Volume 26 Number 1 Spring 2021

Israel
Studies

Special Section:
ISRAEL FOREIGN RELATIONS
 Khinvraj Jangid

Imagining Nations, Creating

States: Nehru, Ben-Gurion
and an Analogical Study of
India and Israel in
Post-colonial Asia
ABSTR ACT

Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first Prime Minister (1947–64), and David

Ben-Gurion, Israel’s first Prime Minister (1948–54; 1955–63), played sub-
stantial roles in shaping two modern nation-states in post-Colonial Asia.
The article is anchored by a comparative study of the two leaders who
influenced nation-building through their individual political values and
ideological convictions. The key question posed here is what similarities
existed in the nation-building roles these figures played and how they may
have contributed to the trajectories followed by their respective nations.
Nehru and Ben-Gurion were both modernists in terms of their political
visions of a secular, socialist-democratic and egalitarian state. Although
the two men never met and remained on non-speaking terms because
India had reservations about forging ties with Israel, they both represented
qualities of leadership in Asia.
Keywords: Leadership, Imagined Nation, State-Building in Asia, Democracy,
Secularism, Religion, Democratic-Socialism, Leadership legacies, Trans-
national approach

doi 10.2979/israelstudies.26.1.04 73
74 26 number 1

INTRODUCTION

T
states after achieving independence in 1947 and 1948 respectively, point
to the development of secular ideals and democratic aspirations in post-
colonial Asia. India gained independence from British rule in August 1947,
and Israel declared its independence in May of 1948. Although the two
states had no bilateral diplomatic ties until 1992, their nascent political
trajectories share noteworthy parallels with regard to democratic orien-
tation, colonial legal and bureaucratic legacies, and democratic socialist
ideals favoring secularism. Jawaharlal Nehru, India’s first Prime Minister
(1947–64), and David Ben-Gurion, Israel’s first Prime Minister (1948–54;
55–63), played pivotal roles in shaping the post-independence identities of
the two modern nation-states.
Both leaders were modernists in their political visions of a secular,
democratic and egalitarian state; both leaned towards socialism in the
public articulation of their personal political ideologies. The article is
anchored by a comparative study of the two leaders and their founding
values given that their peoples have turned to a religion-inflected nation-
alism in recent decades and have arguably pushed back against unfettered
globalization and created a narrative of self-sufficiency (edging at times into
ethnic chauvinism) drawn from the collective consciousness of their long
religious histories.
The comparison is inspired by notable parallels between India and
Israel. Although in political life nothing is similar to anything elsewhere,
insight may be derived from a comparison of certain events, actors and
ideas. In the present case, a careful comparison will help us develop a clearer
understanding of evolving trans-national phenomena in Asia.
Both India and Israel achieved statehood towards the end of British
colonial rule in Asia. The formation of the nation-state was, in both cases,
undercut by severe tensions between religious fundamentalism and secu-
larism which had to be negotiated. Nation building was not a coherent,
one-dimensional exercise for either country, and both had to struggle with
internal issues of cultural nationalism in the hope of establishing a modern
state, founded on secular law and progressive principles.
Notwithstanding the secular national liberation forces which had
guided independence, both leaders confronted serious cultural and/or reli-
gious challenges to the identities of their new countries; in both cases,
minority rights have remained a significant concern, yet India and Israel
are exemplars of stable democracies in post-colonial Asia. Nehru guided
 75

India along a path to democracy fraught with obstacles and challenges

which might very well have thwarted his ambition. In the event, India has
managed to sustain its democratic orientation, and is today an ideal for
many Afro-Asian nations. Ben-Gurion, for his part, wished Israel to become
a model democracy in the region of Western Asia.
Albeit the notion of democracy in Israel was contested by the assertion
of Jewish identity, the new state secured a resilient working democracy
in the regional context. My argument here is that the delicate process of
state-building was made possible by the personal qualities and guidance
of Ben-Gurion and Nehru. Their abilities to take the painstaking road
of democratic values, rule of law, egalitarian and socialist principles to
accommodate different classes (in Israel, Jewish immigrants from Western
and Eastern countries and in India, higher castes and untouchables). Both
leaders were powerful enough as individuals to govern in an autocratic
manner but chose the path of consensus building and compromise instead.
Arguably, the historical context from which the Republic of India
emerged has few parallels with the State of Israel before independence. The
Indian national movement was primarily concerned with liberating the land
from foreign rule by means of anti-colonialism activity; Jewish nationalism,
i.e., Zionism, had as its goal the return of the Jewish diaspora, “born in
exile,” to its ancestral lands, but without fully considering the presence of
a non-Jewish native population.1
The geographic and demographic distinctions between India and
Israel must also be taken into account in a comparative framework which
considers the two countries together. However, even after accounting for
their different historical circumstances, their similarities are relevant and
substantive.
It is through these parallel, analogous, but far from identical contexts
that I aim to develop a reading which positions the corresponding
post-statehood histories of the two nations during which they had no
bilateral relations, yet confronted many of the same key issues: religion,
secularism, majority-minority relations, nationalism versus universalism
or cosmopolitanism, traditional values versus modernism etc.2 Ben-Gurion
was deeply concerned with “the country’s spiritual state” as Nehru was with
India’s great civilizational ethos ‘vasudhaiva-kutumbakam’ (Sanskrit: The
World is one Family). Theirs was a mission in which nation was not the
goal but a means to a better world.
In this juxtaposition of Nehru and Ben-Gurion, I propose that Asian
nation-states should be studied from an Asian perspective. As such, it is
more meaningful to compare India and Israel to each other than to Western
76 26 number 1

