Category: 2. World

New Delhi, India – When United States President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin meet in Alaska on Friday, their summit will be followed closely not only in both those countries, Europe and Ukraine – but also more than 10,000km (6,200 miles) away, in New Delhi.

Since the end of the Cold War, India has juggled a historically strong relationship with Russia and rapidly blossoming ties with the US. New Delhi’s relations with Washington grew particularly strong under the presidencies of George W Bush and Barack Obama, and remained that way during Trump’s first term and under Joe Biden.

At the heart of that US warmth towards India, say analysts, was its bet on New Delhi as a balancing force against Beijing, as China’s economic, military and strategic heft in the Asia Pacific region grew. With Soviet communism history, and China, the US’s biggest strategic rival, Washington increased its focus on Asia – including through the Quad, a grouping also including fellow democracies India, Australia and Japan.

But a decade after Obama famously described the US and India as “best partners”, they appear to be anything but.

Trump has imposed a 50 percent tariff on Indian imports, among the highest on any country’s products. Half of that penalty is for India’s purchases of Russian oil during its ongoing war with Ukraine – something that the Biden administration encouraged India to do to keep global crude prices under control.

Meanwhile, China – which buys even more Russian oil than India – has received a reprieve from high US tariffs for now, as Washington negotiates a trade deal with New Delhi.

That contrast has prompted questions over whether Trump’s approach towards China, on the one hand, and traditional friends like India on the other, marks a broader shift away from the US pivot to Asia.

Troubles for India, and Modi

Since the early 2000s, successive governments in New Delhi have embraced closer ties with Washington, with its stocks rising in the US as an emerging strategic partner in security, trade and technology.

Trump made that relationship personal – with Modi.

During Trump’s first term, he shared the stage twice in public rallies with Modi, as they also exchanged frequent bear hugs and described each other as friends.

But none of that could save New Delhi when Trump hit India with tariffs only matched by the levies issued against goods from Brazil.

“The tariff moves have triggered the most serious rupture in the US-India relations in decades,” said Milan Vaishnav, the director of the South Asia Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

For months after Trump threatened tariffs on Indian imports, New Delhi tried to placate the US president, refusing to get drawn into a war of words. That has now changed, with India accusing the US of hypocrisy – pointing out that it still trades with Russia, and that Washington had previously wanted New Delhi to buy Russian crude.

“One thing is clear: Trust in the United States has eroded sharply in recent days, casting a long shadow over the bilateral relationship,” Vaishnav told Al Jazeera.

To Praveen Donthi, a senior analyst at the International Crisis Group, the crisis in the relationship also reflects a dramatic turn in the personal equation between Modi and Trump. The state of ties, he said, is “a result of a clash of personalities between President Trump and Prime Minister Modi”.

India has previously faced the threat of US sanctions for its close friendship with Russia, when it decided to buy S-400 missile defence systems from Moscow. But in 2022, under the Biden administration, it secured a waiver from those proposed sanctions.

“Not long ago, India could avoid sanctions despite purchasing S-400 weapon systems from Russia. However, now, India’s policy of multi-alignment clashes with President Trump’s transactional approach to geopolitics,” said Donthi.

To be sure, he pointed out, America’s Cold War history of bonhomie with Pakistan has meant that “a certain distrust of the US is embedded in the Indian strategic firmament”. The Trump administration’s recent cosiness with Pakistan, with its army chief visiting the US this year, even getting a rare meeting with the president at the White House, will likely have amplified those concerns in New Delhi.

But through ups and downs in India-US ties over the years, a key strategic glue has held them close over the past quarter century: shared worries about the rise of China.

“A certain bipartisan consensus existed in the US regarding India because of its long-term strategic importance, especially in balancing China,” said Donthi.

Now, he said, “the unpredictable Trump presidency disrupted the US’s approach of ‘strategic altruism’ towards India”.

It is no longer clear to Asian partners of the US, say experts, whether Washington is as focused on building alliances in their region as it once said it was.

Turn from Asia

Under the Obama administration in 2011, the US adopted what was known as the “Rebalance to Asia” policy, aimed at committing more diplomatic, economic and military resources to the Asia Pacific region, increasingly seen as the world’s economic and geopolitical centre of gravity.

This meant deeper engagement with treaty allies like Japan, South Korea, and Australia, strengthening security ties with emerging partners such as India and Vietnam, and pushing forward trade initiatives like the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP).

The idea was to shape a regional order that could balance China’s rise.

During Trump’s first term, the economic leg that gave the pivot its weight hollowed out. The US withdrawal from the TPP in early 2017 removed the signature trade pillar, leaving behind a strategy that leaned heavily on military cooperation and less on binding economic partnerships.

Yet, he refrained from the bulldozing negotiations that have shaped his approach to tariffs, even with allies like Japan and South Korea, and from the kind of tariffs Trump has imposed now on India.

“There is currently a period of churn and uncertainty, after which clarity will emerge,” Donthi said. “There might be some cautious rebalancing in the short term from the Asian powers, who will wait for more clarity.”

India, which, unlike Japan and South Korea, has never been a treaty ally to the US – or any other country – might already be taking steps towards that rebalancing.

Russia-India-China troika?

Faced with Trump’s tariff wrath, India has been engaged in hectic diplomacy of its own.

Its national security adviser, Ajit Doval, visited Moscow earlier this month and met Putin. Foreign Minister S Jaishankar is scheduled to travel to the Russian capital later this month. Also in August, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi is expected to visit New Delhi. And at the end of the month, Modi will travel to China for a summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, his first trip to the country in seven years.

