Elbit exhibit at CANSEC 2025 highlights Skylark drone implicated in the targeting of human rights defenders, journalists, civilians
Photo: Elbit Systems at CANSEC 2025.
The Elbit Systems exhibit at the CANSEC 2025 arms show at the EY Centre in Ottawa appears to have prominently featured an image of their Skylark drone.
The Jerusalem Post has explained that Elbit-manufactured Skylark drones are operated by Israel Defense Forces (IDF) Sky Rider units. In December 2023, the newspaper noted: “Skylarks are used to collect intelligence, soaring over the battlefield from where they can see in front of infantry or tanks. This can help the artillery, or what are called fire brigade units, to coordinate fire against targets.”
Israeli i24NEWS has further noted: “The Skylark unit, established in 2010, is made up of numerous teams, each consisting of four soldiers and a commander. These teams perform functions in both routine missions, as well operational combat scenarios.”
Photo: The Skylark drone.
Photo: “A Skylark drone, one of the several types used by Israel over Gaza.” Drones above Gaza (Shahd Safi, We Are Not Numbers, November 2023).
In March 2025, the Israeli website Ynetnews also reported: “The IDF Sky Rider drone unit, known as ‘Rochev Shamayim,’ has evolved into one of the military’s most lethal forces, responsible for eliminating more than 700 Hamas and Hezbollah terrorists since the start of the war. Once primarily reliant on small surveillance drones, the unit now operates advanced attack and reconnaissance drones, providing real-time support to ground forces.”
ICJ ruling of plausible genocide
In January 2024, the United Nations International Court of Justice (ICJ) issued a preliminary ruling in which the court found that it is “plausible” that Israel is committing genocide against the Palestinian people.
Deployed during almost every major mission
The American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) has noted: “Deployed during ‘almost every major mission’ carried out by the Israeli military, Elbit’s Skylark tactical drones—operational since 2008—are used alongside Hermes 450 and 900 drones to surveil Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip.”
Hundreds of flights in Operation Cast Lead
In the Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung report Sleepless in Gaza: Israeli drone war on the Gaza Strip (2014), Dr. Atef Abu Saif, a professor of political science at Al-Azhar University [destroyed by Israeli forces in October-November 2023] in Gaza, wrote: “In marketing the Skylark produced by Elbit Systems, the Israeli army refers to its functions in Gaza. It states it as ‘a star [which] was born in the Gaza skies,’ after its ‘hundreds of operation flights’ during Operation Cast Lead [from December 2008 to January 2009].”
Amnesty International documented: “Some 1,400 Palestinians were killed, including some 300 children, and hundreds of other unarmed civilians, including more than 115 women and some 85 men aged over 50 during the 22-day Operation ‘Cast Lead’. …Israeli forces repeatedly targeted ambulances and medical crews, killing several medical workers while they were attempting to rescue the wounded and recover the dead.”
Arbitrary arrests of hundreds in 2014
The American Friends Service Committee also notes: “The Israeli military used the Skylark extensively during its 2014 assault, during which hundreds of Palestinians in the occupied West Bank were arbitrarily arrested.”
2023 to present
The AFSC adds: “[Hermes 450, 900 and Skylark] drones form the majority of Israel’s fleet of large drones and have been used extensively for attack and surveillance purposes in Gaza, the occupied West Bank, and Lebanon, including during Israel’s 2023–2024 genocidal attacks, and along the Gaza–Israel border.”
Photo by Government Press Office (GPO): In February 2024, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu inspected an Elbit Skylark drone at the Zikim IDF base, five kilometres north of Gaza City. On November 21, 2024, the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for him “for crimes against humanity and war crimes committed from at least 8 October 2023 until at least 20 May 2024.”
Human rights defenders targeted
The Dublin-based organization Front Line Defenders (the International Foundation for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders) has also documented the killing of 31 Palestinian human rights defenders in 2023 and 2024.
Front Line Defenders notes: “Those defending the right to health and the right to life as doctors, nurses, or ambulance workers, those exposing and documenting war crimes as journalists, and those providing humanitarian support as volunteers or employees of aid agencies were all specifically targeted by Israeli bombs or guns.”
Drones target journalists
Madrid, Spain-based Skyline International for Human Rights (SIHR) highlights: “Skyline International for Human Rights strongly condemns the deliberate targeting of journalists through drone strikes by the Israeli military, a practice that constitutes a gross violation of international humanitarian law.”
Their article adds: “A recent investigation by Forbidden Stories and a global consortium of journalists have revealed that at least 18 media workers in Gaza have been killed or injured by precision drone strikes since October 7, 2023. Among them, four were clearly identifiable as journalists, wearing press vests at the time of the attacks, further underscoring the deliberate nature of these violations.”
The Committee to Project Journalists (CPJ) has documented: “More journalists were killed in 2024 than in any other year since the CPJ began collecting data more than three decades ago. At least 124 journalists and media workers were killed last year, nearly two-thirds of them Palestinians killed by Israel.”
The CPJ further specifies that Israeli military drone strikes killed Palestinian journalists Ismail Al Ghoul, Mohammed Balousha, Hamza al Dahdouh, Hassan Hamad, video journalist Mustafa Thuraya, and camera operator Rami Al Refee.
CANSEC 2025
More than 300 people took part in a protest on May 28 in opposition to the CANSEC weapons show taking place at the EY Centre in Ottawa.
Further reading: Protest challenges CANSEC weapons show in Ottawa; thirteen arrested at demonstration upholding international laws (May 29, 2025).
Photos of protest by Koozma J. Tarasoff.
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