06-main-dossier.md

Key Findings

• Economic: B&Q has stocked products from Israeli-founded manufacturer Keter (Herzliya) since at least 2012, a relationship that continued through the period Who Profits documented Keter operating a factory in the Barkan settlement industrial zone in the occupied West Bank; B&Q told campaigners in 2012 it had received guarantees it was not sourcing from the Barkan site itself, and Keter exited Barkan operations during 2014–2016.¹²³⁴
• Economic: B&Q continues, as of August 2026, to sell Keter and Palram-Canopia (also Israeli-founded) branded garden and storage products through its DIY.com platform.¹⁵⁶⁷
• Political: No boycott, divestment, or settlement-business listing (OHCHR, Who Profits, BDS Movement, Ethical Consumer, AFSC, Don’t Buy Into Occupation) names B&Q or parent Kingfisher plc, and no B&Q/Kingfisher statement on Israel-Palestine or Gaza was identified, in contrast to Kingfisher’s dated, named 2022 statement on Russia-Ukraine.^89101112
• Not found: No military, defence-contracting, or digital-surveillance nexus was identified - no contracts, technology, or supply relationships link B&Q or Kingfisher to Israeli defence bodies, defence primes, or Israeli-origin surveillance/cyber vendors.¹³¹⁴¹⁵

Target Profile

Key Facts:

• B&Q’s Middle East retail footprint is a franchise partnership with the Al-Futtaim Group operating two B&Q-branded stores in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia - no Israel presence.²²²³
• Kingfisher’s group banners are B&Q, Castorama, Brico Dépôt, Screwfix, and a 50%-owned Koçtaş joint venture in Turkey; none operate in Israel or the OPT.²⁴²⁵
• Kingfisher’s only documented Israel-linked physical-goods transaction outside the Keter/Palram retail relationship is an April 2020 order of roughly three million face masks sourced partly from Israeli suppliers, as part of a €1m/£1m pandemic PPE-funding programme across Europe.^26272829

Executive Summary

B&Q is a UK-founded (1969) home-improvement and garden retailer trading as a subsidiary of Kingfisher plc, a London-listed multinational group whose other banners include Castorama, Brico Dépôt, and Screwfix.¹⁶³⁰³¹ Across four independent domain audits - military, digital, economic, and political - B&Q’s documented nexus to Israel and the occupied Palestinian territories is narrow and almost entirely confined to a single commercial vector: product sourcing from two Israeli-founded manufacturers, Keter and Palram-Canopia.

The strongest documented finding is economic. B&Q has sold Keter-branded plastic garden storage, sheds, and furniture since at least 2012, when the UK campaign group Corporate Watch corresponded directly with B&Q about the relationship.²³² Who Profits documented that Keter operated a manufacturing facility in the Barkan Industrial Zone in the occupied West Bank, established in 1982 on land from the Palestinian villages of Haris, Bruqin and Sarta; Keter denied in 2014 that it owned any facility “in what the UN defines as the occupied territories,” a denial Who Profits researchers said was contradicted by photographic documentation of Keter-branded trucks at the Barkan factory yard on 21 March 2014.³ Multiple sources indicate Keter discontinued its Barkan operations during 2014–2016 following BDS-related pressure.³³³⁴⁴ In 2012, B&Q told Corporate Watch it was “not sourcing from the Barkan site” and had “received appropriate guarantees from Keter to verify this claim,” while continuing to source from Keter generally; Corporate Watch at the time argued B&Q’s stated policy against sourcing from occupied territories was not consistently applied.²³² No B&Q or Kingfisher statement addressing Keter’s settlement history, its Barkan exit, or Keter’s 2024 change of ownership was identified in later years. As of August 2026, B&Q continues to stock both Keter and Palram-Canopia (another Israeli-founded manufacturer) products through its DIY.com retail platform.¹⁵⁶⁷

