A
riel Sharon is dead. As his life and legacy is discussed across the world, Ariel Sharon, who remains a controversial figure, will be remembered in India as the first Israeli prime minister to visit the country – and the only one till now.
The year Sharon came to New Delhi (2003) marked a watershed moment in the history of the India-Israeli relations. Diplomatic relations had been elevated to full ambassadorial level only a decade earlier. While both countries established relations soon after Israel’s creation, India kept them low key, with only a small Israeli consular office operating out of Mumbai, restricted to mostly trade.
As a founding-member of the Non-aligned Movement (NAM), India saw itself as a champion of all oppressed, colonised people, and its commitment to the Palestinian cause has had been unwavering. Along with its large Muslim minority, India did not want to antagonize its relations with the Arab world.
The end of the cold war, the dissolution of the USSR – India’s traditional defence and strategic ally – changed all that. More significantly, it coincided with the Madrid and Oslo processes, and with India’s own policy of liberalization of trade and economy. India – under a Congress government – upgraded its relations with Israel to full ambassadorial level in 1991 and since then bilateral relations have only surged forward, especially in defence but not restricted to it. However, there was hardly any contact at the top-level, with no visit by head of state or government visiting either way.
In 1999 when the BJP-led NDA coalition formed the government, one of its foreign policy priorities was to deepen ties with both Israel and the US. The same year, during India’s Kargil war with Pakistan, Israel, which had by then become one of India’s largest arms seller, rushed to its defence by providing, amongst other things, photographs from its military satellites. It was followed by a range of high level visits to Israel, which included L.K. Advani, then home minister, and then external affairs minister Jaswant Singh.
This string of high-profile interactions was followed by an invitation by India for the Israeli prime minister to visit the country. Ariel Sharon accepted the invitation and visited India in 2003. It was a visit mired in controversy. Much of the opposition, including the Left parties, were against the visit, as were major Muslim groups across the country. What caused this outrage was not so much Sharon’s past history in Lebanon or elsewhere, or his claim to be ‘father of settlement movement’ in Israel, as it was his more recent measures taken with regards to the Palestinians. It had more to do with the house arrest of Palestinian leader5 Yasser Arafat in 2001, the siege of the Muqata, the military incursions into the West Bank villages and towns, after the establishment of the Palestinian Authority there, the massacre in Jenin, and the beginning of the construction of Israel’s ‘apartheid wall’ – all of which came close on the heels of the 9/11 tragedy and the beginning of the war on terror. For liberals, the invitation to Sharon by the government was the waving of the proverbial red flag.
In fact, few visits by foreign dignitaries have ever stirred up so much passion in India as most Indians tend to see foreign policy as something out there which does not impact their lives directly.
Leaders of the Communist Party of India (Marxist), the Communist Party of India, the Rashtriya Janata Dal, the Janata Dal (Secular), the Samajwadi Party and other parties issued a statement where they described the government’s invitation to Ariel Sharon as “a most unfortunate decision.” The signatories also included former prime minister H.D. Deve Gowda. The government was criticised for floating the idea of a ‘US-Israel-India’ axis.
Most editorials and opinion pieces in the Indian media were scathing of the government. Many Muslim groups voiced their fierce antagonism to Sharon’s visit. Syed Ahmed Bukhari, the chief cleric at Delhi’s Jama Masjid, said Mr Sharon’s visit was ‘a black day for India’s democracy’. Said S.M.N. Rahman Barkati, chief cleric at the Tipu Sultan mosque in Kolkata: “It is very unfortunate that the BJP government is joining the U.S. and Israel to create an anti-Islamic climate.”
On the Friday before the visit Muslims in Mumbai gathered in large numbers after prayers to protest against the visit. Children marched holding banners which read “Sharon: Enemy of the people”. Similar protests were held in Delhi and Kolkata too.
Other protests included those in Delhi by about 800 members of communist parties marched near India Gate, while shouting anti-Sharon slogans and with placards that read “Israeli Hitler go home”.
Finally, amidst extremely tight security, Mr. Sharon did make the visit, accompanied by a high profile business and defence delegation. However, he had to cancel a scheduled visit to Agra, and returned to Israel without fulfilling his wish to see the Taj Mahal. The visit, a diplomatic coup for Israel, was Mr. Sharon’s very first visit as Prime Minister to an Asian capital.
The following year, in general elections the UPA I took charge in Delhi. Cooperation and collaboration between two countries continue, and Israel is today India’s largest weapons supplier. However, there have been no major high- profile visits between the two countries except that of India’s then External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna’s trip to Tel Aviv in 2012.
And now that Mr. Sharon is no more, it’s time to look closely at his legacy in India. Sharon, many experts say, played an important role in the transformation of the India-Israel relations. Besides defence trade, counter-terror cooperation has emerged as an important feature of India-Israel ties over the last decade. In a message to Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu, India’s Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said: “During his long career in public service, Mr. Sharon made extremely important contributions to the State of Israel. As Prime Minister, he took bold steps for peace in the region. We in India recall that he was the first-ever Prime Minister of Israel to visit India in September 2003. His lasting contribution to the promotion of our bilateral ties will be long remembered.” But given Sharon’s controversial record, no senior Indian official attended his funeral.
(The views expressed in this article are solely those of the author. Aditi Bhaduri can be followed on Twitter @aditijan)
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