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<h1 class="gmail-reader-title">Genocide profiteer IBM wins big
on EU funding</h1>
<p class="gmail-node__submitted">
<span class="gmail-field gmail-field-author"><a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/people/david-cronin"
moz-do-not-send="true">David Cronin</a></span>
<span class="gmail-field gmail-field-blog"><a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blog/rights-and-accountability"
moz-do-not-send="true">Rights and Accountability</a></span>
<span class="gmail-field gmail-field-publication-date"><span
class="gmail-date-display-single">24 April 2024</span></span>
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<p>IBM has a history of doing business with human rights
abusers. </p>
<small>
<span>SOPA Images/SIPA USA</span></small>
<p>Israel’s use of artificial intelligence to select
targets in Gaza during the current genocide has
garnered many <a
href="https://www.972mag.com/lavender-ai-israeli-army-gaza/"
moz-do-not-send="true">headlines</a>.</p>
<p>Few who have paid close attention to how Israel tests
new technology on Palestinians can be surprised.
Israel had previously <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/david-cronin/israels-killer-robots-go-display-greek-weapons-fair"
moz-do-not-send="true">signaled</a> that its May
2021 attack on Gaza gave it an opportunity to <a
href="https://www.jpost.com/arab-israeli-conflict/gaza-news/guardian-of-the-walls-the-first-ai-war-669371"
moz-do-not-send="true">experiment</a> with AI.</p>
<p>The proper response to those signals would have been
to halt any funding of AI research involving Israeli
firms and institutions. The European Union has taken
the opposite approach.</p>
<p>In September 2023, the EU authorized a <a
href="https://cordis.europa.eu/project/id/101120218"
moz-do-not-send="true">project</a> aimed at
realizing a future in which collaboration between
humans and AI “takes center stage.”</p>
<p>Participants in the project include IBM Israel – a
subsidiary of the US-based giant.</p>
<p>IBM has a long and ignoble <a
href="https://www.whoprofits.org/publications/report/158"
moz-do-not-send="true">history</a> of providing
technology to abusers of human rights. Among its past
clients were the German government during the Nazi era
and South Africa’s apartheid regime.</p>
<p>More recently, IBM has been awarded a series of
contracts to run technology support centers for the
Israeli military. Robotics are a core feature of the
latest such center.</p>
<p>It is a near certainty that IBM products can be found
in Israel’s toolbox during the current genocide.</p>
<p>No questions about IBM’s ties to the Israeli military
seem to have been asked by EU officials before they
rubber-stamped the aforementioned project in
September.</p>
<p>I have seen a copy of an “ethics check” carried out
on the project – named HumAIne – at the EU’s request.</p>
<p>The exercise was one of box-ticking.</p>
<p>It came to the conclusion that HumAIne had an
“exclusive focus on civil applications.” The only
significant recommendation was that “an independent
ethics adviser must be appointed with the relevant
accumulated expertise” so that the project could be
monitored.</p>
<p>The recommendation did not address IBM’s connections
to Israel’s military. It merely referred to “ethical
concerns” surrounding the project, particularly “the
involvement of humans in the evaluation of AI
systems.”</p>
<p>While HumAIne was signed off by the Brussels
bureaucracy before the genocidal war on Gaza was
declared in October, the EU has <a
href="https://electronicintifada.net/blogs/david-cronin/eu-signs-huge-number-science-grants-israel-amid-gaza-genocide"
moz-do-not-send="true">okayed</a> a huge number of
new research grants to Israel since then.</p>
<p>IBM Israel is among the recipients of those new
grants. It is taking part in a project on data-sharing
innovations, which the EU <a
href="https://cordis.europa.eu/project/id/101135967"
moz-do-not-send="true">authorized</a> in
mid-November.</p>
<h2>“See no evil”</h2>
<p>Ignorance is no defense for the EU’s lack of
curiosity about IBM and its close relationship with
the Israeli military. As IBM Israel has <a
href="https://dashboard.tech.ec.europa.eu/qs_digit_dashboard_mt/public/sense/app/dc5f6f40-c9de-4c40-8648-015d6ff21342/sheet/3bcd6df0-d32a-4593-b4fa-0f9529c8ffb0/state/analysis/select/Organisation%20PIC/999787343"
moz-do-not-send="true">received</a> 130 EU research
grants with a total value of almost $93 million since
2007, Brussels officials have had ample time to probe
the firm’s activities.</p>
<p>That they have chosen not to is symptomatic of a “see
no evil” attitude which prevails.</p>
<p>In late February, a group of EU staff sent a letter
to Johannes Hahn, the European commissioner for budget
and administration. It expressed strong disquiet at
how the EU institutions had expressed support for and
maintained close relations with Israel.</p>
<p>After pointing out that the International Court of
Justice had <a
href="https://www.icj-cij.org/sites/default/files/case-related/192/192-20240126-ord-01-00-en.pdf"
moz-do-not-send="true">accepted</a> there is a
plausible case that Israel is violating the Genocide
Convention, the letter raised concerns that EU staff
could be complicit in the Gaza genocide. It urged that
the EU’s in-house lawyers prepare advice for staff
working in or with the Middle East on how they can
avoid being held liable for complicity in genocide.</p>
<p>Although it is nearly two months since the letter was
sent, Hahn has still not responded to it.</p>
<p>When I contacted his spokesperson this week, I was
told that Hahn “takes note” of the letter and “an
answer is in preparation.”</p>
<p>The cavalier nature of that brief comment is
instructive. Europe’s political elite is continuing to
caress Israel against the backdrop of a holocaust in
Gaza.</p>
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