India’s Stand on Israel Palestine

Context- India voted in favor of a UN General Assembly resolution condemning Israel’s colonial activities in the “Occupied Palestinian Territory”.

About resolution  

• The draft resolution titled ‘Israeli settlements in the “Occupied Palestinian Territory”, including East Jerusalem, and the occupied Syrian Golan’ was approved by the Special Political and Decolonisation Committee (Fourth Committee) of the UN General Assembly by a recorded vote of 145 in favour, seven against and 18 abstentions.
• India was among the 145 nations that voted in favour of the resolution along with Bangladesh, Bhutan, China, France, Japan, Malaysia, Maldives, Russia, South Africa, Sri Lanka, and the U.K. 
• The resolution “Reaffirms that the Israeli settlements in the Occupied Palestinian Territory are illegal and an obstacle to peace and economic and social development.” 
• The resolution reiterated “its demand for the immediate and complete cessation of all Israeli settlement activities in all of the “Occupied Palestinian Territory”, 

India’s Position on Israel -Palestine 

• India voted in favour of five of the six resolutions, abstaining in one resolution that dealt with investigating Israeli practices and operations for human rights violations. 
• India also reiterated India’s traditional position on the Israel-Palestine conflict: “establishing a sovereign, independent and viable State of Palestine living within secure and recognized borders, side by side at peace with Israel.  
• Past Linkages : Historically, India voted against the partition of Palestine and the creation of a separate state of Israel in 1948, and was the first non-Arab state to recognise the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) as the representative of the people, and to recognise Palestine in 1988, and consistently voted against Israel at the United Nations. 
  • In 1992,India established full diplomatic ties with Israel, while continuing to support the Palestinian cause. 
  • There has been a shift towards Israel’s position, given increasingly close bilateral relations, trade, technological assistance, military procurement, and counter-terrorism cooperation.  
  • India even voted against a UN Human Rights Council resolution in 2016 that asked the International Criminal Court (ICC) to investigate Israeli war crimes, and in 2019 voted with Israel at the UN Economic and Social Council to ban a Hamas-linked NGO host an observer status In 2017, Prime Minister Narendra Modi became the first Indian Prime Minister to visit Israel,  in 2018,  Netanyahu visited India. 
  • At the same time, Modi was also the first Indian Prime Minister to pay an official visit to Palestine. 
  • In 2017, India voted against an attempt by the US and Israel  to unilaterally declare all of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. 
• The lines still drawn by New Delhi seem clear: it abhors terrorism but does not accept indiscriminate bombing, although it has a consistent position on Palestine. 
  • There is no way that Hamas can use claims of redress of historical grievances  to justify its inhumane attacks on Israel. 

Challenges of India 

• Israel’s latest demand to evacuate more than a million Gazans as it continues to pound the city and plans a possible ground offensive further complicates Delhi’s political balancing challenge. 

Conclusion and way forward 

• Terrorism is a malignant cancer and knows no borders, nationality or race. 
• The world should not buy justification for terrorist acts.  
• There must be zero tolerance for terrorism 
• India has always supported the two-state solution, India is in sync with the Arab world in normalization with Israel with blocs like I2U2 (India, Israel, UAE and the United States). 
• It is therefore important that India continues to oppose terrorism, but also more strongly against the human tragedy in Gaza.

Source: The Hindu

Practice question:

Q.How is India reacting to the ongoing Israel-Hamas war?

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