One year on, India’s approach to Gaza War reflects wider foreign policy change

It’s been one year since the attacks on Israel that sparked the Israel-Gaza war, which has so far claimed more than 40,000 Palestinian lives, drawing widespread condemnations of Israel’s conduct in the ongoing conflict.

The trigger for the current war was Hamas’ unprecedented attacks into southern Israel, launched on October 7, 2023. More than a thousand Israelis were killed that day, which is the highest casualty count in a single day since the founding of the state of Israel in 1948. Nearly 100 more were taken hostage. In retaliation, Israel launched an all-out invasion of Gaza, vowing to uproot Hamas once and for all.

Since then, the war has spread beyond Gaza, involving occasional skirmishes between Israel and Houthis, an escalating conflict between Israel and Lebanon’s Hezbollah, and the launch of rockets and other weaponry toward Israel by Iraq’s Iran-aligned Shi’ite militias and even Iran itself. As the situation stands today, there seems to be no end to the war in the foreseeable future, despite intermittent negotiations between Hamas and Israel to reach a ceasefire deal and hostage return or the United Nations resolutions passed to that effect.

India’s approach to the Israel-Gaza war and the larger regional crisis that has unfolded since October 7 of last year, though constantly evolving, reflects a change of policy both toward West Asia as a whole and Israel-Palestine in particular under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The manner in which the Gaza crisis unfolded over the past year – and the way the Indian government responded – gives us insights into the changing geopolitics of the region, in which Israel is perhaps more entrenched now than ever in its history as a modern state.India’s Response to the Gaza War

The tone for India’s initial response to the war was set by Modi’s tweet immediately after Hamas’ brutal attacks, in which he condemned the attacks and expressed total solidarity with Israel in its fight against “terrorism in all its forms.” The prime minister’s tweet was largely seen as a categorical tilt toward Israel, although it’s notable India has avoided a similar statement of support since.

During a press briefing on October 12, 2023, the Ministry of External Affairs’ official spokesperson, Arindam Bagchi, maintained that India considers the Hamas attack to be “a terrorist attack,” but he also reiterated that India was committed to its long-standing policy of support for the establishment of “sovereign, independent, and viable state of Palestine.”

Interestingly, in the wake of the outbreak of a full-blown war between Israel and Hamas, India stood alone in the Global South in not voting in favor of a ceasefire at the United Nations General Assembly. However, in the following months as the devastating humanitarian crisis unfolded in Gaza, India officially tried to strike a balance by sending aid to the people of Gaza, raising concerns about civilian deaths, and expressing support for ending hostilities and resolving the conflict through dialogue and diplomacy. Two months into the war in December 2023, India voted in favor of a ceasefire resolution at the United Nations and reaffirmed its traditional call for a “two-state solution” to resolve the Israel-Palestinian conflict.

Despite this, many analysts see India’s responses to the Gaza crisis as deeply problematic and largely supportive of Israel. On November 13, 2023, India abstained from a  UN resolution that dealt with “investigating Israeli practices and operations for human rights violations” in the Israel-occupied Palestinian territories.

Again, in April 2024, India abstained on a UN Human Rights Council resolution that called on Israel to implement an immediate ceasefire in Gaza and called on the member states to impose an arms embargo on the state of Israel. The resolution had called on Israel to be held accountable for possible war crimes and crimes against humanity in Gaza.

The precedent for this allegedly pro-Israel posturing on the part of India was set in June 2019, when India voted in support of Israel at the UN’s Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) to deny observer status to a Palestinian human rights organization named Shahed. This vote at the UN body was seen as a “first” step away from the long-standing two-state theory, under which New Delhi sees both Israel and Palestine as separate and independent countries.

However, the most unprecedented move in the context of the current Gaza war is that the Indian government has resisted calls from civil society organizations, human rights activists, and former bureaucrats to stop some Indian companies from exporting arms to Israel, with the weapons allegedly being used in Gaza. Some analysts see this as complicity in Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza on the part of some Indian firms. The Supreme Court of India refused to entertain a lawsuit from a civil rights organization seeking to stop arms exports to Israel, saying this was a determination for the government to make.

There has been some public outcry and also protests from India’s parliamentary opposition about the Modi government’s stances on the current Israel-Gaza war and alleged changes in India’s traditional support to the Palestinian cause. However, many of these criticisms were laid to rest earlier this year in the Parliament of India by External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar. In an answer to a question, he defended the Indian government’s traditional stand on the Israel-Palestine conflict and reaffirmed support for the establishment of a sovereign Palestinian state. Jaishankar also informed the Parliament that, contrary to popular perception, India’s support and aid to the people of Palestine has increased under the Modi government.