nation-states. This will likewise add a significant historical perspective to

the process of imagining nations and creating states. Both India and Israel
derived this process from established Western political norms such as the
rational-legal sovereign state, the one-people-one-nation theory, secularism,
and even the concept of national liberation as emanating from Woodrow
Wilson’s principle of self-determination. These ideas were introduced into
the Asian political sphere by leaders like Nehru in the case of India and
Ben-Gurion in the case of entrenched Israel, who both successfully imple-
mented them in post-colonial Asia. But in implementing such “western”
notions, they transformed them somewhat to fit a local context. Nehru
managed to carve a multinational state out of India’s polyglot cultures and
ethnicities, while Ben-Gurion found Israel’s identity as a democratic state
embedded in the nation’s Jewish antecedents.
The primary concern of this article is not the diplomatic and political
history of bilateral relations between India and Israel, nor does it compare
Israel’s foreign policy to that of India.3 What intrigues me is the hitherto
unexplored domain of analogical and trans-national readings of these two
nation-states in tandem. The two giant leaders, Nehru and Ben-Gurion,
have not so far been studied in tandem by historical or political scholars.
This is surprising, given their enormous influence on their emergent nation-
states and their parallel years in the power. My research brings the two and
their zeitgeist together for the first time.
The article’s central argument is that India and Israel share more simi-
larities than previously acknowledged with respect to nation-making and
state-building. The comprehensive analogical inquiry into the founding
leaders, Nehru and Ben-Gurion, allows us to follow their common trajec-
tories. The second argument here relates to the methodological approach
of International Relations and Comparative Politics in the study of nation-
states: as separate, sovereign and exclusive objects placed side by side.
My approach is trans-national, rather than an inter-national, at least
with regard to the study of Asian states in the post-colonial era. A trans-
national approach identifies common experience, similar or different histor-
ical starting points, and parallel evolutions, using these to develop a more
nuanced understanding of what happens in the complex process of nation-
making, and why it happens. One research objective is to determine what
ideas Ben-Gurion and Nehru harnessed in the process of nation-building
and what these may have contributed to the similar trajectories their two
nations have followed ever since?
The first section deals with the “unfriendly” diplomatic beginnings
between India and Israel in their formative decades, at a time when they had
 77

much in common. The second section identifies convergences that high-

light their common ideas against a background of post-independence diplo-
matic engagement. This section will also discuss the ideological inspiration
that the political advocates of a Hindu state have drawn from the idea of a
Jewish state. The third section discusses the ideational connections between
Nehru and Ben-Gurion—leaders who exercised formidable influence over
their respective nation-states, and who had much more in common than
the mutual diplomatic antagonism that the diplomatic history of the two
countries suggests.

NATION-STATES UNFRIENDLY/DISTANT YET ALIKE

India and Israel did not establish full diplomatic relations until 1992, 42
years after India formally recognized the State of Israel. During the pre-
independence decades of the Indian national movement and Zionism,
Mahatma Gandhi is believed to have been instrumental in shaping an
“unfriendly” and “indifferent” understanding of Jewish nationalism in
the Indian political and intellectual class.4 After independence in 1947,
Israel remained a “most controversial and deeply divisive” subject in India’s
foreign policy discourse. As the diplomatic historian P.R. Kumaraswamy
noted, “While Israel eagerly sought close ties, Nehru’s India was reluc-
tant and coy”.5 “Nehru’s India” opposed the 1947 UN Partition Plan for
Palestine, and subsequently limited its dealings with the new state to rec-
ognizing Israel without establishing bilateral relations.
India’s diplomatic unfriendliness toward Israel resulted from a complex
set of ideas, actors and events. Anti-imperialism was a defining notion of the
Indian national movement, and was carried over into the foreign policy of
the independent Republic of India. There were minimal common meeting
points between Zionism and the Indian struggle against colonialism and
imperialism. Mainstream Zionism followed a controversial approach to the
question of anti-imperialism, manifested through a complicated process of
harnessing the support the British Empire for its goal of creating a Jewish
nation-state in Mandatory Palestine. Therefore, “they (Zionist leaders)
always avoided, consciously or otherwise, any identification with the anti-
colonial nationalist movements”.6 India’s diplomatic choices before and
after independence were guided by the principles of anti-imperialism,
anti-colonialism, and Third World solidarity. Having sought (and secured,
after a fashion) British support through the Balfour Declaration of 1917, the
Zionist movement was “contaminated” by colonialism, and as such, poles
78 26 number 1

apart from the self-image of the Indian national movement. This breach
was deepened by the Zionist leaders’ choice to build strong relations with
the imperialist West rather than show solidarity with the struggling national
liberation movements of Asia.
Nehru and Ben-Gurion both enjoyed an overwhelmingly persuasive
say on matters of foreign policy. The drive to establish relations—and its
failure—was very much at the initiative of the leaders. Nehru joined the
Commonwealth of Nations or took the matter of disputed Kashmir to the
UN despite objections raised by his own cabinet ministers. Ben-Gurion
did likewise in accepting reparations from West-Germany or ‘colluding’
with France and Britain against Egypt in October 1956. Prime Minister
Nehru was also de facto foreign minister at the time and thus the decision
about whether to befriend Israel or not was left to him. During the four
decades of India’s “recognition-without-relations policy,” Israel remained an
“enigma.” The one small window when Nehru was amenable to establishing
full diplomatic relations with Israel opened in March 1952. In his dual role
he instructed civil servants to prepare the budget for establishing a resident
mission in Tel-Aviv. Walter Eytan, Director General of Israel’s Ministry of
Foreign Affairs (1948–59), was a key actor in Israel’s pursuit of India. He was
informed that “within the next few weeks,” following the first parliamentary
elections of a free India, a formal announcement would follow. However,
nothing happened. According to Ben-Gurion, Nehru “did not keep his
word,” and did not deign to explain his ambivalence or opposition to Israel.
A perplexed Ben-Gurion said in 1959, “India, under the leadership of that
illustrious statesman, Mr. Nehru, refuses to establish normal relations with
Israel, although he has repeatedly promised our representatives to do so”.7
At first, India’s first national elections, due in 1952, delayed the exchange
of diplomatic representatives. Thereafter, financial constraints caused more
delay but essentially it was Nehru’s apprehensions about public opinion, the
Arab world and India’s immediate interests that made him set the matter
aside. The turning point in Nehru’s position was Israel’s involvement in the
Suez Crisis of 1956, and its “collusion” with the ex-imperial powers Britain
and France to attack Egypt, and attempt to dent the rising leadership of
Abdul Gamal Nasser.8 Moshe Sharett, Israel’s first Minister of Foreign
Affairs and second Prime Minister had been scheduled to meet with Nehru
in Delhi, on October 30, 1956, as part of ongoing efforts to secure full
diplomatic relations between the two states. But due to Israel’s “initiated
war”, Sharett’s drive to achieve a diplomatic breakthrough with India—and
greater Asia—was “rendered worthless,”9 and Nehru “using the conflict as
an excuse formally deferred normalization with Israel”.10
 79

