BDS-1000 Dossier: AXA Group (Euronext: CS)

Target Profile

Executive Summary

AXA Group is one of Europe’s largest insurance and asset management conglomerates, with global operations spanning life and property/casualty insurance, reinsurance, and investment management through AXA Investment Managers (AXA IM) and AXA Venture Partners (AVP). The company’s documented Israeli-nexus exposure is primarily financial in character, operating through equity and debt holdings in defense contractors, Israeli technology portfolio companies, and — prior to mid-2024 — Israeli banking institutions.

The strongest documented vectors of complicity are military and economic. In the military domain, AVP’s 8.94% equity stake in Hub Security — an Israeli cybersecurity company founded by IDF intelligence veterans that holds an active Israeli Ministry of Defence contract and publicly confirmed participation in Israel’s wartime “digital defenses” in October 2023 — constitutes a direct financial channel to an entity materially supporting Israeli military operations. This holding was live and confirmed at the time of the October 2023 escalation, with no public evidence of divestment as of the audit date. In the economic domain, AXA IM’s documented holdings of approximately $150 million in equity and debt instruments of multinational defense contractors (Boeing, RTX, Lockheed Martin, BAE Systems, and others) whose weapons systems are in active use by the Israel Defense Forces in Gaza represent the largest single financial exposure vector.

The company has also maintained active commercial relationships with Israeli technology firms — most notably Earnix (Israeli AI-driven insurance pricing) and Verint Systems (contact centre AI and analytics with Israeli R&D operations) — and invested in settlement-adjacent infrastructure through its CAF holdings, which include the Jerusalem Light Rail expansion serving East Jerusalem settlement neighbourhoods.

Countervailing evidence is material and should be noted. AXA completed a near-full divestment from Israeli bank holdings by mid-2024, including from institutions that financed settlement construction. The company does not manufacture weapons or operate directly in occupied territory. The defense portfolio holdings are in globally diversified multinationals rather than Israeli-domiciled entities. The AVP-Hub Security relationship is a minority venture stake, not a controlling operational relationship. AXA has maintained studied neutrality on the conflict rather than active advocacy for either side.

The resulting BRS score of 377 places AXA in Tier D (Moderate), driven primarily by the $150 million defense contractor portfolio (V-ECON) and the active AVP-Hub Security financial stake (V-MIL). The score reflects ongoing financial exposure rather than direct operational complicity in the occupied territories.

Timeline of Relevant Events

Corporate Overview

AXA S.A. is a French Société Anonyme headquartered in Paris, listed on Euronext Paris (ticker: CS). The group operates through three primary business segments: AXA Insurance (property/casualty and life/health underwriting), AXA XL (large-risk and reinsurance operations), and AXA Investment Managers (asset management). AXA Venture Partners operates as a separately branded venture capital arm under AXA Group sponsorship.

Key subsidiary and structural relationships relevant to Israeli-nexus:

• AXA Investment Managers (AXA IM): The group’s asset management arm, holding documented equity and debt positions in global defense contractors and, prior to mid-2024, Israeli financial institutions. Governed by AXA IM’s exclusion policy, which prohibits cluster munitions, anti-personnel mines, biological and chemical weapons, and nuclear weapons outside recognized nuclear-armed states, but does not categorically exclude conventional defense manufacturers or Israeli sovereign debt.

• AXA Venture Partners (AVP): Established under AXA Group sponsorship as a dedicated venture capital fund manager with Israel as a core operating geography alongside Europe and North America. AVP raised a $150 million second Early Stage fund in 2021. AVP was reported to be pursuing management independence in 2024–2025; whether AXA S.A. retains LP interest post-spinout is unconfirmed. AVP’s portfolio page continues to list Hub Security as an active portfolio company.

• AXA Strategic Ventures: Predecessor entity to AVP; made the historical Neura investment (2016) subsequently acquired by Twilio (2019).

• Kamet Ventures: AXA’s proprietary insurtech incubator, capitalized at approximately €100 million, operated a Tel Aviv presence alongside Paris headquarters. Substantially wound down approximately 2022–2023; Tel Aviv operations discontinued.

