Is ICE receiving training from the IDF
Executive summary
Multiple independent investigations, advocacy groups and news outlets report that ICE officers and other U.S. law‑enforcement personnel have participated in longstanding exchanges, conferences and joint trainings with Israeli security agencies and private Israeli firms — programs described as covering surveillance, crowd control, detention and counter‑terrorism — but the sources provided do not supply a single, incontrovertible government document explicitly stating that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) itself runs a formal, ongoing training program specifically for ICE in the United States [1] [2] [3] [4]. Claims that ICE is “trained by the IDF” are widespread in activist and some media reporting and are supported by examples of U.S. officers traveling to Israel for instruction and U.S.–Israeli exchanges, yet the precise institutional lines — IDF versus Israeli police, private contractors, or other Israeli security actors — are mixed across the reporting [2] [1] [3].
1. What the reporting documents: exchanges, trips and shared curricula
A body of reporting stretching back two decades documents U.S. federal, state and local law‑enforcement delegations traveling to Israel for “best practices” exchanges and trainings — including agents from ICE, CBP, FBI and local police — and Israeli representatives giving talks and joint sessions in the U.S., with topics reportedly ranging from counter‑terrorism to crowd control and surveillance technologies [1] [2] [3].
2. Who in Israel is implicated: IDF, police, security firms and companies
The sources describe a variety of Israeli actors involved: Israeli military and police forces, intelligence and security services, and private Israeli companies supplying surveillance and forensic tools such as Cellebrite, with reporting citing Israeli defense electronics firms contracting with U.S. agencies and private firms organizing exchanges [4] [5] [2]. Some pieces attribute tactics directly to the IDF, while others specify Israel National Police, Shin Bet, Israeli companies or a broader “Israeli security apparatus,” so the term “IDF” is sometimes used loosely across coverage [6] [4] [5].
3. Scale and character of training: thousands, recurring programs, and technology transfers
Investigations and campaigns such as “Deadly Exchange” and multiple news outlets report that thousands of U.S. officers and agents have been involved in these exchanges since the early 2000s and that the collaboration includes technology transfers, conferences and grant‑backed research projects; reporting also documents sales or provision of surveillance tools and border‑security technology tied to Israeli companies [2] [1] [3] [4].
4. Advocacy framing and critiques: “training by the IDF” as political shorthand
Advocacy groups and critical outlets frame these exchanges as the IDF or Israeli occupation tactics being imported to the U.S., arguing the programs transmit repressive practices; those criticisms are supported in the reporting by examples of courses and vendor relationships [2] [4] [6]. At the same time, outlets like HonestReporting warn that the shorthand “the IDF trains ICE” can recycle misleading narratives by collapsing distinct Israeli institutions and private contractors into a single actor, and they question accuracy when reporting lacks precise sourcing [7].
5. Limitations, open questions and the most defensible answer
The assembled reporting establishes that ICE personnel have repeatedly participated in Israel‑linked trainings and that Israeli military, police, security services and companies have been part of exchanges and technology transfers [1] [2] [3] [4], but within the provided sources there is not a single, unambiguous official record presented that documents a formal, continuous IDF‑run training program directly administered to ICE inside the United States; therefore the most defensible conclusion is that ICE has trained with and learned from Israeli security actors and firms — sometimes described as IDF involvement in advocacy and press accounts — while the exact institutional responsibility (IDF vs. Israeli police, Shin Bet, private contractors) is variably described and not definitively settled by the materials supplied [2] [1] [7].