Several major international and regional events contributed to the

belated shift in India’s Israel policy. First, the end of the Cold War and the
collapse of Soviet Union in 1991, created a new world for India, leading
to the wholesale revision of Indian foreign policy.11 Second, Israel was an
excellent source for armaments and defense systems, a useful alternative
in the wake of Soviet collapse and the collapse of its associated weapons
industry. India’s poor military capabilities played a crucial role in its deci-
sion to initiate bilateral relations with Israel. Israel had supplied arms to
India in 1962 during its war against China; Nehru wrote to Ben-Gurion
in November of that year, asking for help.12 Third, following the Madrid
Conference of 1991, Israel was negotiating with the Arab states and repre-
sentatives of the Occupied Palestinian Territories on the basis of eventual
mutual recognition. The mutual willingness of the two parties to nego-
tiate– even though it did not lead to a Palestinian state—neutralized some
of India’s long-held reservations about dealing with Israel.
These early political or ideological disagreements between India and
Israel appear minor when compared with the commonalities between the
two countries. The creation of both nation-states was anchored by major
political ideas and contemporary norms. These include constitutional
democracy, non-alignment (in the case of Israel, known as non-identi-
fication, which was feasible only between 1948 and 1956)13, modern and
progressive political institutions oriented by a parliamentary system of
government, and socialist leanings in terms of economic planning.
In both cases, the notion of a state was “Western” oriented. Many of
the leaders of the Indian and Israeli national movements were educated in
the Western world, and influenced accordingly. Western ideas of moder-
nity, rationalism, secularism and scientific development dominated their
thinking as they tried to conceptualize and create “Western” states in
Asia after the end of imperial rule. Michael Walzer terms this a “Western
Creed,” due to the “secularizing, modernizing and developmental creed”
that nationalist leaders followed in India, Israel, and also Algeria.14 And that
is why “upon independence both new states, India and Israel, launched
policies to encourage energetic and systematic industrial, economic and
scientific development.”15
Often, the methodological presuppositions of comparative politics and
area studies in the discipline of International Relations tend to take the
nation-state as the basic unit for analysis and comparison. In the field of
International Relations, states are conceptualized as distinct and separate
entities, best understood by juxtaposing them as independent units. But
this often limits the scope for studying the inter-relations between two
80 26 number 1

or more states (as conventional bilateral foreign policy studies). With this
approach, states become the ‘black box,’ the only unit of analysis, and the
complex historical and socio-cultural processes that can inform and enrich
analysis are overlooked. I suggest that it is more rewarding, certainly in the
case of India and Israel, to identify the role played by shared ideas, parallel
(if not common) historical experiences, and the ideological orientation of
their respective national leaders. By extending the inter-national historical
perspective and engaging in trans-national considerations, one may theorize
on the basis of the similarities of the two countries during their nascent
periods of statehood. The study of their commonalities enhances the under-
standing of contemporary socio-cultural and political issues, such as religion
and the role of the state, majority-minority relations, and the rise of religious
nationalism coupled with neo-liberalization etc. in India and Israel.

THE IDEATIONAL CONNECTIONS: NEHRU

AND BEN-GURION

Nehru and Ben-Gurion played substantial roles in shaping the two modern
nation-states that form the basis of this study. According to Brecher, “They
were transforming leaders of the reform type, even more so, exemplars
of the planning leader, and perhaps most accurately, visionary realists”.16
Both seem aptly described as falling into the category of transforming
reform leadership, given their commitment to achieving social and eco-
nomic change, with a significant emphasis on consent, compromise and
charisma. According to Ayelet Harel-Shalev,

India and Israel were founded against the backdrops of violent struggles (of
partitions) that subsequently affected the definitions of the state’s characters
and public policies. The dominant parties (Congress and Mapai respectively)
in both countries dictated the rules of the game and power relationships
between the different sectors of society during this period. Nehru dominated
Indian politics as the elected prime minister from the state’s founding until
his death in 1964, whereas David Ben-Gurion dominated Israeli politics as
the elected prime minister from the state’s founding until 1963, excluding a
brief hiatus.17

According to Walzer, India and Israel (under Nehru and Ben-Gurion) were
“by world standards … liberal regimes with opposition parties, a highly
critical press, and free universities”.18
 81

The following sections draw attention to three shared political values

that establish ideational connections between Nehru and Ben-Gurion—
democracy, secularism and modernity.
In terms of background and personal life, Nehru and Ben-Gurion were
very different. Both their fathers worked in the legal profession. However,
Nehru was born to a privileged family, and grew up in the high culture
of the Brahmins in India. He was educated at elite English institutions
(Harrow, Trinity College Cambridge, the Inns of Court); his intellectual
background was very much informed by his time in the West, and he always
remained enchanted by these influences. Tall and stylish, Nehru lived
lavishly. Ben-Gurion, by contrast, was short and frugal, and lived a more
modest life. While he did study at the University of Warsaw, he was for the
most part “impressively self-educated in the classics of East and West, with
a persistent ideological preference for the ideas of national self-determi-
nation, as a natural right of the Jewish People, and moderate socialism”.19
Ben-Gurion emigrated to Palestine in 1906, at the age of 20; some years
later, in 1912, he set off to study law in Istanbul, inspired by the political
ambition to “organize the Jews of the Ottoman Empire into a political force
that would be represented in Turkish parliament”. This ambition remained
unfulfilled, as did that of a degree in law; he was forced to leave his studies
after two years, due to “financial hardships and health problems”.20 At a
young age he was influenced by the ideas of Poalei Zion (Socialist Jewish
Workers Party), and began to develop his vision of nationalism, driven by
progressive and socialist values.
Distinct as they indubitably were as individuals, Nehru and Ben-Gurion
were both very much alike in their political aspirations. According to
Brecher,

Both leaders shared and manifested a profound intellectual and emotional

commitment to the political goal of independence. For both, the supreme
rationale for political leadership, prior to independence, was its attainment,
based upon the inherent right of Indians and Jews to self-determination for
their nations.21

