Oslo, 12 August 2025 – The world’s largest sovereign-wealth fund has begun severing ties with Israel’s corporate sector, announcing late Monday that it has sold every share it held in 11 Israeli companies and will bring all remaining Israeli holdings under in-house management to ensure tighter ethical oversight.
What was sold – and what remains
- Divested: stakes in 11 firms that were outside the fund’s equity benchmark index.
- Retained: positions in c. 50 other Israeli companies that are still inside the index.
At 30 June the fund owned shares in 61 Israeli businesses worth more than 22 billion kroner ($2.1 billion).
Hence the divestment represents roughly one-fifth of its Israel exposure.
Official justification
Nicolai Tangen, CEO of Norges Bank Investment Management (NBIM), said the decision was triggered by:
“a very special conflict situation… the serious humanitarian crisis in Gaza. We are invested in companies operating in a country at war, and conditions in the West Bank and Gaza have deteriorated recently”.
The fund also stated it is terminating all contracts with external asset managers in Israel and will run those positions internally “as soon as possible”.
Timeline & political pressure
- Last week: Norwegian daily Aftenposten revealed the fund had increased its stake in Bet Shemesh Engines Holdings, an Israeli jet-engine parts maker whose components service F-16s used in Gaza.
- Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Støre called the revelation “worrying” and asked Finance Minister Jens Stoltenberg to open a review.
- Stoltenberg set NBIM a 20 August deadline to propose “new measures” regarding all Israeli holdings.
The divestment follows repeated civil-society campaigns: 50 Norwegian NGOs and 78 % of the public want the fund to avoid complicity in rights abuses, according to an Amnesty poll. In June parliament rejected a full boycott, but the issue is expected to dominate September’s general election.
Global ripple effect
Several European financial giants have already scaled back exposure to Israeli firms this year. The UN Special Rapporteur on Palestine, Francesca Albanese, recently urged states to cut all trade and finance ties with Israel, terming it an “economy of genocide”.
Next steps
NBIM will now screen the remaining 50 companies inside its benchmark for “unacceptable risk” of contributing to violations of international humanitarian law.
Any further exclusions would need approval from the fund’s Council on Ethics and the Ministry of Finance.
Bottom line: Norway’s move does not yet amount to a blanket boycott, but it marks the first large-scale exit from Israel by the world’s most influential state investor—signalling that even the most cautious funds can no longer ignore the reputational and legal risks of Gaza-related holdings.