A day after External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar arrived in Jerusalem on a five-day visit, it has emerged that Israel is looking to take help of the “Indian angle” to be part of the Middle East’s emerging strategic landscape.
In an interview to Times of India, Israel’s foreign secretary Alon Ushpiz said that his country is keen to participate along with the Quad in areas such as climate change, vaccine and security. “We will be happy to join any conversation in these areas. I will be very happy to deepen our cooperation with India on all these issues. But noone from the Quad has knocked on our doors,” he was quoted as saying in the report.
Ushpiz said that Israel is also keen to make use of the opportunities available in the Arab world by using its equation with India. “We want very much to look into, how can the new situation in the Middle East have an Indian angle to it? How can we incorporate India into the opportunities that are emerging? Normally this region is flooded with threats and challenges. But in the last year, I have seen the dramatically changed landscape in the Middle East because of the Abraham Accords,” he told TOI.
The development comes on the same day when Jaishankar has told the Indian Jewish community and Indologists in Jerusalem that India and Israel share similar challenges to their societies from radicalism and terrorism apart from many other emerging developments on the geopolitical landscape.
Jaishankar pointed out that India’s bilateral relations with Israel has been in a qualitatively different trajectory in the last few years. “Our two countries share values of democracy and pluralism. We also share some of our guiding civilizational philosophies: Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam in India, or the world is one family, and Tikun Olam in Israel, or heal the world.”
“We also share similar challenges to our society from radicalism and terrorism, apart from many other emerging developments on the geopolitical landscape,” Jaishankar said without elaborating.
India has been facing major threats emanating from across the border from Pakistan and Israel is also surrounded by hostile neighbours. India and Israel have a Joint Working Group on Counter-terrorism and the two countries also share real time intelligence to deal with the menace.
Jaishankar said that the “real thrust, however, is to expand the innovation and trade partnership between our two knowledge economies”.
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