• AXA Sigorta: Former Turkish subsidiary operating under AXA majority ownership; deployed Check Point network security per 2021 Annual Report. Majority stake divested to Sabancı Holding approximately 2022–2023; no longer an AXA Group subsidiary.

• AXA XL: Large-risk and reinsurance operations providing reinsurance to global insurance markets including Israeli primary insurers (Migdal, Clal Insurance, Harel Insurance, Phoenix Holdings). Reinsurance treaty terms are confidential; no specific named treaty identified.

• Earnix: Israeli AI-driven insurance pricing company; AXA is a documented major strategic client using Earnix’s platform across multiple markets (France, Germany, UK). This is a live commercial relationship (licensing fees paid to an Israeli-incorporated entity) as of April 2026.

• Verint Systems (NASDAQ: VRNT): AXA Retail deploys the Verint Open Platform for contact centre AI, analytics, and workforce management, covering 100% of calls in the relevant business unit. Verint Systems maintains significant R&D operations in Israel. Verint spun off Cognyte (government surveillance business) in 2021; AXA’s deployment is with the post-spin-off Verint entity.

• Hub Security / HUB Cyber Security (NASDAQ: HUBC): Israeli cybersecurity company in which AVP holds an 8.94% equity stake (confirmed September 2023). Not confirmed as an AXA Group subsidiary; relationship is financial (venture investment).

• CAF (Construcciones y Auxiliar de Ferrocarriles): Spanish rail manufacturer in which AXA IM holds an investment position. CAF leads the TransJerusalem J-Net consortium contracted to expand the Jerusalem Light Rail Red and Green Lines, serving East Jerusalem settlement neighbourhoods.

Domain Summaries

V-MIL: Military

Mechanism of Involvement

AXA Group’s military-domain exposure operates through two principal mechanisms: venture capital equity investment in an Israeli defense-adjacent technology company and asset management holdings in global defense contractors with documented IDF supply relationships.

The primary finding is AVP’s 8.94% beneficial ownership stake in HUB Cyber Security (Hub Security), confirmed via SEC filings dated 30 September 2023.¹ This stake was live at the outbreak of the October 2023 conflict and, based on available evidence, remains extant or in wind-down as of early 2025 — no confirmed public divestment announcement has been identified. Hub Security was co-founded by veterans of IDF Unit 8200 (signals intelligence and offensive cyber) and Unit 81 (classified military technology research), as documented in the company’s own investor-facing materials.²³ In September 2022, Hub Security was awarded a NIS 4.2 million tender by the Israeli Ministry of Defence covering hardware and software products and services over a three-year period.⁴ This contract was active at the time of the October 2023 escalation and confirmed by Hub Security’s public statement that same month pledging participation in strengthening Israel’s “digital defenses” — with the company’s CEO, publicly identified as a retired IDF Major General, committing the firm to providing “cutting-edge solutions to defend against cyber threats.”⁵ A subsequent NIS 16 million contract with the Israeli Ministry of Interior was announced in late 2024/early 2025.⁶⁷

The secondary mechanism is AXA IM’s documented holdings of approximately $150 million in equity and debt instruments of multinational defense contractors — Boeing, RTX (Raytheon Technologies), Lockheed Martin, BAE Systems, General Dynamics, Northrop Grumman, Rolls-Royce, and L3Harris Technologies — whose weapons systems are documented as in active use by the Israel Defense Forces.⁵¹⁸ These holdings continued through at least June 2024 with no announced divestment post-ICJ Advisory Opinion (July 2024) or post-ICC arrest warrants (November 2024).

Counter-Arguments and Evidence Limits

AXA Group is not a defense contractor, weapons manufacturer, or military systems integrator. The AVP-Hub Security relationship is a minority venture equity stake (~8.94%), not a controlling operational relationship or a direct defense procurement contract. Hub Security’s products — Hardware Security Modules and Confidential Computing platforms — are commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS) security infrastructure with documented civilian enterprise applications; the dual-use characterization rests on the confirmed military end-user (IMOD) rather than on separate “tactical variant” product lines.

