India’s relationship with Israel has traditionally been linked to its principled stand on Palestine, which essentially required it to keep up distance from Tel Aviv, whilst each states established diplomatic ties below PV Narasimha Rao in 1992. Since the Narendra Modi authorities got here to energy in 2014 with a Lok Sabha majority by itself, the India-Israel relationship emerged out of its dormancy and obtained larger consideration. Through the final decade, India has proven an rising willingness to companion with Israel on key bilateral and multilateral financial initiatives, together with a gradual development in defence cooperation. In 2017, PM Modi grew to become the primary Indian PM to go to Israel (whilst he grew to become the primary PM to go to Palestine, in 2018).

Evidently, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) authorities felt comfy breaking new floor in overseas coverage even because it maintained India’s conventional assist for the two-state answer. For India, its principled stand on Palestine was now distinct from its bilateral relationship with Israel. In the instant wake of Hamas’ October 7, 2023 assaults, India abstained from a United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) decision calling for a ceasefire. India, which sought to separate its stand on terrorism from different points, stood alone within the Global South in not voting in favour of a ceasefire, as a Canada-led modification to sentence Hamas within the decision had failed earlier. This offered extra grist for the India-Israel mill. However, two months later (with the loss of life toll in Gaza crossing 20,000 by then), India deserted this place, voting in favour of a ceasefire in December, regardless that this decision largely mirrored that of October (and didn’t explicitly condemn Hamas). Later in December, India’s vote in favour of a UNGA decision condemning Israeli settlements in Palestine additionally made headlines.

A have a look at India’s voting historical past on the UNGA particularly throughout the final 10 years reveals that New Delhi’s rising closeness to Tel Aviv below the Modi authorities has grown regardless of its long-held place of a two-state answer, throughout numerous resolutions pertaining to Israel on the worldwide physique.

The basic sample

Between 2014 and 2023, India on the UNGA participated in key discussions, and voted on pertinent resolutions, on the query of Israel’s occupation of Palestine. Each yr, the UNGA considers, discusses, and votes on up to date resolutions below recurring titles, other than particular resolutions which might be borne out of recent crises/new developments. Among these, 5 key resolutions pertain to Israeli practices affecting the human rights of the Palestinian folks within the Occupied Palestinian Territory, together with East Jerusalem; Israeli settlements in Occupied Palestinian Territory; the peaceable settlement of the query of Palestine; help to Palestinian refugees; and the inalienable rights of the Palestinian folks. Among different issues, these resolutions explicitly name for Israel to withdraw from the Palestinian territories it has occupied since 1967, condemn each Israeli settlements in these territories in addition to the harassment of Palestinians by Israeli settlers, and undertake an exhaustive essential evaluation of all actions by Israel as an occupying energy in breach of worldwide legislation. These resolutions have constantly been fervently opposed by Israel, particularly for his or her essential language and tone. India’s vote for nearly all of those resolutions, throughout 10 years, has been in favour. Its abstention was noticed solely within the 77th Session (2022) for Resolution A/RES/77/247 (Israeli practices…within the Occupied Palestinian Territory).

This abstention, nonetheless, was not indicative of any change in coverage however fairly India’s reservations with the UNGA’s alternative to hunt an advisory opinion from the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on Israeli actions in occupied territory (the case which is at the moment being heard by the Court).

Also learn: Eye on the Middle East | The case 52 states made against Israel before the ICJ

In precept, India has often opposed such authorized strategies to fixing political issues. In the 78th UNGA session in December 2023, India continued to vote towards Israel within the recurring resolutions. Among these was India’s beneficial vote on the decision condemning Israeli settlements, which caught media consideration as a result of nearer watch on Indian voting positions on the UN after its shock abstention earlier in October. However, as proven above, these are recurring resolutions the place the Modi authorities too has proven appreciable continuity in coverage with earlier governments.