Nehru and Ben-Gurion shared a commitment to modern and progressive

political ideas, such as parliamentary democracy, rule of law and egalitari-
anism; the democratic way of life was a core common value. Most of these
influences came from the British political culture they both admired. Both
had a deep regard for the principles of self-determination and the will of
the people, and it was under their respective leaderships that “the Indian
82 26 number 1

National Congress and the Labour Zionists were committed to democracy

and mostly managed their internal tensions in nonviolent ways”.22
In his first speech after independence—well known as A Tryst with
Destiny, in August 1947, Nehru stated that the free India aspired

to bring freedom and opportunity to the common man, to the peasants and
workers of India; to fight and end poverty and ignorance and disease; to build
up a prosperous, democratic and progressive nation, and to create social,
economic and political institutions which will ensure justice and fullness of
life to every man and woman.23

These sentiments resonate in Israel’s Declaration of Independence, read out

by Ben-Gurion on May 14, 1948, according to which the State of Israel will

foster the development of the country for the benefit of all its inhabitants; it
will be based on freedom, justice and peace as envisaged by the prophets of
Israel; it will ensure complete equality of social and political rights to all its
inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex; it will guarantee freedom of
religion, conscience, language, education and culture.24

Freedom and justice for all are common here, as is the pursuit of a pro-
gressive state. Both shared a strong proclivity for universalism and cosmo-
politanism and aspired to a world of synergy and enlightened nationalism.
It is largely due to this legacy that the current political class in both
countries can boast that India and Israel are the “only” stable democracies
in Asia. While greeting the foreign minister of India, Sushma Swaraj,
during an official visit to Israel in January 2016, Israel’s prime minister,
Benjamin Netanyahu, stated that “The Middle East’s only democracy
welcomes the Foreign Minister of the world’s greatest democracy.”25 Such
a claim is rhetorical, since critical questions abound with respect to the
procedural nature in both democracies. From its inception, Israel has
attempted to negotiate the incongruities between the Jewish character of
the state and principles of democracy. The occupation of Palestinian terri-
tories since 1967 is another ongoing challenge to its democratic creden-
tials.26 The state of emergency imposed on the Arab communities of Israel
during 1949–1966 certainly went against the ethos of equality. On the
other hand, the institutions of state, the Knesset and the Supreme Court in
particular, have successfully defended the overriding principle of a relevant
democracy, acknowledging to a great extent the interests of all citizens of
the State of Israel.
 83

In the case of India, democracy is on a promising footing, with an

established and functional constitution and parliamentary system. Aside
from the (relatively) brief State of Emergency (1975–1977) declared by Indira
Gandhi, an autocratic and popular leader, and the daughter of Nehru,
democracy in India has been stable and effective. Democratization is an
ongoing process in both India and Israel; but in relation to the time-frame
that informs this comparative study, Nehru and Ben-Gurion may plausibly
be given the credit for paving a path to democracy for their respective
peoples.
An assessment of the nascent democracies of India and Israel requires
us to look back at their troubled origins and the critical roles played by their
founding prime ministers. Both were required to lead their states out of
the violence and inchoateness of partition. The colonial “great” partition of
India was followed by a prolonged ethno-religious and communal conflict
with Pakistan and within India as well. After Partition, India’s unity was
of paramount importance for Nehru. In the case of Israel, independence
followed the failure of the UN Partition Plan and the invasion of the
newly-declared state by the surrounding Arab states, leading to a long phase
of hostilities. Nevertheless, Nehru and Ben-Gurion both went through the
pains of securing the foundations for democratic functioning and culti-
vating modern parliamentary institutions, despite existential challenges
from within and from without. Ben-Gurion faced the task of creating a
state and a new Hebrew society out of a great diversity of Diaspora Jews;
Nehru, for his part, resisted the pressure created by religious schisms for
the further division of Indians.
Ben-Gurion referred to Nehru’s democratic achievements when he
met U.S. President John F. Kennedy in May of 1961: “It is not for me to
judge him (for being reluctant towards Israel). He is a great man. I admire
him. There is democracy in India; it is the only country in Asia which is
democratic except Japan. If Nehru goes, I am not sure what will happen;
but now it has democracy”.27
It is interesting that Ben-Gurion had such admiration for Nehru, given
that a full decade after India’s recognition of Israel in 1950, the latter was still
reluctant to form diplomatic ties with Israel. Ben-Gurion similarly extolled
“the illustrious leader” in the Knesset in May 1958, while responding to
another parliamentarian’s comments about Nehru’s anti-Israel stance. In
defense of Nehru, Ben-Gurion said, “the great Indian statesman will ulti-
mately fulfill his promise”, because his opposition “has to do with tactics, not
principes”.28 However, Ben-Gurion was wrong in his assumption that Nehru’s
reluctance towards Israel was only about “tactics” and the political situation
84 26 number 1

of South Asia after partition. As far as Nehru was concerned, the Balfour
Declaration of 1917 placed Zionism squarely against anti-Colonialism,
and created an ideological difficulty for him, and being an ideologue, he
chose not to fulfill the promise he had made in 1952.
Setting aside the differences between two, Nehru and Ben-Gurion
were both secularists and modernists who aspired to lead their countries in
a secular and democratic direction.29 Asked by Andre Malraux what had
been his most difficult task after independence, Nehru replied, “creating
a just state by just means,” and “perhaps, too, creating a secular state in a
religious country.”30 While Nehru insisted on a secular politics, opposing
the Pakistani example of a state underpinned by religion, he encountered
opposition from Hindu nationalists like V.D. Savarkar (1883–1966), an
intellectual mentor of extremist Hindu nationalism. Following Gandhi’s
steps to reconceptualize Hinduism as more pluralistic and inclusive during
the nationalist struggle period, Nehru succeeded in preserving a sufficient
distance between religion and state.31
Nehru, rational and modern-minded, believed that religion was
destined to decline. Secularization did not require radical coercion because
it was an inevitable historical tendency. “Some Hindus dream of going back
to the Vedas”, Nehru wrote in The Discovery of India, “some Muslims dream
of an Islamic theocracy. Idle fancies, for there is no going back to the past . . .
There is only one-way traffic in Time”.32 But Nehru was mistaken. India
did not see a decline in the influence of religion, not in the public sphere
and not in politics. To the contrary, the country witnessed a resurgence
of religious activism from the 1980s onwards, notably with the rise of the
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) as a force in domestic politics through Hindu
nationalism. Indian society, across faiths, cleaves more tightly to religion
than the rational and modern nation that Nehru envisaged. Today, the
ideological descendants of Savarkar who lost his battle with Nehru(vian)
ideology many years ago, are in power and their professed objective is to
undo Nehru’s secularism.
Ben-Gurion, like Nehru, was a secular optimist; when he made his
famous deal with the Haredim and agreed to the exemption of yeshiva
students from military service, he was confident that the days of religion
were numbered, and that the ideals of the modern state would prevail.33
According to Walzer, Ben-Gurion thought “he could safely compromise
with the rabbis because the future belonged to him and to his fellow
freethinking citizens”.34 Ben-Gurion considered himself a “secularist and
non-religious”; he firmly believed that “secularism is a fact of our time and
since I am not religious I have no reason to deplore it”.35 But in fact the
 85