AXA IM’s defense holdings are in globally diversified multinationals supplying weapons through standard government procurement channels, not in Israeli-domiciled entities. These companies supply multiple governments and militaries globally; the IDF supply relationship is one channel among many. The bonds component (~$71.56 million of the total) cannot be confirmed as subscribed post-October 2023, as issuance dates are not publicly disclosed.⁸

The Neura investment (2016) was a historical, closed exposure: Neura was acquired by Twilio in 2019 and ceased operating as an independent Israeli entity. Claims of ongoing exposure or adoption by Israeli security services for targeting purposes were not supported by verifiable evidence and are excluded from this audit’s findings.

The precise quantum of AXA IM’s CAF equity or debt exposure has not been verified from a primary AXA regulatory filing. The settlement-connectivity function of the JLR expansion is documented by DBIO and Who Profits, but AXA’s role is that of a passive financial investor, not a direct infrastructure contractor.

Named Entities and Evidence Map

V-DIG: Digital

Mechanism of Involvement

AXA Group’s digital-domain exposure arises through commercial licensing relationships with Israeli-headquartered technology companies whose founders or operations are linked to Israeli military intelligence, and through cloud infrastructure arrangements with vendors that are parties to Project Nimbus.

The most substantively evidenced relationship is AXA Retail’s active deployment of Verint Systems’ Open Platform for contact centre AI, analytics, and workforce management — covering 100% of calls in the relevant business unit.² Verint Systems is headquartered in Melville, New York, with significant R&D operations in Israel. Verint’s cloud-hosted platform processes AXA customer data; the company’s Israeli R&D operations serve the enterprise customer engagement products deployed at AXA. Verint spun off Cognyte (government surveillance/lawful interception business) in 2021, but Verint Systems retains Israeli R&D infrastructure.¹³¹⁴¹⁵

AXA is a documented major strategic client of Earnix, an Israeli AI-driven insurance pricing company backed by Jerusalem Venture Partners.¹⁶¹⁷ AXA uses Earnix’s platform across multiple markets including France, Germany, and the UK, paying licensing fees to an Israeli-incorporated entity. This is a live commercial relationship as of April 2026.

At the 2025 UK & Ireland CISO Executive Summit, AXA Business Security Partner Shaun Crawford and Wiz Head of Solutions Engineering Julia Weimer co-presented a session titled “Collaboration into Action — Cloud Security Approaches to Secure Business Growth,” confirming active AXA-Wiz engagement post-ICJ Advisory Opinion and post-ICC arrest warrants.¹⁸ Wiz is an Israeli-founded company whose founders have Israeli military intelligence and Unit 8200 backgrounds.¹⁹ Google announced acquisition of Wiz for approximately $32 billion in March 2025 (pending regulatory approval as of April 2026), which would bring Wiz under the Project Nimbus contractor ecosystem.²⁰

AXA’s primary cloud infrastructure is built on Microsoft Azure and Amazon Web Services.⁶⁵¹ Microsoft and Google are joint contractors for Project Nimbus, providing cloud infrastructure and AI services to the Israeli government and military.²¹ AXA is a customer and tenant of both platforms; no public evidence connects AXA’s specific workloads to the Project Nimbus contractual relationship, but AXA’s position as a tenant of two Project Nimbus contractors is structurally relevant.

AXA XL’s historical citation of Check Point Research threat intelligence data (2020) established an intelligence-consumption relationship, but does not confirm a direct licensing or procurement contract.²² AXA Sigorta’s Check Point deployment (2021) is historical and predates the Sabancı Holding divestment (~2022–2023); it is no longer attributable to AXA Group.

Counter-Arguments and Evidence Limits

AXA is not a party to Project Nimbus and no public evidence connects AXA’s specific cloud workloads to Israeli government or military cloud initiatives. AXA’s Azure case study references the France Central region for European data processing, consistent with GDPR obligations.⁶ No public evidence indicates AXA’s data is routed through or hosted in Microsoft’s Israel Central or AWS Tel Aviv regions.

