The activity of several French firms based in Israel is affected by the consequences of the Hamas attack on Israeli territory.
The hours pass and the toll of the war between Israel and Hamas continues to rise dizzyingly, with thousands of deaths recorded in total, five days after the surprise attack launched by the Palestinian Islamist movement from Gaza. In a state of alert, many sectors of daily life in Israel have since slowed down: in particular, the economy, impacted by the fear of a new violent war.
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A war which precisely affects French companies based in Israel. Around a hundred companies or subsidiaries of groups like Thalès, Carrefour or Décathlon. In total, there are nearly 6,000 people, for whom activity has been slow since Saturday.
Some employees are “army reservists”
Frédéric Samama is the founder of a medical prosthetics company. He has lived in Tel Aviv for 11 years, since Saturday all his appointments have been canceled. He is also president of the local French Tech, the organization brings together 200 French entrepreneurs in new technologies. The sector has easily switched to teleworking in recent days, even if the Israeli workforce in the teams is inevitably affected. “These are still young people who work here in techexplains Frédéric Samama. A number of employees were called up because they are army reservists. They had to leave their posts for a while. We hope for as little time as possible, but if it can be counted in weeks or months. This will obviously affect the work of companies.”
The uncertainty is therefore total for all these companies. But Daniel Rouach, president of the France-Israel Chamber of Commerce and Industry, is reassuring: “Since the start of the crisis, I have not heard of a single company that wants to leave Israel.”
“Israelis have this ability to respond to adversity in an absolutely incredible way. All the economic forces in the country are continuing and this will most certainly continue for the next few months.”
Daniel Rouach, president of the France-Israel Chamber of Commerce and Industryat franceinfo
For its part, EDF Renewables, which manages around thirty solar installations in the region, indicates that most continue to produce electricity. Some are stationary, but the group does not say if these are those which are precisely located in the area attacked this weekend.