The Netherlands continues to export specially trained dogs to Israel, despite growing pressure to restrict the trade due to concerns about their use by the Israeli military in human rights abuses, Nieuwsuur reported on Monday.

The issue has taken on renewed urgency following the war in Gaza and escalating violence in the West Bank and calls are mounting for tighter political control over the export of service dogs.

At the moment, service dogs are treated the same as pets under export regulations. By contrast, military goods and so-called dual-use items — such as chips or chemicals with both civilian and military applications — are subject to strict export controls.

However, MPs recently voted in favour of plan to change this, and have the dogs reclassified as dual use.

Three Dutch companies are currently involved in exporting dogs to Israel none of which responded in detail to Nieuwsuur’s questions.

Two companies claimed the animals are not attack dogs but detection dogs trained to sniff out drugs or explosives. It remains unclear how the dogs are ultimately deployed by the Israeli army, the programme said.

“We see the Israeli army systematically using service dogs in human rights abuses — such as the torture of detainees and attacks on civilians in their homes and in the streets,” said Lydia de Leeuw, a researcher at the Centre for Research on Multinational Corporations (SOMO). “Our Palestinian partner organisations and the UN have also documented this.”

According to figures obtained by SOMO, 110 veterinary certificates for dog exports to Israel have been issued since the Gaza war began. One hundred of these certificates were granted to the company Four Winds K9, a police dog training centre in the southern Dutch village of Geffen.

In 2018, Four Winds K9 agreed to pay compensation to a Palestinian boy bitten by one of its animals on the command of the Israeli army in 2014.

The Israeli army did not respond to Nieuwsuur’s request for comment.