No public evidence has been identified of AXA deploying facial recognition, biometric identification, gait analysis, or comparable surveillance technologies from any Israeli-origin vendor (AnyVision/Oosto, Trigo, BriefCam, Trax). Claims of indirect surveillance vectors through bank branches or future insurtech ecosystems are speculative and unsupported.

The AXA-Verint relationship is with the post-spin-off Verint Systems entity (enterprise customer engagement), not with Cognyte (government surveillance). The structural relevance — Verint Systems’ Israeli R&D operations serving the products AXA deploys — is real but reflects standard global technology supply chain complexity rather than a specifically Israeli military-purpose deployment.

The AXA-Wiz relationship scope (which business units, which cloud environments, what contractual terms govern data access) is not disclosed in any verified public source. The Google acquisition of Wiz, if completed, would bring Wiz under Project Nimbus contractor infrastructure, but this represents a forward-looking risk rather than a current verified nexus.

CyberArk and SentinelOne customer relationships with AXA are not supported by evidence. Architectural inferences from vendor-to-vendor integration partnerships do not constitute procurement evidence.

Named Entities and Evidence Map

V-ECON: Economic

Mechanism of Involvement

AXA Group’s economic-domain exposure is the most substantial documented vector, operating primarily through AXA IM’s investment holdings in defense contractors and settlement-financing institutions and, to a lesser extent, through venture capital investment in Israeli technology companies with settlement-adjacent operations.

The dominant finding is AXA IM’s aggregate holding of approximately US $150.43 million in equity and debt instruments of multinational defense contractors whose weapons systems are documented as in use by the Israel Defense Forces, as of June 30, 2024.⁵¹⁸ Confirmed named holdings include Boeing, General Dynamics, Lockheed Martin, RTX (Raytheon Technologies), Northrop Grumman, BAE Systems, Rolls-Royce, and L3Harris Technologies.⁵¹⁸ The debt component is estimated at approximately $71.56 million; individual instrument vintage and issuance dates are not publicly disclosed, making it impossible to determine from available sources whether bond subscriptions predate or postdate October 7, 2023.⁸ These holdings continued through at least June 2024 with no announced divestment post-ICJ Advisory Opinion (July 2024) or post-ICC arrest warrants (November 2024).

Prior to mid-2024, AXA IM held equity positions in five major Israeli banks — Bank Hapoalim, Bank Leumi, Israel Discount Bank, Mizrahi Tefahot, and First International Bank of Israel — documented by Refinitiv/LSEG shareholding data.⁵¹⁶ These banks are listed in the UN OHCHR settlement database for providing mortgage lending, project finance, and branch services to Israeli settlements in the West Bank and East Jerusalem.²⁴²⁵²⁶ AXA IM’s divestment proceeded in stages: partial divestments during 2018–2019, full divestment from Bank Hapoalim and Israel Discount Bank by June 2024, with a residual approximately 16,000 shares in Bank Leumi (~$130,000) remaining at that date.³⁴⁶¹⁶ CEO Buberl confirmed at the April 2024 AGM that AXA held “zero investments in Israeli banks, direct or indirect,” framing the divestment as a portfolio management outcome rather than a human rights decision.⁴⁶

AXA IM’s investment in CAF (Spanish rail manufacturer) creates an indirect settlement-financing nexus: CAF leads the TransJerusalem J-Net consortium contracted to expand the Jerusalem Light Rail Red and Green Lines, linking East Jerusalem settlement neighbourhoods (Pisgat Ze’ev, French Hill, Neve Yaakov, and others) with West Jerusalem.^10112728 This infrastructure is assessed by multiple international legal bodies as facilitating and consolidating the occupation. Construction continued through 2023–2025, including the post-ICJ Advisory Opinion and post-ICC arrest warrants periods, documented in DBIO V (November 2025).¹⁰

AXA Venture Partners’ investment in Hub Security (detailed in V-MIL) and historical investment in Neura (Israeli AI/IoT, acquired by Twilio 2019) constitute additional Israeli technology sector exposure through the venture capital arm.

