India’s Israel tilt | An excerpt from Stanly Johny’s Original Sin
The HinduIn the 76 years of its existence, Israel has built itself as a powerful entity in a largely hostile region. So a future Palestine state, whenever it’s formed, should be unarmed.” Perceived threat If Israel says a future Palestine state should be unarmed, it would not be a sovereign state. “I think that anyone who moves to establish a Palestinian state today, and evacuate areas, is giving radical Islam an area from which to attack the State of Israel,” he said in 2015. Naftali Bennett, the former Prime Minister, said in a 2013 interview, before he formed his government, “There is not going to be a Palestinian state within the tiny land of Israel.” By “the tiny land of Israel”, he was referring to the land between the Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, which was historical Palestine. India has also de-hyphenated Israel and Palestine so that we can deepen our bilateral partnership irrespective of the Palestine factor.” With his crisp comment, the diplomat was actually laying bare India’s position towards Israel-Palestine, which has seen both changes and continuity over the years.