influence of religion did not abate, and little by little after the 1967 War,
Israel began to incline more towards Jewish identity than towards its erst-
while democratic aspirations, as “the cultural transformation intended by
Ben-Gurion […was] now publicly challenged by a revived and militant
Judaism”.36 Nationalistic Judaism could prevail over the secular nationalism
of Ben-Gurion.
One might argue that Nehru and Ben-Gurion erred alike as well.
Both underestimated the role of religion in their national movements. The
top-down, political-elite approach of secularism did not percolate to society.
The end of their respective administrations was followed by what may be
called a religious revival against the aspirations of the founding fathers. The
afterlives of these two leaders had similar trajectories as it were. The both
sought to fashion nation-states premised on modern egalitarian, secular and
democratic principles, yet with democratic socialism and secularism on the
wane, both have been marginalized by their respective nations.
The parallel careers of Nehru (1947–63) and Ben-Gurion (1948–63)
may shed light on the difficulties of importing Western political ideas about
modern statecraft in post-colonial Asia. Thus, it seems important to study
the two countries from a trans-national perspective, instead of dwelling
solely on the diplomatic ties between the two leaders. Conceptually, the
leadership character of Nehru and Ben-Gurion fall into two categories, char-
ismatic and rational-legal, to use Max Weber’s classical typology. Political
scientists may apply other typologies in order to capture their trajectories
but an analogical assessment of the role of leadership in the formation of
Asian nation-states is important, and under-utilized research tool.
Nehru and Ben-Gurion were not revolutionaries. They believed rather
that long-term evolutionary processes are preferable to radical ideologies.
As political scientist Hana Lerner, suggests, Ben-Gurion was “convinced
that painful revolutions were not required, since the arc of history was
headed in the secular direction.”37 Nehru faced a similar dilemma and was
firmly convinced that radical-revolutionary change would lead to violence
or the use of unjust means in politics. He sought to create a just state by
just means. Both leaders looked to spiritual mentors like Martin Buber and
Mahatma Gandhi in their striving to personify Plato’s Philosophy King.
Nehru and Ben-Gurion were powerfully drawn to the British political
system and evolutionary principles like the rule of law, and the socio-
cultural and political maturity of the Westminster parliamentary system.
Both favored Fabianism, the British socialist movement that espoused a
gradualist and reformist approach to politics over Revolutionary Marxism.38
In Rebirth and Destiny of Israel Ben-Gurion wrote that “Israel must be
86 26 number 1

assured of two things above all—the rule of law and the rule of democracy,
for thereon our future hangs”.39 Nehru shared a similar concern on this crit-
ical issue with his chief ministers in March 1951: “Our democracy is a tender
plant which has to be nourished with wisdom and care and which requires
a great deal of understanding of its real processes and its discipline.”40
Another correlation between Nehru and Ben-Gurion was the vital role
Asia played in their political frameworks and in their speaking, writing,
and thinking about the history and future of the continent. As leaders
of newly created nation-states, both conceived of Asia as an extension
of their national politics. Nehru championed a new role for Asia post-
WWII through political experiments like the Non-Aligned and Third
World movements. For example, in April 1947, three months before India’s
independence, Nehru hosted an Asian Relations Conference. It was one of
the most significant regional events to take place in Asia, with more than
200 delegates from India, Burma (Myanmar), Ceylon (Sri Lanka), Malaya
(Malaysia), a number of Asian Soviet republics, and the West Asian states.
A ten-member delegation was also invited to attend, as representatives of
the Yishuv (the pre-statehood Jewish community of Mandatory Palestine).
Addressing the conference Nehru said,

The old imperialisms are fading away…. This Conference itself is significant
as an expression of that deeper urge to the mind and spirit of Asia which
has persisted in spite of the isolationism which grew up during the years of
European domination…. In this Conference and in this work there are no
leaders and no followers. All countries of Asia have to meet together on an
equal basis in a common task and endeavour. It is fitting that India should
play her part in this new phase of Asian development.41

However, by the next big Asian gathering which took place in Bandung,
Indonesia, in 1955, there was “no room for Zionist or Israeli delegates in the
room”, due to political opposition from Arab states and a threat to boycott
the conference should Israel be invited. Nevertheless, Ben-Gurion was keen
to develop a constructive role for Israel in Asia:

There is great thirst in the world for true peace and a covenant of amity
between the nations, and the more subject peoples are freed, to stand on their
own feet and reinforce the United Nations, the stronger will be pressure more
speedily to quench that thirst. It is true that the independence of Asian and
African peoples has become a new factor in inter-bloc tension, but these are
‘pangs of redemption’.42
 87

He wished Israel to be part of the “great East”, a role model for the many
Asian and African states emerging from Colonialism. He wanted Israel to
“[apply] her energies to science and research, for their own sake and so that
their discoveries may benefit economic development, security and redemp-
tion [of Asia]. Israel’s paramount aim is the advancement of man … Israel
by indirection helps the new states to the best effect and widest extent: by
being a model and example”.43

