Air India created history on March 22 as its Tel Aviv-bound flight flew over Saudi Arabia for the first time. With this, the flag carrier of India broke a 70-year-ban on commercial jets flying over the Arab Kingdom to reach the Jewish nation.
India’s Boeing Dreamliner received warm welcome at Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv after its historic flight over Saudi. Israeli Transport Minister Yisrael Katz, who was present at the airport, said: “This is a historic evening. The Israeli skies are connecting with the Saudi Arabian skies in one direct flight. We are celebrating the strengthening relations with India and the first civilian connection with Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states.”

Ben Gurion Airport

For his part, Indian Civil Aviation Minister Suresh Prabhakar Prabhu said that Riyadh’s decision to open its airspace for Israel-bound Indian flights would reduce the cost of running flight service. He hinted that Air India would use this route for transportation of goods in future.
Like other Muslim nations, Saudi Arabia has imposed many restrictions on Israel. However, the improvement of bilateral diplomatic ties has broken the ice, with India playing the role of a catalyst. New Delhi maintains cordial ties with both Riyadh and Tel Aviv.
According to foreign policy experts, the recent development underscores the success of Indian diplomacy in West Asia under the Narendra Modi government. Prime Minister Modi managed to boost ties with Riyadh, despite the fact that Saudi Arabia enjoys ‘friendly’ ties with Pakistan. Most importantly, India’s close ties with Israel and Iran have no negative impact on New Delhi-Riyadh relations.
The erstwhile Manmohan Singh government and the current Modi government in New Delhi successfully balanced India’s ties with Israel and with the Islamic West Asian nations. Although the Modi government hyped up the ties with Israel, the development didn’t upset the Islamic countries. In a rare first, experts find a certain dynamism in the Indian diplomacy toward West Asia.

President Putin & PM Modi

It is to be noted that Prime Minister Modi has also managed to inject new vitality into India’s relations with Russia. It was a bigger challenge for the Indian premier, as he had to make up for lost time, apart from tackling the inertia. The Indian PM’s personal interest in rebooting the bilateral relationship has helped New Delhi come closer to Moscow once again. PM Modi was one of the first global leaders to congratulate Vladimir Putin on his re-election as Russian president last week.
The Indian foreign policy experts have welcomed the PM’s attempt to create an atmosphere for strengthening India-Russia-Iran co-operation. They believe that the trilateral co-operation may also help normalise India’s ties with China, thus, ensuring peace in Asia. A change in the Asian geopolitics is on the cards, as influential Iranian political figure Alae’ddin Broujerdi recently said: “Americans are pushing for harder policies towards the Islamic Republic of Iran and we need to strengthen our view towards the East, especially China and Russia.”
Will it be possible for India to play the role of a positive catalyst once again in cementing ties between ‘East’ and ‘West’ Asia?

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Published by Koushik Das

Koushik Das (born on May 16, 1976 in Kolkata) is a career journalist. Based in the Indian capital of New Delhi, Koushik writes mainly about foreign policies and current geopolitical issues, and rarely about other topics. His own political ideas are highly influenced by Antonio Gramsci, Louis Althusser, Michel Foucault, Michael Oakeshott and others. English philosopher and political theorist Oakeshott (Dec 11, 1901-Dec 19, 1990) says that “in political activity, men sail a boundless and bottomless sea. There is neither harbour for shelter nor floor for anchorage, neither starting-place, nor appointed destination. But we have to keep afloat”. (Rationalism in Politics, 1962) As a student of Political Science, Koushik loves to share his views on issues, which have great impacts on his thought process (and also on India, South Asia and of course on the global community), with his readers through his website – Boundless Ocean of Politics. By doing so, he tries to keep himself afloat. You will find some of his articles in https://inserbia.info/today/ (https://inserbia.info/today/author/kou_das13_i/), as he has been trying to assess the global geopolitics since 2003. You can also mail him at kousdas@gmail.com View all posts by Koushik Das