DHL Global Forwarding
DHL Global Forwarding is a logistics company at JFK Airport with a documented role in the military supply chain moving through the New York metro area. Global logistics and shipping company that shipped parts from Spain to Elbit Systems in 2025. Tied to 3 published sources, cited below.
🔎 Evidence
- Shipped vehicle components from Spain to Elbit systems in 2025.
- Ships to Israel and maintains offices in Israel, "daily flight" out of US in response to war (2023)
✈️ The Israel airbridge through JFK
When most carriers pulled out of Tel Aviv after October 7, 2023, DHL kept flying. FreightWaves reported that DHL Express continued its cargo flights to Tel Aviv without interruption while other major carriers suspended service, and weeks later DHL Global Forwarding chartered a dedicated Boeing 767 freighter flying daily from Liege, Belgium to Tel Aviv. Its executives were explicit: "We'll never abandon Israel. Our plan to stay there is unequivocal," DHL Express's Americas chief told FreightWaves, while the forwarding division's Americas CEO said the company was "very well positioned to support our customers in and out of Israel."
The pattern repeated when Israeli airspace closed during the June 2025 war with Iran: DHL Global Forwarding's own customer advisory shows its cargo airline suspending flights while the approved lifeline ran daily from Tel Aviv to Liege and to New York's JFK on Challenge Airlines, with Israeli ports open and operations continuing.
📄 Documented cargo to Israel's arms industry
In September 2025, less than a week after Spain announced a ban on military exports to Israel, the investigative outlet The Ditch documented DHL flights carrying a Basque manufacturer's anti-vibration mounts from Vitoria, Spain through DHL's Leipzig hub to Tel Aviv, delivered to Elbit Systems' electronic warfare plant in Holon. After the reporting and pressure from Basque unions and solidarity groups, the manufacturer announced it would stop selling to Israel entirely.
At the Leipzig hub itself, a DHL worker and union representative who spoke at a roughly 1,000-person march against arms transports through the airport was fired in September 2025. DHL says he violated terms of his employment contract; its statement does not address whether the company moves military goods. A German labor court case over the firing is ongoing, with the main hearing scheduled for May 2026.
🗽 The JFK connection
DHL Global Forwarding's New York station is Building 89 on the JFK Airport cargo campus in Jamaica, Queens, and in December 2019 the company opened its seventh US Foreign Trade Zone at JFK, a status that defers or reduces customs duties on cargo moving through the airport. JFK's freight terminals are the chokepoint mapped by our JFK Airport campaign. Because forwarders arrange the routing and the customs paperwork, they sit where the export paper trail meets the physical freight; our end-user certificate (EUC) explainer covers the documents that are supposed to control military cargo moving through terminals like these.
When Israel's air cargo shrank to a lifeline during the June 2025 war, one end of that lifeline was JFK: the only approved Israel flights in DHL's own advisory ran daily from Tel Aviv to Liege and JFK.
📚 Sources
🏢 Corporate profile
- Sector
- Private Company
- Official site
- dhl.com/us-en/home/global-forwarding.html
- Wikidata
- Q514108
Sourcing last reviewed .
❓ Questions
What is DHL Global Forwarding's role in the arms supply chain?
Global logistics and shipping company that shipped parts from Spain to Elbit Systems in 2025. DHL Global Forwarding appears in Break the Chain's audited database of companies with a documented role moving military cargo through the New York metro area, classified as a logistics. The entry is tied to 3 published sources cited on this page.
Where is DHL Global Forwarding located?
DHL Global Forwarding is in JFK Airport, within the New York and New Jersey gateway that Break the Chain maps: JFK Airport, Port Newark and Elizabeth, and the Brooklyn Navy Yard.
What is the evidence for including DHL Global Forwarding?
Shipped vehicle components from Spain to Elbit systems in 2025. A company appears here based on already-published sources, which is not a legal conclusion about the company. The sources are listed on this page.
Does DHL ship to Israel?
Yes. DHL Express kept cargo flights to Tel Aviv running without interruption after October 7, 2023, while other major carriers suspended service, and DHL Global Forwarding chartered a dedicated daily freighter from Liege, Belgium to Tel Aviv, according to FreightWaves. The company's own June 2025 customer advisory shows it continuing Israel operations through the Israel-Iran war. The one shipment publicly documented reaching an Israeli arms maker on DHL flights carried vehicle components to an Elbit Systems plant in September 2025, per the investigative outlet The Ditch.
Where is DHL Global Forwarding at JFK Airport?
Its New York station operates from Building 89 on the JFK Airport cargo campus in Jamaica, Queens, and since December 2019 DHL Global Forwarding has run a Foreign Trade Zone at JFK, its seventh in the United States, which defers or reduces customs duties on cargo moving through the airport. JFK's cargo terminals are one of the chokepoints this campaign maps, and DHL's own June 2025 advisory shows JFK as one end of Israel's wartime air-cargo lifeline.
Is DHL on the BDS list?
DHL does not appear in the main corporate-accountability databases like Who Profits or AFSC Investigate, and no documented US port action has targeted DHL over Israel shipments. Its documented Israel exposure comes instead from shipment records, its own customer advisories, its executives' public statements, and investigative reporting like The Ditch's September 2025 documentation of components flown to an Elbit Systems plant. This page cites those primary records so readers can weigh the evidence directly.
✊ Take Action
DHL Global Forwarding is part of Break the Chain's audited database of companies complicit in arming Israel through the New York metro area. Help cut the supply chain:
🏭 More complicit companies
Full sourced list: Military logistics companies in NYC and New Jersey