UNACKNOWLEDGED SHARED IDEAS: CREATING

UNCONVENTIONAL (RELIGIOUS) NATION-STATES
IN ASIA

Despite India’s vote against the 1947 UN Partition Plan, and its reluctance
to formally recognize Israel until 1950, Israeli leaders were influenced by
Nehru and the way India presented itself and its own political understand-
ing and values to the international community. Ben-Gurion’s unrequited
admiration for Gandhi can be inferred from the fact that Gandhi’s portrait
hung in his bedroom in Sde Boker. Similarly, Chaim Weizmann, Israel’s
first president, had a portrait of India’s first president Rajendra Prasad—
providing “an additional testimony to his forgotten dialogue”.44
Moreover, during WWII, Nehru’s autobiography and letters from
prison were published by Hakibutz Hameuhad, the main Zionist labor
movement publishing house underlining the connection many in the
Yishuv recognized between the Zionist and Indian nationalist struggles,
their shared leanings towards socialism, collectivism and universalism, and
their anti-British orientation. Another Indian figure revered in Israel was
the renowned Bengali poet Rabindranath Tagore, ‘a staunch friend of Jews
and Zionism’.45 Shlomit Flaum, an influential teacher and idealist educator,
became Tagore’s pupil during the two years (1922–24) she spent in his intel-
lectual abode, Shanti-Niketan the House of Peace, near Calcutta, and in
1946, translated his biography into Hebrew.
In a recent essay, Arie Dubnov captured some of the historical ideas
revolving around partition shared by Zionist and Indian nationalists:

Such conceptions (ideational connections) of a Zionist-Indian nationalist

nexus have long been forgotten. For the inhabitants of the Indian Sub-
continent today, just like the citizens of Israel/Palestine, the dramatic years
1947–48 mark a decisive historical moment, when partition and sovereignty
became inextricably bound together. Paradoxically, despite the multiple
88 26 number 1

parallels between those two traumatic historical experiences, the gaining of

full political sovereignty also marked the moment of rupture, disconnecting
the two post-imperial spaces.46

These “multiple parallels” undoubtedly existed between India and

Israel; but the nature of the political and diplomatic “moment(s) of rupture”
discouraged India, particularly, from viewing Israel as “alike”. India, as a
sovereign state, chose not to establish formal relations with Israel; therefore,
the political elite who came to represent India tried hard to diminish and
dismiss these parallels, instead exaggerating how much India did not have
in common with Israel. In fact, the creation of Israel was often character-
ized as closer, in form and intent, to that of Pakistan, India’s nemesis. Faisal
Devji, for instance, suggested that the political idea of Pakistan, a Muslim
minority seeking independence from the Hindu majority, was akin to the
Jewish minority in Mandate Palestine; he underlined similarities between
Muslim nationalism and Jewish nationalism through the label “Muslim
Zion”.47 Moreover, Israel and Pakistan, it has been argued, emerged as the
result of 20th century ideological movements anchored by religion.48 Yet,
many such similarities between Israel and Pakistan are limited to the pre-
state period of nationalism, or to the role of religion in defining the idea
of the state.
There were, however, religious parallels shared by India and Israel,
both during the torturous path to independence and in political processes
thereafter. While the ruling Congress Party under Nehru refused to recog-
nize these parallels with Israel, the Hindu nationalists who were not part of
Congress identified, and from an early stage, the potential for ideological
alignment between their vision of a Hindu State and the Jewish State.
According to Harel-Shalev, “The establishment of the State of Israel as a
Jewish state was not endorsed by mainstream Hindus, but only among
Hindu nationalists who viewed it as further legitimization of their claim
that India should be defined as a Hindu and democratic state”.49
Savarkar was a vocal supporter of Zionism and (later) of the State of
Israel. While writing a manifesto of Hindu nationalism in 1923, he wrote:

The ideal conditions … under which a nation can attain perfect solidarity
and cohesion would … be found in the case of those people who inhabit the
land they adore, the land of whose forefathers is also the land of their Gods
and Angles, of Seers and Prophets; the scenes of whose history are also the
scenes of their mythology. The Hindus are about the only people who are
blessed with these ideal conditions that are at the same time incentive to
 89

national solidarity, cohesion and greatness … If the Zionists’ dreams are ever
realized—if Palestine becomes a Jewish State … then, only … Palestine … if
ever the Jews can succeed in founding their state there, can be said to possess
this unique advantage.50

Savarkar and his organization Hindu Mahasabha (Assembly of Hindus)

were also very critical of Nehru for not immediately establishing relations
with Israel after its independence in 1948. In February 1956, Savakar wrote:
“I say that Bharat (India) should give unequivocal recognition to Israel”. In
September 1949, a year before India recognized Israel, Hindu Mahasabha
passed a resolution extending “fraternal greetings” to the “brave sons of
Israel,” and “deplored the discriminatory policy of the Nehru Government
in refusing recognition to the new state (Israel).”51 A copy of this resolution
was sent to President Weizmann.
The old political idea of the Hindu nation, and the new Hindutva poli-
tics of India, have been instrumental in prodding India toward establishing
stronger relations with Israel since the 1980s. The ideological alignment of
the two around cultural-religious nationalism is an important driving force
under Prime Minister Nareder Modi and the Bhartiya Janta Party (Indian
People’s Party), which is “known for its traditional sympathies for Israel”.52
The way in which each state defines its national identity has a direct link
with its attitudes toward the other. The significant rise of BJP in India
therefore underlined the assertion for stronger bilateral ties with the State
of Israel, given that Hindu nationalists had wished to emulate the Jewish
state once before, in the 1950s.53
Notwithstanding, I have viewed them here as parallel ideological
movements which developed almost simultaneously. This underlines
one of my key arguments, the value of studying the two in tandem in
order to shape a stronger understanding of the role played by shared
ideas—in this case religious nationalism. “The Israeli model—a State
that serves as official homeland for a particular religious group—has
understandable appeal for many in India who espouse the cause of Hindu
nationalism”, according to Gary Jacobson who examined the consti-
tutional development of secularism in India within an unprecedented
cross-national framework, which included Israel and the US.54 In the
trans-national analogy, majority communities in India and Israel perceive
their corresponding national territories to be “holy lands”: Bharat Mata
(mother India) or Pitra-Bhoomi (fatherland) in the case of India and Eretz
Ha’kodesh (the holy land) or Ha’Aretz Ha’Muvtahat (the promised land)
in the case of Israel.
90 26 number 1

