On Tuesday 9 September, campaigners coming together under the banner of #ShutDSEIDown blockaded the entrance to the three-day Defence and Security Equipment International (DSEI) trade exhibition in East London during its opening. Despite facing violent policing, as well as a small fascist presence, the protestors succeeded in effectively disrupting the obscene showcasing of the purveyors of war and genocide. The arms fair included no less than 51 Israeli companies:
JCB at DSEI: profits covered in Palestinian blood
British bulldozer manufacturer JCB, which Reform-supporting billionaire and peer Anthony Bamford owns, is one of the companies exhibiting its equipment at DSEI.
Members of the Stop JCB Bulldozer Genocide campaign joined the protests. Campaigners held a banner with the slogan:
JCB: Stop Bulldozer Genocide in Palestine, India and Kashmir
They joined other protestors in vocally reminding the arms buyers and sellers attending that:
your profits are covered in Palestinian blood
And they told them how:
you are killing children too.
JCB at the heart of ethnic cleansing and genocide
In January 2025, the Stop JCB campaign published a report. It detailed JCB’s role in ethnic cleansing and genocide in Palestine, India, and Kashmir.
In Palestine, JCB operates through its sole dealer, the Israeli company Comasco. The corporation holds contracts with Israel’s Ministry of Defence for the same model of JCB machines the Zionist settler state uses in the demolitions and construction of settlements.
From as early as 2006, the Israeli military has been photographed demolishing Palestinian homes in the West Bank with JCB bulldozers.
Currently, JCB is also complicit in Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza. UN Special Rapporteur Francesca Albanese listed JCB in her July report. This was among numerous companies directly aiding and profiting from the genocide. Israel has long used armoured, unbranded JCB High Mobility Engineer Excavator (HMEE) machines, known as ‘Ami’ in Hebrew, and is now using them in Gaza.
JCB propping up Hindu supremacist Narendra Modi’s government
In India, Narendra Modi’s Hindu supremacist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) government has consistently used JCB bulldozers to demolish Muslim homes, shops, and places of worship across various Indian states. It’s part of an ongoing project disturbingly named ‘bulldozer justice’.
In fact, JCB is so closely intertwined with this project that it has come to symbolise attacks on Muslims. Authorities have used JCB bulldozers to carry out both punitive and arbitrary demolitions. In the punitive demolitions, authorities destroy the homes of people the state accuses of crimes. This includes merely protesting against the BJP.
In recent months, a targeted campaign of evictions, including demolitions by JCB bulldozers, has been underway across the country.
Meanwhile, in the northeastern state of Assam, the state displaced 1080 families on July 12. On 17 July, police killed 19-year-old Sakuar Ali in the Goalpara district. According to Human Rights Watch, the BJP government is fuelling discrimination by arbitrarily expelling Bengali Muslims from the country, including Indian citizens.
Border Guard Bangladesh reported that India expelled more than 1,500 Muslims to Bangladesh between May 7 and June 15. In July, around 3,400 Bengali Muslim homes were demolished in five eviction drives across Assam. In Siasat Nagar, Gujarat, authorities demolished 8,000 Muslim homes in May. And in the Wazirpur area of Delhi, JCB bulldozer demolitions in June have destroyed the homes, built several decades ago, of Dalit, oppressed caste and Muslim working class families. Originally migrants from Bihar, the state has offered them no rehabilitation.
Housing demolitions and displacement in Kashmir
In Kashmir, which is one of the most militarised zones on earth, Indian authorities have consistently used JCB machines in house demolitions during large-scale evictions. This is despite many residents providing proof of ownership.
It is just one aspect of the Indian state’s broader regime of human rights violations of the Kashmiri people. This is particularly so since 2019, when the Indian government revoked the limited autonomy of the state of Jammu and Kashmir.
In order to facilitate the entry of Indians and Indian capital, the state is acquiring land and property, and dispossessing local owners without any due process.
JCB: Stop Bulldozer Genocide campaign at DSEI
The campaign JCB: Stop Bulldozer Genocide is a coalition of organisations with two main demands. The first is that JCB must end its relationship with the Israeli Ministry of Defence and cease all activities in occupied Palestine.
The second is that JCB must commit to ensuring that its products are not used for human rights violations in India and Kashmir through robust monitoring and prevention systems. This includes making compulsory the use of its existing LiveLink technology to trace and locate JCB machines.
JCB has routinely exhibited equipment – including the HMEE machines – at the annual DSEI exhibition.
A member of the campaign stated over DSEI:
DSEI is a hub for many of the most genocidal and warmongering companies in the world. JCB is no exception. They are proudly exhibiting the same machinery that is directly used to demolish homes, businesses and places of worship in Palestine, India and Kashmir, fuelling programmes of ethnic cleansing and genocide. JCB’s presence at DSEI is a reminder to the world that they are not just a construction company, but a producer of military equipment openly used to further war and violence. JCB defence products have been displayed at DSEI for years – we will not let this continue in peace so long as they remain complicit in genocide. JCB have blood on their hands
Featured image supplied
