Serbia Locks in Israel Arms Deal — And the Balkans May Explode

The mysterious European nation buying $1.6B of Israeli arms has turned out to be Serbia, so is Israel going to ignite the Balkans next?
Right, so last week, the Israeli defence manufacturer Elbit Systems announced that it had signed a contract worth $1.64 billion with an unnamed European country, the country in question clearly not wanting people to know who they were, the optics of buying weapons that require the sign off of the genocidal apartheid state obviously not being good ones if that country was revealed. Unfortunately for them, it now has been. Within days it has emerged that the buyer is Serbia. For Serbia, this deal is the largest single arms purchase in its modern history. For Israel, it is a desperately needed boost to its arms industry at the very moment it faces accusations of genocide in Gaza before the International Court of Justice and is on the receiving end of significant BDS action, growing from the streets to business boardrooms and government settings. For Europe though, this is a potential unravelling of the fragile peace settlement that has barely held the Balkans together since the 1990s.
So this is not simply another defence sale. It is a deliberate gamble taken at the worst possible moment. Serbia has chosen to bankroll Israel’s genocide economy with the biggest arms deal in its history, and Israel has chosen to export Gaza-tested weapons into Europe’s most fragile peace domain, an arms race in the Balkans the last thing we need to see after what we bore witness to before and in doing so, both countries risk reigniting the very wars Europe thought it had put to bed.
Right, so at first glance, this might appear to be a straightforward act of procurement. Small states buy arms all the time, and Israel has long sold its “battle-proven” weapons abroad, “battle-tested” usually meaning Gaza tested. Yet the scale, timing, and context of this contract transform it from an ordinary deal into something far more consequential. Serbia is not Switzerland, secure in its neutrality and surrounded by stability.

►SOURCES:
PRESS TV: Israel's Elbit signs major arms deal with undisclosed European country
TIMES OF ISRAEL: Serbia revealed as EU country behind $1.64b weapons deal with Israel’s Elbit
CALCALIST: Serbia revealed as buyer in Elbit’s $1.63 billion arms deal
YNET: Serbia is the country that purchased Elbit weapons for $1.63 billion; Elbit Systems inks $1.6 billion defense deal with European country, reports record orders
JERUSALEM POST: Elbit Systems awarded $1.6b. European defense contract over five-year period
AP: Hungary welcomes Netanyahu and says it will leave the International Criminal Court
SKWAWKBOX: Hungary withdraws from ICC to avoid arresting Netanyahu
AL JAZEERA: UN expert Albanese slams states that let Netanyahu fly over airspace to US