The exceptions

While India’s voting sample displays a transparent ingredient of continuity, there have usually been breaks particularly resolutions that deviate from the sample. For occasion, within the recurring decision titled ‘Peaceful settlement of the question of Palestine’, the UNGA yearly requires Israel to withdraw from the Palestinian territories it has occupied since 1967, which India votes in favour of, because it did even within the 76th UNGA session in December 2021. However, in the identical session, India abstained on a decision expressing “serious concern” about “the possible displacement of Palestinian families from homes that they have lived in for generations in the Sheikh Jarrah and Silwan neighbourhoods in East Jerusalem”. This decision, which was voted on as a result of riots in Sheikh Jarrah in May 2021, as a response to Israeli police motion, drew an abstention from India. Evidently, in resolutions that known as for Israel’s whole-scale withdrawal from East Jerusalem, India voted in favour. But on a decision that seeks to protect towards pressured displacement of Palestinians from neighbourhoods (equivalent to Sheikh Jarrah) inside East Jerusalem, India abstained.

Similarly, in October 2023, as India abstained on a UNGA Emergency Special Session decision calling for a ceasefire, its reasoning was (implicitly) linked to the failed modification to sentence Hamas. However, when the UNGA voted in favour of a ceasefire in 2018 following an escalation of hostilities within the Gaza Strip, rejecting a United States-led modification to sentence Hamas, India then voted in favour. In December 2023, India went again to this 2018 place, deviating solely in October 2023.

Terrorism is a definite situation

Arguably, India’s October abstention was pushed as a lot by the coverage of viewing terrorism as a definite situation, as a lot as by the assumption that it had area to manoeuvre. In the instant aftermath of the Hamas assaults on October 7, 2024, international sympathy lay with Israel, and Arab reactions have been muted. In each scale and scope, this modified, with Arab opinion now consolidated towards Israel. Regardless of trigger, in impact, India’s change in vote occurred parallel to the change in Arab reactions, even because the loss of life toll in Gaza exponentially grew. More telling is the truth that following the Prime Minister’s tweet expressing solidarity with Israel after October 7, India has not expressed any comparable assertion that may be characterised as a categorical tilt in the direction of Israel. Rather, in numerous subsequent public statements, India’s External Affairs Minister has vigorously asserted the need of the two-State answer (whilst Benjamin Netanyahu himself pivots away from it), whereas condemning terrorism. Evidently, India’s assist for Palestinian sovereignty has solely additional strengthened throughout this battle.

It is obvious then, that India below the Modi authorities has displayed a capability to sofa its UN stance from its geopolitical decisions, at the least with regard to the Israel-Palestine situation. There are different examples to assist this. For occasion, regardless of the India-United States relationship additionally reaching unprecedented heights below the Modi authorities, India has constantly refused to again Washington’s resolution to recognise Jerusalem (together with occupied territories) as Israel’s capital in 2017 and transfer its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem in 2018. Notably, when the UNGA categorically criticised the transfer in a particular session and known as upon states to desist from establishing diplomatic missions to Israel in Jerusalem, India voted in favour of the UNGA decision (A/RES/ES-10/19). That place stays unchanged, and India itself continues to recognise Tel Aviv as Israel’s capital.

When it involves voting on the UN on polarising geopolitical points (particularly these the place New Delhi has sturdy ties with both contested social gathering), India’s voting preferences vis-a-vis resolutions on the Ukraine struggle present that it prefers the abstention method. An abstention permits it extra room to train alternative, even because it expresses its want for a cessation of hostilities in its explanations of the vote. India may have very nicely adopted the identical method for resolutions on Israel-Palestine (each earlier than and in the course of the Gaza struggle), as its relationship with Israel grew, alongside its relationship with Arab states (particularly the United Arab Emirates). Its option to proceed voting in favour of key resolutions criticising Israel as an alternative of abstaining exhibits its desire to claim its initially held ideas, no matter which authorities is in energy, at the least to this point.

Bashir Ali Abbas is a analysis affiliate on the Council for Strategic and Defense Research, New Delhi, and a South Asia Visiting Fellow on the Stimson Center, Washington DC. The views expressed are private.