A recently published report claims that the Narendra Modi-led ultra-right-wing government in India ignored all international and domestic warnings about the Israeli genocide in Gaza and directly or indirectly enabled Israel in committing war crimes in the Occupied Palestinian Territories.

India emerged as one of the leading weapon suppliers to Israel with a total of over 2,596 shipments of arms sent to it since the beginning of the war in Gaza in October 2023, says the recently published Amnesty International report.

The report says Indian weapons, ammunition, parts, and components of dual-use items were used by the Israeli army to kill and maim Palestinians and destroy the civilian infrastructure in Gaza.

The report, titled“Made in India: The Supply of Weapons and Ammunition to Israel,”was published on July 30 with details of shipments, actors involved, and the possible nature of their complicity in Israeli war crimes in Gaza.

Over 73,000 Palestinians, a large number of them children, have been killed and over 1,74,000 others have been wounded in the Israeli war in Gaza.

Though a ceasefire was achieved in October last year, Israel still continues to carry out daily attacks on Palestinians in Gaza with over 1,200 people killed and over 4,100 others injured in those attacks.

Close ideological connections

It is a fact that India was not the only country supplying weapons to Gaza during the war. The US and various European states, such as Germany, France, and Slovenia have been far major suppliers of arms to Israel in this period. However, the pace of India’s transformation from an anti-colonial actor to occupation and genocide enabler has been remarkable.

India for decades refused to have formal diplomatic relations with Israel and had a long-standing position of supporting a two-state solution. Now, under the Hindu-supremacist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led government, ruling the country since 2014, it has even refused to criticize Israeli war crimes in Gaza.

The Indian government under Modi boasts about close ideological connections with Zionism and has been pushing for deeper economic and military ties despite strong opposition from within the country.

Modi made an official state visit to Israel earlier this year amidst the global calls for sanctions over the ongoing genocide in Gaza. He ignored the fact that the ICC has issued arrest warrants against his Israeli counterpart Benjamin Netanyahu and its former defence minister Yoav Gallant for war crimes.

Modi called Netanyahu a “close friend” and went ahead and even addressed the Knesset on the eve of the US-Israeli war on Iran boasting about historical ideological links and invoking “shared victimhood” of “terrorist violence.”

The Modi government has cracked down on domestic protests against the genocide in Gaza and has been accused of persecuting even minor forms of expressions of solidarity with the Palestinians. On international platforms such as the UN, it has avoided voting against Israel on critical resolutions.

Deep military ties

India sent weapons, ammunition, parts, and components of dual-use items to maintain the supply chains “enabling Israel’s military operations,” including those which have been widely recognized by the UN and other international bodies as acts of genocide, the Amnesty report says.

“Israel has been enabled to carry out crime of this magnitude by an almost uninterrupted supply of weapons and munitions from states that, in facilitating this supply, have been providing material support for the genocide,” the report says.

The Indian companies which supplied arms to Israel include both the public and privately owned. According to the Amnesty report, India has shipped nearly a million units of arms parts, parts used to make explosive devices such as drone warheads and components of military vehicles to Israel since October 2023.

India, under Modi, has also established strong business relationships with various Israeli weapon manufacturers such as the Elbit systems and Rafael Advanced Defense Systems, among others. Some of these Israeli companies have also established their factories in India under joint ventures.

These joint ventures include one of India’s largest private corporate groups, Adani, as well as the public sector undertakings such as the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO).

India contributes to Israeli occupation and genocide also by being the largest buyer of its arms for years. It bought weapons worth over a billion dollars from Israel in 2022 contributing one third of all its earnings from arms sales that year.

India may be complicit in Israeli war crimes

According to international law, all states are prohibited to allow sales of weapons which can potentially be used for human rights violations. If a state or a private entity within that particular state is involved in such weapons transactions it is liable to face war crime charges.

Since all suppliers of weapons are expected to do due diligence to identify and prevent any use, actual or potential, of their supplies in committing human rights abuses by a state or a non-state actor. It is obvious that India knowingly violated its obligations.

Amnesty report also underlined the lack of any judicial initiative to prevent India playing a role in Israeli genocide. The Indian Supreme Court dismissed a petition submitted by former civil servants demanding cancellation of all weapons export deals to Israel while citing “economic, geo-political and other interests” in international relations in 2024.

The report concludes that despite genocide being a common knowledge India continues to supply weapons to Israel and demanded that “India and Indian companies must take urgent action to stop this” or face the risk of complicity in Israeli war crimes.

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