A week is a long time in war and politics. The horrific October 7 terror attack on Israeli civilians by the Palestinian militant outfit, Hamas has sparked off global outrage but also impacted domestic politics. A Congress Working Committee (CWC) resolution mysteriously omitted mentioning Hamas terror while focusing on Palestinian rights. With the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) accusing the grand old party of being terror apologists, the Congress hastily clarified that it unequivocally condemned the loss of all civilian lives. Now, a week later, the blast at a Gaza hospital site in which hundreds have died, has led Opposition leaders to ask questions of the BJP: Will India’s ruling party speak up for the long-suffering Palestinian people?
Historically, terror acts have seen Indian political parties speak mostly in one voice. The ascent of Prime Minister (PM) Narendra Modi and his politics of muscular nationalism changed the ground rules. When, during the 2019 general elections campaign, Modi referred to the Balakot airstrikes and boasted, “ghar mein ghuskar maara” (we entered their home and attacked them), he positioned the war against Pakistan-based terror at the centre of his re-election pitch. More specifically, he contrasted the retaliatory strikes with the Manmohan Singh government’s more cautious approach in the aftermath of the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack.
During last year’s Gujarat assembly elections campaign, the PM was even more direct when he asked the electorate to be “alert” about the Congress and like-minded parties which he said kept mum on “big terrorist attacks” to not offend their vote bank. An uncorroborated claim by Congress leader Salman Khurshid that Sonia Gandhi was moved to tears by pictures of Indian Mujahideen terrorists shot dead during the 2008 Batla House encounter was used to amplify the argument that the Congress was guilty of minority appeasement and soft on terror. A series of terror blasts during the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) years, especially between 2005 and 2008, have been highlighted to push the Congress onto the defensive.
Where this terror politics takes an uglier turn is when it resorts to constant dog-whistling to draw a link between global Islamic terror groups and co-religionists in the neighbourhood. Indian Muslims may express solidarity with the Palestinian cause but why should they bear any collective guilt for a dastardly attack by Hamas in Israel or indeed for the nefarious cross-border activities of a Pakistan-based Lashkar or Jaish terrorists or Afghan Taliban militia. Recall how when the Taliban recaptured power in Afghanistan in 2021, Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath at an election rally warned that those with a “Talibani” mindset within the country would be dealt with sternly. If the Congress stands accused of minority pandering, then the BJP can be faulted for seeking to consolidate a Hindu vote bank by playing politics with terror. It is the starkly polarised nature of vote bank politics, which uses religion to divide and rule, that has drawn domestic politics within the crosshairs of a terror attack in another country.
Moreover, the ever-widening influence of social media and instant messaging tools on mobile phones has created ominous real-time narratives that are craftily exploited as weapons of mass division (WMDs). Take, for example, the toxic WMD that “not every Muslim is a terrorist but every terrorist is a Muslim” that is repeatedly and deliberately echoed across WhatsApp groups to spread fear and prejudice about an entire community. Right-wing internet warriors in particular have been quick to use incendiary social media content in the war on terror to demonise all Muslims. A report by Boom, a fact-checking website, found that a number of Indian X users were helming a concerted Islamophobic disinformation campaign to showcase Palestinians as fundamentally inhuman. This includes a fake video claiming to show dozens of young girls taken as sex slaves by a “Palestinian” fighter.
The shrill propagandists may seek to create a neat black and white universe of villains and heroes but India’s approach to the Israel-Hamas war stems from a complicated history. In the Nehruvian non-aligned era, India was seen to firmly hitch itself to the “Free Palestine” bandwagon. By contrast, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) leadership was always a staunch supporter of the Israeli State even when New Delhi kept its distance from Tel Aviv. In 1992, RSS leaders backed the Narasimha Rao government’s decision to establish full diplomatic ties with Israel.
In more recent times, the Indo-Israeli equation has acquired strategic depth with PM Modi striking a strong personal bond with his Israeli counterpart Benjamin Netanyahu. At the same time, Modi has consciously and successfully cultivated business-friendly Gulf States such as the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia. While New Delhi has rightly expressed sympathy with Israel over the unprecedented terror attack, the Modi government cannot afford to antagonise its newfound friends across the Arab world with any harsh one-sided remarks. How can the Indian political establishment stereotype Palestinian Muslims as villains and Israeli Jews as victims when the reality is a tortured and prolonged conflict in which basic human rights are at stake? Realpolitik demands a diplomatic tightrope walk shorn of high-decibel rhetoric or moral grandstanding.
Which is why Indian politicians across the divide need to be more circumspect before jumping the gun to seek any potential electoral benefit. The horrors of Hamas need to be condemned but not without reference to the numerous atrocities faced by the Palestinian people for decades. There are no winners and losers in this cycle of hate and violence, revenge and collective retribution, only thousands of dead bodies.
Post-script: Clearly discomfited by the CWC resolution faux pas, a young Congress leader has an interesting explanation for the party’s dilemma over Israel and Palestine. “Some of our leaders were reared in a period when Indira Gandhi was wooed by Yasser Arafat and Israel was pitched as an enemy State. These leaders live in past nostalgia and not present realities,” he admits. Touche!
Rajdeep Sardesai is a senior journalist and author. The views expressed are personal