In November 2025, the Indian and Israeli governments signed a series of agreements that further entrench their long-standing military partnership and expand bilateral economic cooperation. In just three weeks, the two governments formalised a new “defense” Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), launched formal negotiations for a Free Trade Agreement (FTA), and held multiple rounds of high-level meetings on cooperation across a host of sectors, including artificial intelligence, surveillance technology, agriculture, water management, and industrial manufacturing.
This tightening military and economic embrace come over two years into Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza. Despite the declared ‘ceasefire,’ Israel’s relentless strikes have killed more than 350 Palestinians in Gaza since October 9th, 2025. The UN and various human rights groups also continue to document Israel’s systematic torture, war crimes , unrestrained settler attacks, forced displacement, land seizures, and expansion of apartheid policies waged against Palestinians throughout the occupied territories.
At the same time, the Indian government has escalated its human rights abuses and militarisation of in Jammu and Kashmir. The Indian military has carried out sweeping raids of civilian homes and has arbitrarily detained over 1,000 Kashmiris over the past few weeks. This follows the government’s collective punishment of Kashmiris in April of 2025 following the Pahalgam attack in which 26 tourists were killed out by suspected terrorists. The Indian military similarly raided and demolished civilian homes, and detained over 1,500 people.
It was in this context that India and Israel commenced negotiations for the seventeenth Joint Working Group meeting on ‘Defense Cooperation’ in Tel Aviv. India’s Defense Secretary, Rajesh Kumar Singh, and Israel’s Ministry of Defense, Amir Baram, co-chaired the meeting that concluded with the signing of an MoU on November 4.
According to a press release from the Indian Ministry of Defense, the agreement establishes a “unified vision and policy direction,” by outlining plans for strategic dialogues, joint military training, defense manufacturing, cyber operations, and the sharing of "advanced technologies,” to “promote co-development and co-production.” The latter reflects India's Atamnirbhar Bharat (Self-Reliant India) initiative. This allows the two states to research, develop, and manufacture surveillance systems, predictive policing software, and other dual-use AI-based military technologies that might otherwise be restricted or proprietary.
During the visit, Singh and other Indian representatives met with a “special panel” of Israeli CEOs from “major defense industries” to observe emergent technologies. The delegation also toured facilities operated by (genocide profiteers) Elbit Systems, Rafael Defence, and Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI). All three companies have been explicitly identified for supplying the weapons and surveillance infrastructure used to execute Israel’s war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Gaza Strip. Reports by UN Human Rights Council, Amnesty International, and the Campaign Against Arms Trade also indicate the companies have profited substantially from Israel’s ongoing assault on the Gaza Strip since October 2023.
The same firms had previously showcased their advanced air defense and electronic warfare systems, UAVs, and satellites at the Aero India conference in Bangalore earlier this year. The Israeli Defense Ministry described the event as an opportunity for the companies to, "demonstrate their effectiveness during the current war.”
While this agreement marks a notable milestone in their military partnership, it fits squarely within a decades-long pattern of intelligence collaboration and arms trade between the two countries. Israel has long served as one of India’s top arms suppliers, while India remains Israel’s largest arms customers.
An internal report from 2023, found India accounted for a quarter of IAI’s export revenues. According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), India has historically accounted for a substantial share of Israeli weapons exports, with purchases ranging from radars to surface-to-air missile systems, UAVs, and precision-guided munitions. These systems are frequently marketed to India as “battle-tested,” a euphemism that refers to their previous use against Palestinians in the occupied Palestinian territories.
Middle East Eye similarly reported in 2022 that Israeli arms exports to India have exponentially increased over the past few decades, rising from 15 percent of all Israeli weapons exports from 1997-2000, to as high as 42% in 2014, after Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s BJP-government came to power. The Israel-to-India weapons pipeline shows no signs of slowing. A recently reported $3.3 billion deal involves the Indian Army’s acquisition of 425,000 carbine rifles through a joint Israeli–Indian venture.
In addition to weapons and surveillance equipment, India also agreed to continue its imports of Israeli military tactics. The new MoU advances long-standing collaboration in military training between the IDF and the Indian armed forces. Reports dating back to the early 2000s reveal that Indian troops have been training in Israel, and Israeli generals have provided guidance to military officials at bases in Kashmir — a practice both governments frame as part of a joint effort to combat “Islamic insurgents.”
These tactics underscore an ideological alignment that was evident during the recent working group meetings. The Indian ministry described the partnership as driven by “shared challenges of terrorism and underscored their collective resolve to fight against the threat.” In both states, the line between so-called counterterrorism operations and the violent suppression of local populations, has long been blurred.
India and Israel’s “first-rate” strategic partnership was further fortified in late November, when India’s Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal, led a delegation of more than one hundred Indian representatives to Tel Aviv to finalise a new Terms of Reference (ToR) for the India–Israel Free Trade Agreement. This marks a major step in trade negotiations that have been underway for over fifteen years.
The visit included meetings with Israeli officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and President Isaac Herzog. The visit also featured a trip to Kibbutz Ramat Rachel to reportedly, “understand Israel’s community-driven models of sustainable agriculture and rural development.”
Additionally, delegates participated in over two-hundred and fifty business-to-business meetings as part of the India–Israel Business Forum. The demonstrations and formal discussions covered a wide range of sectors including agritech, watertech, defense, fintech, AI, quantum computing, pharmaceuticals, and space.
The FTA proves mutually beneficial for two governments whose ideological projects are inextricable from their ‘defense and security’ priorities. While Israel gains greater access to a large consumer market and a manufacturing base that can lower its production costs and expand its exports, India is offered technologies that allegedly promote modernisation and enhance resource security. This squares well with Modi’s industrial and privatisation-driven development agenda. The agreement also provides new pathways for Indian labourers to work in Israel.
Apart from the immediate legal and ethical concerns raised by India’s enthusiastic expansion of defense and industrial cooperation with the Israeli state, the partnership potentially gestures at the kinds of governance and military strategies the Indian government is seeking to import.
Whether it be the weapons, drones, sensors, smart fences, and surveillance systems, which India has already directly tested in Kashmir, or the Israeli agritech and water management technologies emerging from Israel’s military-backed research institutions, the newest phase of India–Israel cooperation spans the entire spectrum of methodologies used to control local populations and their lands.
At a moment when Israel’s bombardment of Gaza continues and enters a new phase of occupation shaped by the United States, and India concludes 2025 with the arbitrary detention of approximately 2,800 individuals, including journalists, activists, and human rights defenders in Jammu and Kashmir, the agreements seems to reflect motivations that lie well beyond the acquisition of advanced military hardware or gains to national GDP.
India also appears to be doubling down on its imports of Israeli methodologies that have been used against civilian populations in occupied Palestine. The underlying assumption appears to be that these systems and techniques will similarly find application among already heavily securitised populations in Kashmir.
The Jerusalem Post aptly noted, “The defense deal is going forward at a time when many other democracies have cut back on their defense relations with Israel due to the war in Gaza. Signing a deal with India, the world’s largest democracy, could assist Israel in rebuilding its reputation globally.”
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