CONCLUSION

An analogical study of the two spaces located in post-colonial Asia, fol-

lowing a trans-national rather than inter-national approach, casts light
upon some of the contemporary political experiments, (re)imaginings of
nationhood and socio-political anxieties of the struggling democracies of
India and Israel. According to Harel-Shalev, such an approach is particularly
relevant, given that “these countries definitely lend themselves to analogy,
and, to a certain extent, they are even becoming increasingly similar to
one another”.55 A comparative perspective that presents India and Israel
as separate and wholly unrelated units, devoid of trans-national analogy,
prevents us from identifying the shared systemic context in which these two
postcolonial states operate and the transnational trends affecting them.56
The complex interplay of factors that characterized the emergence
of the two nation-states possibly discouraged a localized trans-national
approach—too much ground to cover, no immediately obvious lineal links
between the two. But it is through this complexity that one can appreciate
the potential contribution of such an approach. India and Israel present a
productive case study of state-building, democratization, the tussle between
religion and secularism, and experiments of political modernity in Asia.
Both India and Israel’s political trajectories were steered in the crucial
post-independence period by charismatic leaders; both leaders harnessed
the Western conceptualization of nation-state—albeit with context-specific
improvisations—to this end. Today, both nations are enjoying increased
international relevance, in part due to the modernizing engagement with
science and technology that both Nehru and Ben-Gurion championed at
an early stage; but, paradoxically, both nations are contending with the
resurgence of a political conservatism, informed by a nexus of religion and
cultural identity—the very influences that Nehru and Ben-Gurion explic-
itly rejected in favor of secularism and modernity.
The predictive influences of these factors on the evolving political iden-
tity of the Western nation-state model in the two countries—and in Asia,
more generally—justifies the comparative orientation of this article and
suggests rich territory for future research. It also underlines the importance
of studying the role of leaders, their leadership style and personal values
within a trans-national approach. Sadly, Nehru and Ben-Gurion never
had the opportunity to consummate the very real possibility of a political
friendship. Who knows what may have happened, had the two taken the
opportunity to exchange ideas about their respective political journeys and
experiences?
 91

Notes

I am indebted to Professors Assaf Likhovski and Orit Rozin from Tel-Aviv

University for mentoring this research during the David Berg Fellowship,
2018–19. I thank Prof. P R Kumaraswamy, Dr Ayelet  Harel-Shalev, Dr.
Rotem Geva and Dr, Shimon Lev for their insightful comments. Research
for this article was supported by the Israel Science Foundation (ISF) grant
no. 586/18. OP Jindal Global University was kind to grant leave for this
research.
1. Michael Walzer, The Paradox of Liberation: Secular Revolutions and Religious
Counterrevolutions (Yale, 2015), 35.
2. For an overview of the parallel histories of the India-Pakistan and Israel-
Palestine partitions, and of state-making in India and Israel, see Arie Dubnov,
“Notes on the Zionist Passage to India; ‘The Analogical Imagination and its
Boundaries’”, Journal of Israeli History, 35.2 (2016): 177–214; Allon Gal and Isaac
Lubelsky, “The Disintegration of the British Empire and the Nationalist Cases of
India and Israel: A Comparative Analysis”, Israel Affairs 14.2 (2008): 165–83.
3. This topic has been extensively assessed by scholars such as P.R. Kumaraswamy,
India’s Israel Policy (New York, 2010); Nicolas Blarel, The Evolution of India’s Israel
Policy: Continuity, Change, and Compromise since 1922 (Oxford, 2015); Shimon Lev,
Soulmates: The Story of Mahatma Gandhi and Hermann Kallenbach (Chenai, 2018).
4. Mahatma Gandhi’s views on Zionism were complex and became controver-
sial internationally. See P.R. Kumaraswamy, Squaring the Circle: Mahatma Gandhi
and the Jewish National Home (New Delhi, 2018); Simone Panter-Brick, Gandhi
and the Middle East: Jews, Arabs and Imperial Interests (London, 2008); Gideon
Shimoni, Gandhi, Satyagraha, and the Jews: A Formative Factor in India’s Policy
towards Israel (Jerusalem, 1977).
5. Kumaraswamy’s India’s Israel Policy is the first and until now one of the best
comprehensive and scholarly work. See also Blarel, The Evolution of India’s Israel
Policy.
6. Michael Brecher, Political Leadership and Charisma—Nehru, Ben-Gurion
and other 20th Century Leaders: Intellectual Odyssey (London, 2016), 128.
7. David Ben-Gurion, Like Stars and Dust: Essays from Israel’s Government Year
Book (Sede-Boker, 1997), 283.
8. Moshe Sharett wrote of his dismay in his diary, “So, we had colluded”,
while he was in Delhi during the long (81 days) tour covering eleven Asian coun-
tries: Burma, the Philippines, Japan, Singapore, Malaya, Ceylon (Sri Lanka),
Nepal, India, Thailand, Laos, and Cambodia. See Neil Caplan, “The 1956 Sinai
Campaign Viewed from Asia: Selections from Moshe Sharett’s Diaries: Introduced
and Annotated”, Israel Studies 7.1 (2002): 81–103.
9. Ibid., 91, 95.
10. Kumaraswamy, India’s Israel Policy, 5.
92 26 number 1

