Israeli-controlled car importers are widening their footprint in the European Union, according to delivery data for the first five months of 2026. Greece is currently the most active market: brands imported by locally based companies owned fully or partly by Israelis accounted for about 14% of new-car sales there from January to May.
The largest player is Italian Motion, owned by Samlel Group and its Greek partner Auto Hellas. It sells Stellantis brands, including Fiat, Jeep, Alfa Romeo and Leapmotor, and reached about 5.5% of the Greek market with roughly 4,000 deliveries, including commercial vehicles. Samlel is also expected to begin selling Chery’s Lepas brand in Greece in September, focusing on hybrid and plug-in models. In Greece, Renault and Dacia are distributed exclusively by Grand Auto, the international automotive marketing arm of Taavura Group, owned by the Livnat family; the two brands held a combined 9.33% share, or about 6,000 vehicles. Union family-owned Geo Mobility, part of Union Group, also sells Geely and Zeekr, but is still at an early stage.
In Romania, Chery, imported since mid-last year by Samlel subsidiary Auto Italia, reached about 3.3% of deliveries, or roughly 1,650 vehicles, in January to May. That put it just behind BYD, which held about 3.4%. Chinese car brands now account for 12% of all Romanian deliveries. Austria is another emerging market, where Colmobil holds the import and sales rights for Omoda and Jaecoo from Chery. The two brands reached about 1.2% of Austrian sales, or roughly 1,500 vehicles, in the first five months, and Colmobil has recently started selling to fleet customers there. Carasso Motors’ European arm has also begun marketing Chery vehicles in Austria.
Industry sources say the current round of activity is expected to implement, for the first time, a broad cyber-protection framework for vehicles developed in recent years, including by Israel’s National Cyber Directorate. Importers that supply the IDF have already been required to disable data-transmission functions, but the new rules are expected to cover more of the vehicle lifecycle. They include organizational-level data security, reporting cyberattacks on vehicles and companies, full documentation of software and firmware updates, protection of vehicle data at service garages, and storage of vehicle-computer data on servers located in Israel.
Meanwhile, competition from Chinese brands is pushing Japanese makers into discounting. Toyota launched a rare broad campaign with relatively modest discounts of 2,000 to 5,000 shekels. Haim’s Group, Honda’s importer, cut prices on several models as part of a comeback push, including the Jazz, HR-V and ZR-V, and said it plans to renew imports of the hybrid CR-V next year. Mitsubishi also lowered the price of the Outlander by about 10,000 shekels. BYD is running a promotion through June 26, with discounts ranging from 2,000 to 28,000 shekels. In Israel, Frisbee introduced the Renault Symbioz and a hybrid Dacia Duster, while Lubinski said, “Innovation is an inseparable part of the DNA of the Lubinski Group.”
