Clutching their bleeding hearts, a group of self-styled conscientious objectors have filed a public interest litigation (PIL) in the Supreme Court. Prashant Bhushan, Jean Dreze, Harsh Mander and some others want the good and great of India’s top court to stand in judgement of India’s arms exports to Israel. They want the SC to urgently come up with a legal remedy to halt this imagined perfidy against Palestine.
In the petition, Bhushan has averred that “India is bound by various international laws and treaties that obligate India not to supply military weapons to States guilty of war crimes, as any export could be used in serious violations of international humanitarian law.”
The reference to “war crimes” in team Bhushan’s PIL draws from an International Court of Justice (ICJ) ruling on Israel earlier this year. The panel had ordered provisional measures against Israel for violations in the Gaza Strip, related to obligations under the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of Genocide.
Since the Ministry of Defence (MoD) has been made a party to the PIL, the top court may even admit the plea and issue notices. But the SC, if it has any meaningful claim to wisdom, should dispose of the matter. This is one issue that even the all-knowing Milords, with due deference, can do without arbitrating.
After all, foreign policy experts never tire of pointing out that while morality is not irrelevant in foreign relations, it is not decisive either. If morality was decisive in formulating a response to the war in Gaza, then Bhushan and company would have been denouncing Hamas. More on this later.
Ordering the Indian government to halt arms exports to Israel will put a strain on a relationship that is pivotal to India in more ways than one.
First, Israel stands as one of India’s largest weapons suppliers, providing critical technologies such as missile defence systems, drones, and precision-guided munitions. These weapons don’t just contribute to India’s military modernisation efforts; they are vital to it. Moreover, Israel serves as a crucial partner in India’s counter-terrorism efforts, providing valuable intelligence and expertise. These shared inputs have visibly enhanced India’s ability to counter regional and cross-border terror, along with broader military threats.
Away from military matters, Israeli imports are becoming increasingly pivotal in helping India fight food insecurity. Boosting agricultural productivity is pivotal to India’s aim of building a more equal and thereby stable society.
Above and beyond, there are also the exigencies of geopolitics. India is locked into a crucial alliance with Israel in West Asia. The I2U2, comprising India, Israel, the UAE, and the United States, is the Gulf version of the Indo-Pacific QUAD. Simply put, the I2U2 ensures a balance of power in one of the world’s most contested geographies, straddling the most vital trade and energy corridor on Earth. Additionally, the I2U2 prevents the China-Pakistan axis from acquiring strategic depth in a region that overlooks India’s western flank. This bloc provides tactical breathing space to India at a time when China has already ring-fenced it on its northern, southern, and eastern frontiers.
Upsetting Israel at this juncture, when it is pursuing legitimate security interests central to its survival, will almost certainly embitter Tel Aviv, potentially forcing a review of its ties with India. Which, for reasons listed here, will be a body blow to India’s national interest.
If anything, New Delhi owes a debt of gratitude to Israel. Who can forget Israel’s military and moral support to India during the 1999 Kargil conflict? Israel’s military munitions proved to be the factor that tipped the scales in India’s favour when our troops were, one daresay, literally looking over the precipice in that high-altitude war theatre.
Also, in 1998, the year before Pakistan’s Kargil misadventure, the Israeli government offered unstinting support to India’s Pokhran nuclear pyrotechnics. Israel was one of the few states that refused to join the crippling sanctions regime against India.
Even on the question of morality, the “all eyes on Gaza” ecosystem would be better off denouncing Hamas. It’s Hamas that has brought war and damnation upon the Palestinians of Gaza by unilaterally provoking a crime against humanity on Oct 7, 2023. Hamas crossed the border into Israel, slaughtering 1,100 innocent Israelis, including babies sleeping in their cribs. It’s the Hamas that has turned hospitals into ammunition dumps and ordinary Palestinians into human shields in Gaza. It is the Hamas that diverted billions of dollars of foreign funds, meant to transform Gazan lives above ground, towards literally building an underground network of Islamist revanchists. The Hamas Charter declared a war to the finish on Jews. It is the people of Gaza that voted for the anti-Semitism of Hamas.
Of course, the Bhushan posse—some of whom were members of Sonia Gandhi’s erstwhile NAC—will do nothing to call out Hamas. Exposing Hamas and its bigotry undermines a diligent left-liberal project to preserve a sense of Muslim victimhood.
If it weren’t Palestine, it would have been Kashmir. It is worth remembering that Bhushan and some of his cohorts in the past have even made a legal case for a plebiscite in Kashmir. And when that endeavour failed, they moved the apex court to reverse the abrogation of Articles 370 and 35A by what they label as a “Hindu majority” government. Remember, they are yet to accept the SC ruling upholding the abrogation of Articles 370 and 35A.
The ecosystem’s “Palestine Interest Litigation” is merely the latest perverse attempt to fan the fears of Hindu majoritarianism. And we all know towards what end.
Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect News18’s views.
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