By Chloe Baker, Senior Opinions Editor
On February 25, 2026, when Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi stood before the Israeli Knesset and introduced himself as “a representative of one ancient civilization addressing another,” something shifted in the air. The shift wasn’t diplomatic (those effects may take years to surface), rather it was in the story we tell about Israel’s place in the world.
I visited India last summer, but if you know me you already know that, judging by how much I talk about it. My friends poke fun at my constant reminiscing, and I probably think about my trip daily. I now drink chai tea (which I learned is really just called “chai”), and I’ve even purchased curry spice in an attempt to bring some Indian flair to my 35th Street dorm. But what I keep coming back to isn’t the excellent food or even the chaos and vibrant colors of the streets. Rather, it is the warmth and friendliness of the people that I can’t stop thinking about. It is the sense that these people are part of a civilization that has been here for thousands of years and know it deeply. They were unhurried, rooted and deeply themselves.
Those qualities, I’d argue, are exactly what India and Israel recognize in each other.
India recognized Israel in 1950, just two years after the state was founded, and Israel’s consulate in Mumbai has operated since 1953. Yet full diplomatic relations between the two countries were not established until January 29, 1992. During the Cold War, India showed support for Palestine and was the first non-Arab country to recognize the Palestine Liberation Organization as the “sole and legitimate representative of the Palestinian people.” With the end of the Cold War and the promise of the Oslo Accords, India’s stance on Israel changed in the 1990s. But, the shift was not as dramatic as it might seem, considering India’s treatment of Jews dating back centuries.
One of the things I learned while in India was that it is one of the only countries in the world that never expelled the Jews. There were no violent pogroms in India, and no mass murders of the Jewish people. The story of India doesn’t necessarily align with the Jewish narrative that we were persecuted in every place we ever went. In fact, it’s almost the opposite. The Jews first arrived in India after the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE, settling along the Malabar Coast in southwest India. They eventually made their way to Cochin, in the state of Kerala, where a Jewish community flourished for over 600 years. When Jews were expelled from Spain and Portugal in the 1490s, some of those refugees made their way to Cochin (a port city in India) as well, finding safety in a land that had never turned Jews away. India was, for much of Jewish history, a quiet exception to the harsh treatment of the Jews. India was a civilization ancient enough and secure enough in its own identity that it had no need to scapegoat ours.
The civilizational relations between India and Israel date back to more than two millennia. As Prime Minister Modi said in his speech to the Knesset, “Long before we related to each other as modern States, we were linked by ties that go back more than two thousand years.” That ancient foundation now supports modern initiatives. In defense and security, the two countries signed a formal MOU (Memorandum of Understanding) on Defense Cooperation just last November, reflecting what Modi called a vital partnership between “trusted partners” in an uncertain world. On counterterrorism, both nations share what Modi described as a “consistent and uncompromising policy of zero tolerance for terrorism, with no double standards.” This policy comes from lived experience rather than just political calculation, with India dealing with Islamist terrorism stemming from Pakistan. In agriculture, Israeli expertise in precision irrigation has already transformed farming practices across India, with 43 joint Centers of Excellence training over half a million Indian farmers — and Modi called for expanding to 100 joint Centers. In technology, the two countries are collaborating on quantum computing, semiconductors and artificial intelligence, and in 2018 Modi and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu jointly inaugurated a technology incubator in India that has since supported nearly 900 startups. This relationship wasn’t built overnight and it isn’t built off of convenience. It is carefully crafted and tended to, sector by sector, visit by visit into something genuinely substantial.
In 1953, then Israeli Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion produced Israel’s National Security Doctrine. This document — commonly referenced by the state’s government today — outlines the asymmetries between Israel and its Arab neighbors in relation to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Ben-Gurion discusses in depth the advantages the Arabs possess. One of the asymmetries, he notes, is that Israel is a nation that dwells alone (while the Palestinians rack up support). I beg to differ. While it’s true that Israel will never be able to really rely on anyone but itself, the staunch support from India, and its leader Narendra Modi, challenges the story we tell about Israel’s place in the world. We have an ally, not just in modern, diplomatic terms, but in an ancient, unwavering way.
There is one more thing worth pausing on. I had always been puzzled by the fact that in Hebrew, India is called Hodu. It appears in the very first line of Megillat Esther — “from Hodu to Kush” — referring to all of the places Achashverosh ruled over. The word Hodu also carries another meaning entirely. It comes from the root hoda’ah — gratitude, acknowledgement, thanks. Hodu L’Hashem — to give thanks to G-d. After visiting India last summer, after learning about the centuries of Jewish life that flourished there undisturbed, and now watching Modi stand in the Knesset and declare “India stands with Israel firmly, with full conviction, in this moment and beyond,” I think I finally understand why.
The very name we use for India is etymologically inseparable from the Jewish concept of gratitude. If that isn’t a hint from history, I don’t know what is.
Photo Credit: Chloe Baker