11. See C. Raja Mohan, Crossing the Rubicon: The Shaping of India’s New Foreign
Policy (New Delhi, 2003); David Malone et. al., Oxford Handbook of Indian Foreign
Policy (New Delhi, 2015).
12. Kallol Bhattacharjee, “With Nehru Writing to Its PM, Israel Gave Arms
to India in 1962,” The Hindu, 27 May, 2017 (Last accessed, December 20, 2019):
https://www.thehindu.com/news/national/with-nehru-writing-to-its-pm-israel
-gave-arms-to-india-in-1962/article18591835.ece
13. In the context of the given binaries of the Cold War, India and Israel avoided
aligning with any of the two blocs. See Avi Shlaim, “Israel between East and West,
1948–56”, International Journal Middle East Studies 36 (2004): 657–73.
14. Walzer, The Paradox of Liberation, 7.
15. Gal and Lubelsky, “The Disintegration of the British Empire”, 175.
16. Brecher, Political Leadership and Charisma, 231.
17. Ayelet Harel-Shalev, The Challenges of Sustaining Democracy in Deeply
Divided Societies: Citizenship, Rights, and Ethnic Conflicts in India and Israel
(Langham, MA, 2010), 403.
18. Walzer, The Paradox of Liberation, 69.
19. Brecher, Political Leadership and Charisma, 231.
20. Anita Shapira, Ben-Gurion: Father of Modern Israel (London, 2014).
21. Brecher, Political Leadership and Charisma, 231.
22. Walzer, The Paradox of Liberation, 27.
23. Jawaharlal Nehru, “A Tryst with Destiny”, Speech at the Constituent
Assembly of India, (1947) https://www.theguardian.com/theguardian/2007/may
/01/greatspeeches
24. David Ben-Gurion, “The Declaration of the Establishment of the State of
Israel,” (1948) https://www.knesset.gov.il/docs/eng/megilat_eng.htm
25. “P.M Netanyahu Meets with Indian External Affairs Minister Swaraj,
Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs, January 18, 2016 (Last accessed, December 20,
2019): http://mfa.gov.il/MFA/PressRoom/2016/Pages/PM-Netanyahu-meets-with
-Indian-External-Affairs-Minister-Swaraj-18-Jan-2016.aspx
26. The democratic spirit, and its underlying principles, have become more
contentious in Israel in recent years. In July 2019, the Knesset passed the Basic Law:
Israel as the Nation-State of the Jewish People declaring that the State of Israel’s
national self-determination is unique to the Jewish people.
27. Ben-Gurion at the Kennedy-Ben-Gurion Meeting, May 30, 1961 https://
www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/kennedy-ben-gurion-meeting-may-1961
28. “Nehru’s Anti-Israel Remarks Evoke Reply by Ben-Gurion in Knesset”,
Jewish Telegraphic Agency, May 22, 1958.
29. Walzer, The Paradox of Liberation, 20.
30. As quoted in ibid., 76.
31. Roger Friedland and Richard Hecht in their illustrative comparison of
the “Violent Parallels”, examine the two religious cities, Jerusalem and Ayodhya,
to capture the radical and violent temple movements in India and Israel, “The
 93

Bodies of Nations: A Comparative Study of Religious Violence in Jerusalem and

Ayodhya”, History of Religions 38.2 (1998): 101–49.
32. Jawaharlal Nehru, The Discovery of India (Delhi, 1947), 579.
33. A detailed account of this controversial decision of Ben-Gurion is recorded
in the conversation of Israel’s president Shimon Peres with journalist David Landau
in Shimon Peres, Ben-Gurion: A Political Life/Shimon Peres in Conversation with
David Landau (New York, 2011). Peres was Ben-Gurion’s official emissary for this
matter in 1948.
34. Walzer, The Paradox of Liberation, 58.
35. David Ben-Gurion, Recollections (London, 1970), 27).
36. Ibid., 53.
37. Hana Lerner, “Critical Junctures, Religion and Personal Status Regulations
in Israel and India”, Law & Social Inquiry 39.2 (2014): 387–415.
38. Gal and Lubelsky, “The Disintegration of British Empire”, 170–1.
39. Ben-Gurion, Rebirth and Destiny of Israel, 370.
40. Jawaharlal Nehru, Letters for a Nation: From Jawaharlal Nehru to His Chief
Ministers 1947–1963 (Apple Books, digital edition (2014), 238.
41. Jawaharlal Nehru’s speech at 1st Asian Relations Conference, New Delhi,
March 24, 1947 (Last accessed, November 12, 2019): http://icwadelhi.info
/asianrelationsconference/images/stories/jawaharlalnehru.pdf
42. David Ben-Gurion, Israel: Years of Challenge (Tel-Aviv, 1963) [Hebrew].
43. Ibid., 234.
44. Arie Dubnov, “Notes on the Zionist Passage to India, or: The Analogical
Imagination and its Boundaries,” Journal of Israeli History 35.2 (2016): 178.
45. “Tagore, Friend of Jews and Zionism Dies in Calcutta”, JTA, Daily News
Bulletin published by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, August 8, 1941.
46. Ibid., 181.
47. Faisal Devji, Muslim Zion: Pakistan as a Political Idea (Boston, 2013).
48. P.R. Kumaraswamy, “The Strangely Parallel Careers of Israel and Pakistan”,
Middle East Quarterly (1997): 31–9.
49. Harel-Shalev, The Challenges of Sustaining Democracy, 403.
50. V.D. Savarkar, Hindutva: Who is a Hindu? (Bombay, 1923), 136.
51. Hindu Nationalist Organization Asks Indian Government to Recognize
Israel, JTA, September 22, 1949.
52. For BJP’s foreign policy and Israel see Kumaraswamy India’s Israel Policy, 140;
Efraim Inbar, “Improving Ties between India and Israel,” BESA Center Perspectives
Paper, 304 (2015); and Sumit Ganguly, “Hindu Nationalism and the Foreign Policy
of India’s Bharatiya Janata Party”, Transatlantic Paper Series 2 (2015).
53. See Abdul Ghafoor Noorani, “A Question of Ideology: Modi and Zionism,”
Outlook 4 August 2017; Gary Jacobson, The Wheel of Law: India’s Secularism in
Comparative Constitutional Context (Princeton, NJ, 2009); Walzer, The Paradox
of Liberation.
54. Jacobson, The Wheel of Law, 147.
94 26 number 1

55. Harel-Shalev, The Challenges of Sustaining Democracy, 32.

56. Dubnov, “Notes on the Zionist Passage to India”, 204.

KHINVRAJ JANGID is Associate Professor and Director at the Centre

for Israel Studies, Jindal School of International Affairs, OP Jindal Global
University, Sonipat, Delhi NCR.
 Israel and International Law: The Indigenous
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Havatzelet Yahel 172
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Palestine
Reuven Gafni 196

The Cover:
India’s first Prime Minister – Jawaharlal Nehru (L).
Courtesy of the Jawaharal Nehru Memorial Fund.
Israel’s first Prime Minister – David Ben-Gurion (R).
Courtesy of the National Photo Collection, Israel Government Press Office.