In many subsequent public statements, Jaishankar has asserted the necessity of the two-state solution to end the conflict.

India has joined an overwhelming number of UN members in support of a UNGA draft resolution to admit the state of Palestine as a full-fledged member of the world body and recommended the Security Council to “reconsider” the matter “favorably.” However, on September 19 India abstained on a UN resolution that called on Israel to end the illegal occupation of Palestine within a year.

India, it seems, has adopted a more nuanced position on the war and seeks space to maneuver when it comes to the Israel-Palestine conflict. However, many in diplomatic and strategic circles largely see India’s position on the Gaza crisis as more favorably titled toward Israel and thus, shifting (albeit gradually) away from India’s traditional stand on the issue.

This transformation in India’s approach toward the Israel-Palestine issue or the wider West Asian region didn’t come about overnight, or on October 7, 2023. An important turning point that marked the beginning of the change of attitude toward the region was May 2014, when the Modi-led Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) came to power.

India Under Modi: An Evolving West Asia Strategy Amid Shifting Geopolitical Tides

India has centuries of historical, cultural, and trade ties with the West Asian region and established formal diplomatic relations with all countries in the region decades ago. But an official West Asia policy was formulated only under the Manmohan Singh-led United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government. The policy sought to establish enduring relations with the region, especially the Gulf countries, which have been the most important source of India’s energy supplies. The Gulf states also support over 8 million Indian diaspora members, who in turn send billions in remittances back home annually.

India’s “Connect West Asia Policy” under Singh featured a strong affinity with the Palestinian cause, which was inherited from India’s own freedom struggle against British colonialism. Due to this synergy between domestic and foreign policy imperatives, the policy was generally successful, and relations with the Gulf countries were extended across several areas of cooperation. At the same time, India’s support and commitment to the Palestinian issue was further strengthened.

However, India’s policy toward the region has gone through a radical transformation since 2014, when Modi became prime minister for the first time. The engagement between India and the West Asian region has since moved beyond the traditionally dominant spheres of trade, energy, and diaspora ties. Modi’s “Think West” policy has emphasized cooperation in the fields of defense and security, building strategic partnerships and exploring several new areas of cooperation. India’s cooperation with the Arab Gulf countries, in particular, has been deepened and diversified, which in turn led to huge amounts of investment in India by some of these countries and the signing of a historical trade deal between India and the United Arab Emirates, while negotiations for an India-Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) trade deal might catch up soon. The West Asia policy under Modi is arguably the most successful aspect of his diplomatic endeavors.

Still, the most significant aspect of the policy has been the deepening and strengthening of relations with Israel. Soon after assuming power, the Modi government “de-hyphenated” the Israel-Palestine policy. This was a very bold move that paved the way for a stronger relationship with Israel under his leadership. Thus, in 2017 Modi became the first Indian prime minister to visit Israel, where his Israeli counterpart, Benjamin Netanyahu, famously said that the India-Israel relationship was “a marriage made in heaven.”

Since then the relationship has been further strengthened in the areas of technology, agriculture, education cinema, defense, etc. India is today the largest foreign buyer of Israeli weapons and military products, accounting for 37 percent of Israel’s total arms exports.There has also been a tectonic shift in the public perception about Israel under Modi’s leadership. Indians no longer sympathize or identify only with the Palestinian struggle for liberation. In fact, many people in India today don’t see Israel at fault or view its occupation of Palestine as illegal.

India’s rapid development of relations with Israel astutely caught on to the changing geopolitics of the region. India has established what some call the “West Asian Quad” or I2U2 along with Israel, the UAE, and the United States. This was made possible because of the “Abraham Accords,” under which several Arab countries, including the UAE, normalized relations with Israel. Following the Abraham Accords, West Asia has seen geopolitical polarization, which largely pits Israel and its Arab partners (both formal and informal) against Iran and its “axis of resistance,” which seems to be more committed to the Palestinian cause.

Thus, Indian companies are exporting weapons to Israel amid the Gaza war, while India occasionally abstains from or even supports Israel on critical UN resolutions – all without inviting the displeasure of Arab or Gulf countries. That’s because Israel today is ever more integrated into the region. Many Arab countries have established formal diplomatic relations with Israel and others see it as a future partner. The Indian foreign policy establishment read these developments well and acted accordingly to secure India’s interests in the region. Thus, the changing regional geopolitical arrangements and dynamics of India-Israel relations are both reflected in India’s response to the ongoing Israel-Gaza war.

Since the West Asian region is likely to see further geopolitical churning and the India-Israel relationship is poised to grow stronger, Indian foreign policy attitudes toward the region as a whole and Palestine, in particular, are likely to see further changes. It’s probable in the future that India might only pay lip service to the Palestinian issue because doing that would serve its national interests better.