Beyond this sourcing relationship, the audits found no material nexus. The Military audit identified no defence contracts, dual-use products, construction-and-infrastructure links, or defence-prime supply relationships connecting B&Q or Kingfisher to Israeli military, security, or settlement-construction activity.¹³¹⁴³⁵ The Digital audit identified no Israeli-origin surveillance, cybersecurity, biometric, or cloud-infrastructure relationship; B&Q/Kingfisher’s technology stack runs through TCS, Microsoft/Intwo, Google Cloud, and Alteryx - none Israeli-linked - and the group does not appear connected to Project Nimbus or any Israeli state technology programme.^{3637383940414215} The Political audit found no B&Q/Kingfisher public statement on Israel-Palestine or Gaza (in explicit contrast to Kingfisher’s dated 2022 Russia-Ukraine statement and Russia market exit), no operations in Israel or the OPT, and no appearance on any of the five civil-society boycott/settlement-business databases checked.^{12431011444546}

The evidence record therefore supports a modest, narrowly economic BDS classification. B&Q’s product-sourcing relationship with Keter - including the historical, now-discontinued Barkan West Bank facility overlap - anchors the Economic domain score; the Military and Digital domains score zero for lack of any identified activity; and Political scores near-zero, reflecting the absence of political statements, lobbying, or settlement-listing exposure, tempered only by the unresolved absence of any B&Q clarification of its current Keter relationship. This evidence profile yields a BRS of 116, placing B&Q in Tier E (Minimal).

Timeline of Relevant Events

Corporate Overview

B&Q Limited is the UK trading subsidiary of Kingfisher plc, a London Stock Exchange-listed multinational home-improvement retailer incorporated in England and Wales (Companies House no. 01664812).¹⁶³⁰¹⁷ Kingfisher’s other banners include Castorama, Brico Dépôt, Screwfix, and TradePoint, with disclosed banner geography spanning the UK/Ireland, France, Poland, Iberia, and Romania, plus a 50%-owned joint venture, Koçtaş Yapı Marketleri Ticaret A.Ş., in Turkey.²⁴²⁵ Kingfisher plc’s largest disclosed shareholders are predominantly passive institutional holders - Silchester International Investors (~11%), Vanguard Group (~5.5%), and BlackRock (~4.9%) - with no state-held golden share or sovereign-wealth stake identified.¹⁸¹⁹²⁰

B&Q’s only Middle East retail presence is a franchise partnership with the Al-Futtaim Group, operating two B&Q-branded stores in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia; no equivalent franchise, licensee, or branch presence in Israel or the occupied Palestinian territories was identified.²²²³ No public evidence identified of B&Q or Kingfisher operating stores, offices, warehouses, or joint ventures in Israel or the OPT, and no public evidence identified of B&Q or Kingfisher characterizing Israel as a market in its annual report materials.²⁴

The company’s documented Israel-linked commercial relationships are supplier relationships, not corporate-structural ones: B&Q purchases and resells Keter (Israeli-founded 1948, headquartered in Herzliya) and Palram/Palram-Canopia (Israeli-founded 1963) branded products.¹⁵⁶⁷ Neither Keter nor Palram is a B&Q subsidiary, joint venture, or affiliate; they are independent third-party brand suppliers, meaning commercial and financial flows run from B&Q (as purchaser) to these manufacturers, not the reverse. Keter’s own ownership history is independently well documented: majority-owned by BC Partners and Canada’s PSP Investments from August 2016 (acquired from the Israel-based Sagol family, which retained a minority stake), before Keter’s senior lenders assumed full ownership via a debt-for-equity restructuring completed 29 April 2024.^474850515253

Domain Summaries

Military: Military

Mechanism of Involvement

No mechanism of military involvement was identified. B&Q and Kingfisher’s disclosed corporate governance and franchise materials describe only civilian DIY and home-improvement retail activity, with no defence, security, or military-contracting activity disclosed.^16305657 No contract, tender, or framework agreement with the Israeli Ministry of Defence, IDF, Israel Prison Service, or Israel Border Police was identified.

