India-Israel Ties and the Geopolitical Battle Over Haifa Day

In recent years, a dramatic and surprising transformation has been unfolding in India’s foreign policy. Once regarded as a steadfast champion of the Palestinian narrative on the global stage, India has evolved into a key strategic ally for Israel across a wide array of sectors, ranging from technology and critical infrastructure to large-scale defense cooperation. Under Prime Minister Narendra Modi, New Delhi no longer relies on traditional diplomacy alone, instead adopting a pragmatic and nationalist line that views Israel as a natural partner.

Defense relations have soared to new heights through massive arms deals and joint military technology development. Concurrently, the integration of major Indian corporations into national infrastructure projects cements the notion that Jerusalem and New Delhi are intertwined along global trade corridors such as the IMEC. This warmth was vividly demonstrated when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu swiftly commended the Indian captain of a flydubai flight who, despite being stabbed inside the cockpit, helped save passengers en route to Tel Aviv.

Faced with this geopolitical reality, Palestinian diplomacy and propaganda have exhibited growing frustration. Realizing they cannot directly halt arms deals or economic corridors, they are attempting to undermine the moral and narrative justification of the alliance. At the heart of this struggle lies Haifa Day.

The Battle of Haifa and Modern Remembrance

Every year on September 23, the Indian military commemorates the 1918 Battle of Haifa, in which Indian cavalrymen from the Jodhpur, Mysore, and Hyderabad Lancers captured the city from the Ottoman Empire. Although the war was fought between the British and the Turks, Haifa witnessed a frontal assault by Indian horsemen armed with lances and swords against a heavily fortified Ottoman, German, and Austro-Hungarian force equipped with artillery and machine guns. Against all odds, the cavalry achieved an unprecedented military success, recorded as history's last successful cavalry charge.

In 2010, following historical rediscovery, the First World War in Israel Heritage Association, the Haifa History Association, and the Haifa Municipality initiated official commemorations for Haifa Day to honor the Indian soldiers. Since then, the diplomatic missions of both nations have marked the event annually. In January 2018, during Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's historic visit to India, a central square in New Delhi was named in honor of Haifa to commemorate the 44 soldiers who fell in the battle.

For years, Haifa Day events passed quietly. However, the meteoric rise of India-Israel ties—standing in sharp contrast to Israel's diplomatic isolation in other parts of the world—has become a thorn in the side of the Palestinian Authority. Over the past year, the Palestinian Ambassador to New Delhi, Abdullah Muhammad Abu Shawesh, launched a meticulously planned diplomatic campaign.

Diplomatic Pushback and Historical Narratives

Drawing on rigorous legal and historical research, the Palestinian mission dispatched a formal five-page letter to the Indian government in June. The ambassador expressed deep concern over Israel's alleged attempts to rewrite, distort, and politicize the historical record of Palestine. Alongside the letter, the mission briefed local journalists and parliamentarians.

Abu Shawesh's primary objection focuses on the use of the term liberation and the attempt to weave a battle that occurred roughly 30 years prior to Israel's establishment into a shared Indo-Israeli history. The ambassador protests the framing itself, emphasizing that the Indian soldiers did not act independently but under the command of the British Empire.

The ambassador’s complaints reflect a deep frustration that, on at least one major front, Israel is winning both on the battlefield and in the narrative.

One might wonder why India chooses to warmly embrace soldiers who fell in service of the British Empire, the very power against which India waged a protracted struggle for independence. Yet behind this gesture lies a complex perspective: the Indian capacity to distinguish between the injustices of the colonial regime and the heritage, sacrifice, and valor of the soldiers on the battlefield.

Under Prime Minister Modi, India's relationship with its military history has undergone a profound shift, becoming an integral part of a new national narrative. A cornerstone of this policy was the inauguration of the National War Memorial in New Delhi in 2019, addressing the fact that for some 70 years since independence, India lacked a central monument bearing the names of all its fallen soldiers.

The Geopolitical Battle Over Soft Power

Furthermore, the honor of the Indian-British army soldiers was fully restored, reversing previous administrations' tendencies to downplay their contributions. Modi transformed the commemoration of fallen soldiers into a source of national pride and a pillar of India's soft power as a global superpower.

Later in his letter, the ambassador argues that if one adopts the Indian government's line of thought, India's historical affinity lies with the Palestinians rather than the State of Israel. Citing official figures, he notes that 491 Indian soldiers are buried in the Ramla Military Cemetery, 109 in Gaza and Deir al-Balah, 47 in Haifa, and many others across the region.

He contends that highlighting the Battle of Haifa is a desperate Israeli attempt to court India through an artificial narrative while minimizing the broader sacrifice of Indian soldiers across the entire Middle East. Yet India has long moved past an apologetic foreign policy and is no longer an automatic echo chamber for the Palestinian narrative at the UN.

Ultimately, the diplomatic maneuvers in New Delhi highlight how symbolic history has become a proxy battleground for modern geopolitical alignments, where the enduring memory of past bravery continues to shape contemporary alliances.