Arne O. Holm says Should We Really Secure Our Own Peace to Speculation in Israeli War Stocks?
Some quarters, also political ones, call for the resignation of the Oil Fund's CEO, Nikolai Tangen. (Archive photo of Tangen at TEDxArendal in 2021 by Birgit Fostervold – CC BY-SA 4.0)
Comment: For almost two years, the occupying power Israel has attacked and killed civilian Palestinians. At the same time as the ongoing genocide, the Norwegian Oil Fund has systematically cherry-picked stocks in the Israeli war industry. The profit is used to secure our own peace.
This is a comment written by a member of the editorial staff. The views expressed in the text are the author's own.
A cynical Norwegian stock speculation in Israeli companies that are deeply involved with Israel's warfare has been revealed this past week. The reveal started with Aftenposten and concerned the company Beit Shemesk Engines Ltd, which maintains US fighter jets.
Values rise
One of the more spectacular "reveals" is that 16 historians sent an overview in June to both the Ministry of Finance and the Central Bank of Norway (Norges Bank) showing how tens of Israeli companies connected to Israel's warfare were in the Oil Fund's shopping cart.
The Oil Fund is equipped with an ethics council, which is reportedly to prevent these types of investments. I use the word reportedly because it is not easy to see what the ethics council actually does.
Today, MoF Jens Stoltenberg met the leaders of Norges Bank. After the meeting, the minister announced that measures would be implemented. Exactly what measures are not yet known.
It takes time to say no to the obvious.
Meanwhile, the stock value continues to increase. While Stoltenberg had his meeting, the Israeli President Benjamin Netanyahu announced that Israel would take full military control over the entire Gaza Strip.
It takes time to say no to the obvious.
The Oil Fund's conscious choice to speculate in the aforementioned stock is catastrophic in many ways, not least ethically and morally.
Russia's neighbour
Worst of all, however, it is to think about how such investments are to fund our own peace and security. As a neighbor to Russia, civil and military rearmament in the High North is high on the list of priorities. And that costs money. A lot of money.
Yet, it is possible because we, as a nation, can always count on significant contributions to the state budget from the Oil Fund.
Now also from the Israeli war machine. The company Beit Shemesh Engines' stock price has sextupled while the Oil Fund has made new purchases.
We embellish our lack of principles with ethics councils.
Some quarters, also political ones, call for the resignation of the Oil Fund's CEO, Nicolai Tangen. That is how we solve problems in Norway.
As if firing the Oil Fund CEO would solve a single one of Norway's and international politics's helpless denial of responsibility for what is happening in Gaza and the West Bank. We have been reduced to spectators of a war that aims to wipe out an entire people.
That we, in Norwegian fashion, embellish our lack of principles with helpless ethics councils has not helped the obvious either.
Banal measures
Even Norway, a nation bordering Russia, is not capable of making the most banal measures, like avoiding such investments.
Not that it would matter for Israel if the Oil Fund stops its stock purchases or sells out.
But we must at least find a different way to secure our own peace than through stock speculation in an ongoing genocide.