Counter-Arguments and Evidence Limits

The company’s defence is essentially the absence of any adverse record: cross-checks against published UK-supplier-to-Elbit-Systems reporting and general arms-trade monitoring did not surface B&Q or Kingfisher as a named supplier to any Israeli defence prime.¹³¹⁴³⁵ No SIBAT listing, defence exhibition catalogue entry, export-licence action, or civil-society investigation (Who Profits, AFSC Investigate, Don’t Buy Into Occupation) names B&Q on military grounds.⁵⁸⁵⁹⁶⁰

Named Entities and Evidence Map

No Israeli military, security, or defence-prime entity is documented as connected to B&Q or Kingfisher. B&Q’s only franchise relationship in the Middle East region is with the Al-Futtaim Group in Saudi Arabia - a civilian retail franchisor unconnected to any Israeli defence body.²²²³

Digital: Digital

Mechanism of Involvement

No mechanism of digital or surveillance-technology involvement was identified. B&Q/Kingfisher’s disclosed technology stack - TCS OmniStore for retail/POS, Microsoft Azure via implementation partner Intwo, Google Cloud (including a March 2026 Vertex AI Search shopping-assistant partnership), and Alteryx for people analytics - traces to US and Indian vendors, with no Israeli-origin component identified in any of these engagements.^{36373839404142}

Counter-Arguments and Evidence Limits

Searches combining Kingfisher/B&Q with named Israeli cybersecurity and analytics vendors (Check Point, Wiz, SentinelOne, CyberArk, NICE, Verint, Claroty, Palo Alto Networks) surfaced no company-specific relationship - the one adjacent hit, a Palo Alto Networks SEC filing on its CyberArk acquisition, contains no Kingfisher or B&Q reference and is a market-level document, not a customer relationship.¹⁵ No evidence of Project Nimbus participation, Israeli data-centre operations, or Israeli R&D investment was identified.⁶¹

Named Entities and Evidence Map

No Israeli technology vendor, cloud provider, or surveillance company is documented as connected to B&Q or Kingfisher. The single Israel-linked physical-goods item found in this domain - the April 2020 sourcing of face masks partly from Israeli suppliers as part of a broader European PPE-funding programme - is a pandemic-response procurement, not a technology or digital-services relationship, and predates the current conflict period by more than three years with no reassertion identified since.^26272829

Economic: Economic

Mechanism of Involvement

B&Q’s documented economic nexus runs through its retail supply chain: it stocks and markets products from Keter (Israeli-founded, Herzliya-headquartered) and Palram-Canopia (Israeli-founded), both confirmed live on B&Q’s DIY.com platform as of August 2026.¹⁵⁶⁷ This relationship is documented back to at least 2012.²³² Who Profits documented that Keter operated a factory in the Barkan settlement industrial zone in the occupied West Bank from 1982 until its 2014–2016 discontinuation.³³³³⁴⁴

Counter-Arguments and Evidence Limits

B&Q’s strongest documented defence is direct and dated: in 2012, when queried by campaigners, B&Q stated it was “not sourcing from the Barkan site” specifically and had received supplier guarantees to that effect, and separately asserted a general policy against sourcing “from conflict zones and/or occupied territories.”² Keter itself discontinued the Barkan operation entirely during 2014–2016.³³³⁴⁴ No public evidence identified of any DEFRA or UK customs enforcement action against B&Q regarding country-of-origin labelling, and no public evidence identified of B&Q holding any operational investment, real estate, R&D facility, or equity position in Israel or the OPT. Kingfisher’s institutional shareholdings (Silchester, Vanguard, BlackRock) are diversified, passive index/institutional positions, not evidence of a deliberate corporate decision regarding Israel exposure.¹⁸ The unresolved limit in the evidence is temporal: no B&Q or Kingfisher statement addressing Keter’s settlement history, its Barkan exit, or Keter’s 2024 change of ownership was identified in the years since the 2012 exchange, leaving the current state of B&Q’s supplier due-diligence undocumented rather than affirmatively adverse.

