Nahariya and the Western Galilee are facing another blow after years of war, repeated drone attacks and rocket fire, with about 600 workers at Blade Technology in Nahariya now being laid off. The plant’s American owner, Pratt & Whitney, decided as far back as December 2022 to shut it down because it said the operation was loss-making and no longer economically viable, and it is now moving the engine-blade production line to a new factory in the United States.
The original plan had been to close the site in 2025, but the deadline was pushed back because demand for blades rose and production became overloaded. Since the closure decision was made, about 300 workers have already been dismissed or retired, and the remaining layoffs have now begun. The shutdown is expected to hit not only the plant’s employees but also thousands of indirect workers, including suppliers, service providers and subcontractors across the Western Galilee.
Western Galilee Histadrut chairman Asher Shmueli said efforts to save the factory failed. “I brought four potential buyers who were interested in it, but the company’s management did not want to sell it and wanted to close it,” he told Calcalist. He said Pratt & Whitney rejected a sale because it did not want a competitor to emerge and take market share. Shmueli added that workers had time to prepare and that every extra day the plant remained open had been “a lifeline” for employees and their families.
Pratt & Whitney, part of RTX and one of the world’s largest engine makers alongside General Electric and Rolls-Royce, also operates three factories in the Tefen industrial zone employing about 1,000 people. Shmueli said some of the Nahariya workers may be absorbed there or at other nearby plants, while others can leave under an improved severance package agreed in August 2023. A dedicated job fair is also planned, with openings from about 40 factories and workplaces in the Western Galilee. Still, the closure may erase important know-how in compressor and blade manufacturing, a field founded in the 1960s by the late Stef Wertheimer as “Lea’vi Iscar” in response to France’s arms embargo on Israel. Wertheimer later sold the plant to Pratt & Whitney in the mid-1990s.
Workers said repeated promises from ministers and the Knesset Finance Committee did not help. One worker said, “We keep hearing slogans about increasing production in Israel and economic independence, but those are just words that did not help us.”
