in occupation” but may actually be embedded” in that economy.

Her report names companies from several countries. They include US tech giants Microsoft, Alphabet Inc and Amazon and defense companies such as Lockheed Martin of the US, Leonardo S.p.A of Italy and FANUC Corporation of Japan. All provide “significant supply and demand, little oversight, and zero accountability – while investors and private and public institutions profit freely,” the report said.

It notes that some of the world’s largest banks, including France’s BNP Paribas and the UK’s Barclays have helped Israel with treasury bond rates despite a credit downgrade. It alleges that these big banks have therefore played a key critical role in funding the ongoing military operations in Gaza.

Unsurprisingly Israel has rejected the report as “groundless”. It has previously described Ms Albanese as “anti-Semitic”.

But Israel may have to put up with Ms Albanese, who is in her second three-year term as UN Special Rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories and will serve in this post until 2028.

And the world will have to find a way to live with her damning statements. Consider this: “Colonial endeavours and their associated genocides have historically been driven and enabled by the corporate sector.”

Plus ca change, eh.