Counter-Arguments and Evidence Limits

AXA is not a direct participant in goods supply chains, procurement, or distribution networks. The company’s Israeli-nexus exposure is exclusively financial — portfolio investment and venture equity — rather than physical goods sourcing. No evidence of AXA functioning as an importer of settlement-origin goods has been identified.

AXA IM’s defense portfolio holdings are in globally diversified multinationals that supply weapons through standard government procurement channels to multiple customers globally. The IDF supply relationship is one channel among many, and these companies are not listed in the UN OHCHR settlement database, which focuses on companies with direct settlement-operational ties rather than global defense contractors.²⁵

The June 2024 divestment from Israeli banks (Bank Hapoalim, IDB) and the residual Bank Leumi position represent a substantial reduction in settlement-financing exposure. The bank divestment, while framed as a portfolio management decision rather than a human rights commitment, nonetheless achieved the civil society campaign’s primary objective.

AXA IM’s 2024 updated exclusion policy did not, based on available evidence, add Israeli sovereign bonds or Israeli financial institutions as categorical exclusions, and did not introduce a conflict-zone exclusion specific to Israel/Palestine — but a full primary document comparison against the 2023 version has not been completed and represents an identified evidence gap.²⁹

The precise quantum of AXA IM’s CAF equity or debt exposure has not been verified from a primary AXA regulatory filing. Whether the Bank Leumi residual position has been fully wound down between H2 2024 and early 2026 is not confirmed in publicly available sources.

Named Entities and Evidence Map

V-POL: Political

Mechanism of Involvement

AXA Group’s political-domain exposure arises from the asymmetry between its response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and its response to the Gaza conflict, its failure to acknowledge landmark international legal developments, and its maintenance of commercial relationships with Israeli technology companies within a context of coordinated civil society advocacy.

AXA issued an explicit corporate statement condemning Russia’s February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, accompanied by concrete actions: halting all new investments in Russian assets, suspending underwriting renewals for Russian entities, removing its directors from the board of Russian minority investment Reso Garantia, and pledging €6 million to UNICEF and UNHCR for Ukraine humanitarian relief.² By contrast, AXA has maintained a posture of studied neutrality on the Gaza conflict, reportedly stating it “does not take a position on this serious geopolitical crisis” without attributing responsibility to any party.³ No equivalent named condemnation, no declared halt to new investments in Israeli-linked assets, and no humanitarian pledge of comparable scale specifically for Gaza has been identified.³⁸ The contrast is documentarily robust: AXA’s Ukraine response involved explicit moral framing, named attribution of aggression, and concrete financial commitments; no parallel has been identified for the conflict in Gaza.

No AXA corporate statement has been identified acknowledging or responding to the ICJ’s 19 July 2024 Advisory Opinion or the ICC’s 21 November 2024 arrest warrants.³² AXA’s 2024 Annual Report does not contain a dedicated section addressing either development.³² The Israeli-nexus items in that report are limited to confirmation of the Israeli bank divestment in the ESG/responsible investment section.

AXA maintains a live commercial relationship with Earnix, an Israeli AI-driven insurance pricing company, paying licensing fees that constitute ongoing commercial revenue flowing to an Israeli-incorporated technology company.¹⁶¹⁷ AXA XL provides reinsurance to Israeli primary insurers (Migdal, Clal Insurance, Harel Insurance, Phoenix Holdings), which operate across all lines including property/casualty coverage for businesses and properties in West Bank settlements — creating a potential indirect reinsurance exposure to settlement-area property risks.³³

The BDS Movement’s “Stop AXA / AXA Divest” campaign, active since 2016, has successfully targeted AXA’s Israeli bank holdings (now substantially divested) and pivoted to AXA’s defense contractor portfolio holdings.³⁰³⁴ AXA’s documented response has been to frame divestments as portfolio management outcomes rather than human rights decisions, and to characterize BDS-affiliated protests as “unjustifiable and unjustified acts of vandalism.”³⁵

Counter-Arguments and Evidence Limits

The Ukraine/Gaza asymmetry is not unique to AXA within the European insurance sector. A peer review of major European insurers and reinsurers — including Allianz SE, Zurich Insurance Group, and Munich Re — indicates that explicit Ukraine condemnations without equivalent Gaza condemnations is a sector-wide posture rather than an AXA-specific anomaly.³² Allianz SE issued a statement condemning Hamas attacks in October 2023 and expressing support for Israeli civilians without an equivalent statement on Palestinian civilian harm; Munich Re and Zurich issued no named public statement on Gaza in available training data.