Named Entities and Evidence Map

Keter Group (Herzliya, Israel-founded 1948) - active B&Q supplier; documented former Barkan West Bank facility operator (1982–2014/16); ownership passed from the Sagol family (2016 minority retention) through BC Partners/PSP Investments to senior lenders (April 2024).^{3474850515253} Palram-Canopia (Israel-founded 1963) - active B&Q supplier, no documented settlement-zone facility.⁶⁷ Hamat Group (formerly Lipski Plastic) - a separate Israeli manufacturer documented operating in the Barkan settlement zone and listed on the 2020 UN settlement-business database; no commercial relationship between Hamat Group and B&Q was identified.⁶²⁶³

Political: Political

Mechanism of Involvement

No political mechanism of involvement was identified. B&Q and Kingfisher issued no public statement on Israel-Palestine, Gaza, or the October 2023 escalation, and no lobbying activity specific to Middle East policy was identified in Kingfisher’s EU Transparency Register listing.⁶⁴ No B&Q/Kingfisher donation or sponsorship to FIDF, JNF/KKL, or comparable Israeli military-welfare or settlement-linked organizations was identified.

Counter-Arguments and Evidence Limits

The comparative absence of engagement is itself evidentially significant: Kingfisher demonstrably does issue named, dated crisis statements when it chooses to - its 2 March 2022 Russia-Ukraine statement, paired with its Russia market exit, shows the company is capable of and willing to take public positions and sourcing actions on geopolitical conflicts, making the silence on Israel-Palestine a data point rather than an evidentiary gap.¹²⁴³⁴⁹ No public evidence identified of B&Q or Kingfisher appearing on any of five independently checked boycott/settlement-business trackers: the OHCHR settlement-business database, Who Profits, the BDS Movement’s priority-target list, Ethical Consumer’s Palestine boycott list, and the Don’t Buy Into Occupation 2025 V-Report.^{854551011444546}

Named Entities and Evidence Map

No Israel-linked political, lobbying, or advocacy entity is documented as connected to B&Q, Kingfisher, or its named executives, including outgoing CEO Thierry Garnier.²¹ Kingfisher’s board and leadership were reviewed against pro-Israel/anti-BDS organizations (CFI, AIPAC, ADL, USISTF) and settlement-linked bodies (Regavim, Im Tirtzu) with no affiliation identified.

BDS-1000 Score (V4)

• V_MAX: 1.84 Sum_OTHERS: 0.06
• BRS Score: 116 Tier: E (Minimal)

The score is driven entirely by Economic: B&Q’s documented, ongoing retail-supply relationship with Israeli-founded manufacturer Keter - including the historical, now-discontinued overlap with Keter’s West Bank Barkan facility - is the only domain with sustained impact (I), scale (M), and directness (P) above zero. Military and Digital contribute nothing, as no military or digital-technology nexus was identified in either audit. Political contributes only a marginal residual, reflecting the absence of statements, lobbying, or settlement-listing exposure. This concentration in a single, narrowly commercial vector - with no corroboration across the other three domains - places B&Q at BRS 116, Tier E (Minimal). Scores are computed via the BDS-1000 method: scale-free Impact × magnitude/proximity per domain, drawn only from verified evidence and vetted against the source audits.

Methodology Note

• Every claim in this dossier traces to the four domain audits (Military, Digital, Economic, Political); no additional research was conducted.
• Impact (I) reflects the type of activity documented (e.g., product-sourcing vs. direct contracting); Magnitude (M) reflects its scale; Proximity (P) reflects directness to Israeli state or military activity.
• Temporal rule: Keter’s discontinuation of its Barkan West Bank facility (2014–2016) is treated as a mitigating, divestment-like fact and is carried with that context rather than scored as an ongoing settlement-operation link.
• Entity attribution follows a no-transitive-guilt standard: B&Q is scored only for its own documented conduct (retail sourcing from Keter/Palram), not for Keter’s separate corporate history, ownership changes, or other customers.
• Where a settlement-linked operation is documented, it is eligible for dual-counting across Economic and Political; here, the absence of any B&Q-specific settlement listing or political statement kept the Political contribution marginal.
• “No public evidence identified” is used throughout, per the source audits, wherever a specific check (contract, database listing, statement, investment) returned nothing - this phrasing is preserved verbatim from the audits rather than converted into an assertion of absence beyond what was checked.

End Notes