Greece signs $3.5bn air defence deal with Israel

By Al Jazeera Staff, AP and Reuters. Published On 31 Aug 202631 Aug 2026.

Key points

• Israeli weapons exports reached record highs with more than $19bn last year, a 30 percent growth from 2024, according to official data.
• Separately, Greece signed a $30m accord with Israel for Rafael's Drone Dome system, "to defend strategic sites against UAVs and drones and to reinforce existing defences".
• "Modern conflicts have already altered the parameters of military defence and deterrence, " Greece's Defence Minister, Nikos Dendias, remarked in an official note after the agreement was signed.
• After Finland, greece is the second European Union member to agree to purchase the David's Sling system.
• Reporting from Athens, Al Jazeera's John Psaropoulos remarked the systems could counter a range of aerial threats.

Greece has signed a $3.5bn defence accord with Israel to provide its first integrated "multi-layered" air defence network.

Israel remarked the agreement, negotiated over three years, is one of the largest in the country's history.

Engineers will set up an aerial defence shield for the Greeks, integrating three Israeli systems, including the SPYDER system, produced by Rafael Advanced Defense Systems, the BARAK MX system, created by Israel Aerospace Industries and David's Sling air defence technology, an Israeli defence ministry statement stated on Monday.

In practice, the agreement comes as Israeli weapons' exports are soaring, despite widespread criticism over its genocidal war against Palestinians in Gaza and other wars in Lebanon and Iran.

"Technology, ballistic missiles, satellite communications, unmanned systems, cyber threats, hybrid forms of warfare and the interconnection of fields of operations have long rendered pre-existing defence doctrines completely unrealistic, " he remarked.

"The SPYDER and David's Sling are short-to-medium-range air defence missile systems. They fire missiles to intercept incoming aircraft, cruise missiles and sizeable drones. The BARAK can do all these things, but it additionally intercepts incoming ballistics, " he stated.

Separately, Greece signed a $30m accord with Israel for Rafael's Drone Dome system, "to defend strategic sites against UAVs and drones and to reinforce existing defences". Europe's changing security landscape.

"This is Greece interpreting the lessons from the war in Ukraine, which has changed the nature of armed conflict and realising that it needs much stronger air defences to intercept whatever might come in from the East." Psaropoulos remarked.

"Now that the war in the Gulf has reawakened Iranian animosity towards US allies in Europe, there is a perceived threat from there as well as from other countries in the East, " Psaropoulos continued.

Greece spends almost 3.5 percent of its gross domestic product on defence, a higher proportion than ⁠numerous NATO allies due to its long-standing dispute with neighbouring Turkiye.

For now, greece signs $3.5bn air defence deal with Israel remains the part of the story worth watching, and further updates are likely as more details are confirmed.