AXA S.A. is not listed in the UN OHCHR database of business enterprises involved in settlement activities, which focuses on companies with direct operational, commercial, or real estate activity in settlements rather than financial investors.²⁵ AXA’s direct Israeli insurance operations (Mivtachim) were discontinued prior to the October 2023 conflict via sale to Berkshire Hathaway (~2020).⁷

No regulatory enforcement actions, fines, or formal legal proceedings against AXA specifically relating to Israeli-territory operations have been identified.³⁶ No litigation under France’s Loi de Vigilance targeting AXA’s investment activities in the occupied Palestinian territories has been identified.

The AXA XL reinsurance exposure pathway is inferential from standard industry practice: reinsurance treaty terms are confidential, and no specific named treaty with Israeli insurers has been publicly identified. The UN Special Rapporteur’s 2025 report on the economy of occupation addresses infrastructure investment but does not specifically name AXA.³⁷

Named Entities and Evidence Map

BDS-1000 Score (V4)

• V_MAX: 4.74 Sum_OTHERS: 6.46
• BRS Score: 377 Tier: D (Moderate)

Score interpretation: V-ECON drives V_MAX at 4.74, reflecting the largest financial exposure vector: approximately $150 million in defense contractor equity and debt holdings (Boeing, RTX, Lockheed Martin, BAE Systems, and others) whose weapons are documented in active IDF use, combined with substantial but reduced settlement-financing bank exposure. The Sum_OTHERS score of 6.46 reflects additional complicity across military (AVP-Hub Security venture stake), digital (Israeli technology commercial relationships), and political (Ukraine/Gaza asymmetry, silence on ICJ/ICC) domains. The BRS of 377 places AXA in Tier D (Moderate), below the Tier C threshold of 400.

Methodology note: All V-domain scores are scale-free products of Impact (I, activity type), Magnitude (M, scale of financial exposure), and Proximity (P, directness of involvement). Scores are evidence-only, drawn from the four domain audits, and human-vetted. Divested or exited operations are reflected in temporal mitigation. No transitive guilt is attributed across corporate structures.

Methodology Note

• Evidence base: All findings are drawn exclusively from the four domain audits (V-MIL, V-DIG, V-ECON, V-POL). No independent research, live web search, or facts outside the audit corpus are introduced. Claims marked as unverified, plausible-unverified, or rejected in the source audits are excluded or flagged accordingly.
• Scale-free scoring: V-domain scores are computed as Impact × Magnitude × Proximity. I reflects activity type (weapons supply scores higher than passive financial holding). M reflects scale (dollar value of holdings, contract value, population affected). P reflects directness (direct contract scores higher than passive portfolio investment).
• Temporal rule: Divested or exited operations are treated as substantially mitigated. The 2018–2019 Elbit divestment and the mid-2024 Israeli bank divestment are reflected as historical closures. Ongoing holdings are scored at current status.
• Entity attribution: No transitive guilt is attributed across corporate structures. A subsidiary’s activities are attributed to the parent only where the parent holds a controlling interest or the subsidiary relationship is the mechanism of complicity. A divested subsidiary’s post-divestment activities are not attributed to the former parent.
• Settlement operation dual-counting: Infrastructure operations that both expand occupied territory and entrench settlement connectivity (e.g., Jerusalem Light Rail) are counted in both V-ECON (economic exposure) and V-POL (political/legal consolidation) as distinct harm vectors.
• “No public evidence identified”: This formulation is used where targeted checks found no evidence, distinguishing a confirmed absence from an unsearched gap. It does not constitute a clean bill of health; the database reviewed is not exhaustive.

End Notes