FINAL GROUND LEVEL RAMIFICATION OF THE BILATERAL MEETING B/W PM MODI & NETANYAHU HELD IN EARLY JULY.
Martin
F.R.
This historic visit of Prime
Minister Narendra Modi to Israel is more than just being symbolic. It will be the first ever of an Indian Prime Minister to
visit Israel, and also would be the
first time that an Indian leader is visiting Israel and not putting his foot
forth the Palestinian territory.
At the heart of the
strategic alliance is a military and security collaboration with Israel which
reinforces the colonial occupation and oppression of the Palestinian
people. It is also an alliance which helps the Israeli role of being an
instrument of US imperialism in the region. Modi’s visit comes at appoint when
we are marking the 25th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic
relations with Israel since 1992. Since then, the security and defence
collaboration with Israel has developed steadily under successive governments.
But it is during the BJP-led governments that the alliance with Israel has got
deepened and given an ideological construct.
Since the mid-nineties,
Israel has become a prominent supplier of arms and defence equipments to India.
In the last decade, Israel emerged as the largest seller of arms to India till
that position was taken over by the United States. In April 2017, India
has contracted to buy 2.6 billion dollar worth of short range and long range
Barak-8 missiles from the Israeli Aerospace Industries. The buying of
surveillance drones are in the pipeline. India has launched Israeli spy
satellites through ISRO rockets. Israeli security experts have been advising
India on internal security measures.
Also, India and Israel are moving
towards hand in hand into the future as business partners too. India is a
growing economic powerhouse with a large market and talent pool. Israel is a
world leader in high technology and innovation. The combination of India’s and
Israel’s human resources and ingenuity is going to provide more effective and
more affordable solutions for both in diverse fields that are priorities for
both the governments: agriculture, water, health, environment, education and
security being prime.
This unique blend of
complementary capabilities has forged strong ties between India and Israel,
particularly in the field of technology. From start-ups to space, communications
to cybernetics, Israel’s technological capabilities are going to be merging
with India’s. Indian students specializing in advanced research and technical
studies are building strong links with institutions of higher learning in
Israel. These ties go beyond technological exchange and reflect a long-term
developmental partnership.
Fifteen fully operational joint
Centers of Excellence under the Indo-Israeli Agricultural Project showcase each
other’s mutually beneficial cooperation in the field of agriculture. Together,
both the have are harnessed their respective strengths and learned from each
other’s experience to how to generate and cultivate solutions with a distinct
India-Israel blend.
Israel’s extreme water crises in
the past place it in a unique position to understand India’s quest for
efficient water solutions. The cost effective adaptation of Israeli
technology to India’s needs could also now create new solutions that India
could use to help address the water challenges of other developing nations
across the globe.
Also, in an effort to involve the
business sector as a catalyst of each other’s bilateral relations, India and
Israel will be taking important steps taken important steps. Both the countries
will be establishing a new India-Israel CEOs Forum. Acquiring business visas
from each country will also become easier today than it’s been ever. Both
shall also be asking their respective business leaders to suggest ways in which
they are going to bring our bilateral trade closer to its real potential.
Together both are also ready in creating and funding new avenues for joint
cooperation, including in industrial and technological research and
development.
Apart from just economic
significance, to understand the political significance looking into the past
where the hindutva
outlook of the BJP has always had close affinity with the ethno-nationalist
stream of Zionism. The rightwing ruling Likud party and Prime Minister Benjamin
Netanyahu are ideological soul-mates of the BJP and Narendra Modi. The
RSS and the BJP admire Israel for the way it has oppressed the Palestinian
people and taken on the Arab countries. It is their anti-Muslim bias that makes
them want to emulate Israel, something VD Savarkar exhorted Bharat to do in
1952. It was during the Vajpayee government’s tenure that the security ties
with Israel deepened. LK Advani, as home minister, visited Israel in 2000
to develop intelligence and security relations. The hawkish Ariel Sharon became
the first Israeli prime minister to visit India in 2003 to strengthen military
and counter-terrorism relations.
By openly identifying with
Israel and paying only lip service to the Palestinian cause, the Modi
government has strengthened India’s long held principle of support to the national
liberation struggle of the Palestinian people.
Modi has praised the
democratic system of Israel. What prevails in Israel is a travesty of
democracy. The 1.7 million Arabs living within the original boundaries of the
Israeli state and who constitute 21 per cent of population of Israel have
become second class citizens; the prospects of their status being further
downgraded when Israel is to be formally declared a Jewish State. For the 4.6
million Palestinians living in the occupied West Bank and Gaza, the reality is
of an apartheid State. Their lands are stolen, Jewish settlements dot the West
Bank appropriating the best lands and resources, an eight meter high wall has
cut off urban Palestinian settlements from their own lands, Gaza is under
perpetual siege with its people even deprived of electricity. The reality
is that Israel has perpetuated a brutal colonial occupation for 50 years since
the 1967 war.
Both sides have resolved to
jointly fight terrorism. However, for the Israelis, it is the Palestinian
organisations fighting the occupation and the Hezbollah in Lebanon who are
terrorists. Netanyahu considers Iran as the major source of terrorism in West
Asia. For Modi, there is no difference between the Lashkar-e-Taiba and the
youth protesting in Kashmir against State repression – both are terrorists.
Among the seven agreements
signed during the visit, one is on water management. Much has been made
about Israel’s vaunted ability in developing solutions to water scarcity and
judicious use of scarce water resources. This has been widely propagated
through the mainstream media in India. What is covered up is the theft of
water resources of the occupied West Bank and Gaza. For instance, Israel
controls the Mountain Aquifer, 80 per cent of which lies beneath the West Bank
and it over-extracts this water for agriculture as well as for use in illegal
settlements. Israel’s daily per capita consumption of water is five times that
of the Palestinians.
The strategic alliance with
Israel is part of the rightwing foreign policy shift under the Modi
government. The abandonment of a non-aligned, independent foreign policy,
the turning back on the commitment to the cause of the Palestinian people and
the pursuit of the Hindutva ideal of a US-Israel-India axis.
All reflect the change in
the domestic correlation of forces and the rightwing shift within India. The
fight to change the pro-imperialist and regressive foreign policy has to be
part of the fight against the Hindutva forces that are in power in India.
They are both pro-imperialist and proponents of an exclusivist Hindu
nationalism which is inimical for democracy and national sovereignty.
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