India has also indicated that it is open to considering the revival of a Russia-India-China (RIC) trilateral mechanism, after Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov proposed the platform’s resurrection.

The concept of trilateral cooperation was first proposed in the 1990s and formally institutionalised in 2002, an idea Lavrov credited to the late Yevgeny Primakov, former chair of the Russian International Affairs Council.

Although the RIC met regularly in the years following its creation, there has been a gap in recent times, with the last meeting of RIC leaders in 2019, on the sidelines of the G20 summit in Osaka, Japan.

India’s Modi faces some “very difficult choices”, said Michael Kugelman, a senior fellow at the Asia Pacific Foundation. “Clearly, India is not going to turn on Russia, a very special partner. And India does not turn on its friends.”

But doubling down on its strategic independence from the US – or multi-alignment, as India describes it – could come with its costs, if Trump decides to add on even more tariffs or sanctions.

“The best outcome for India immediately is the Russians and Ukrainians agree to a ceasefire,” said Kugelman, “because at the end of the day, Trump is pressuring India as a means of pressuring Russia.”

Even as questions rise over Washington’s pivot to Asia under Trump, such a rebalance will not be easy for countries like India, say experts. Ultimately, they say, the US will find its longtime partners willing to return to the fold if it decides to reinvest in those relationships.

The cost of a rebalance

An RIC troika would ultimately be “more symbolic than substantive”, Kugelman said.

That’s because one of the sides of that triangle is “quite small and fragile: India-China ties”.

While there have been “notable easing of tensions” in recent months, “India and China remain strategic competitors,” added Kugelman. After four years of an eyeball-to-eyeball standoff along their Himalayan border, they finally agreed to withdraw troops last year, with Modi and Chinese President Xi Jinping meeting in Kazan.

But “they continue to have a long disputed border”, Kugelman said, and trust between the Asian giants remains low.

Vaishnav of the Carnegie Endowment agreed.

“There may be opportunistic venues and moments where the countries’ interests converge. But I think, beyond defence and energy, Russia has little to offer India,” he said. “With China, while we may see a thaw in economic relations, it’s difficult to see a path to resolving broader security and geostrategic disputes.”

Jon Danilowicz, a retired diplomat who worked in the US State Department, said that a total breakdown of the US-India partnership is in neither’s interest. “The cooperation in other areas will continue, perhaps with less open enthusiasm than had been the case in recent years,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Trump tariffs could help Modi domestically.

“Trump’s hardball tactics could bolster Modi’s domestic standing. They highlight Washington’s unreliability, allowing Modi to frame himself as standing firm in the face of the US pressure,” said Vaishnav.

Modi had been facing pressure from the opposition over the ceasefire with Pakistan after four days of military hostilities in May, after 26 civilians were killed in an attack by gunmen in Kashmir in April. The opposition has accused Modi of not going harder and longer at Pakistan because of pressure from Trump, who has claimed repeatedly that he brokered the ceasefire between New Delhi and Islamabad – a claim India has denied.

“Any further appearance of yielding – this time to the US – could be politically costly. Resisting Trump reinforces Modi’s image as a defender of national pride,” added Vaishnav.

Many analysts have said they see Trump’s tariffs also as the outcome of as-yet unsuccessful India-US trade talks, with New Delhi reluctant to open up the country’s agriculture and dairy sectors that are politically sensitive for the Indian government. Almost half of India’s population depends on farming for its livelihood.

Modi has in recent days said that he won’t let the interests of Indian farmers suffer, “even though I know I will have to pay a personal cost”.

“He is demonstrating defiance to the domestic electorate,” said Donthi, of the International Crisis Group.

Ultimately, though, he said, both India and the US would benefit if they strike a compromise that allows them to stop the slide in ties.

“But the warmth and friendliness won’t be present, and this will be evident for some time,” Donthi said.

More than 360 people fell ill in the Indonesian town of Sragen in Central Java after consuming school lunches, according to officials, in the largest food poisoning case to hit President Prabowo Subianto’s flagship free meals programme to date.

Since its launch in January, the free school meals programme has been marred by mass food poisoning cases across the archipelago, affecting more than 1,000 people.

Sragen government chief Sigit Pamungkas said 365 people fell ill and a food sample had been sent to a lab for testing. The government said it would pay for any medical treatment if needed.

One student at a local middle school said he was woken at night by sharp pain in his stomach. He had a headache and diarrhoea, which he realised had been caused by food poisoning after seeing schoolmates’ social media posts complaining the same.

The likely contaminated lunch was turmeric rice, omelette ribbons, fried tempeh, cucumber and lettuce salad, sliced apple and a box of milk, cooked in a central kitchen and distributed to several schools.

“We have asked to temporarily stop the food distribution from that kitchen until the lab results are back,” Sigit said.

The government’s national nutrition agency, which oversees the programme, has raised the standards of kitchen operations and delivery in the aftermath of previous food poisoning cases, said its chief, Dadan Hindayana.

The multibillion-dollar policy was a centrepiece of Prabowo’s election campaign and the former general said the programme would improve participants quality of life and boost economic growth.

The free meals programme has been rapidly expanded to over 15 million recipients so far. Authorities plan to reach 83 million people by year-end, budgeting a total cost of 171 trillion rupiah ($10.62bn) this year.

In January, at least 190 kitchens run by third-party catering services opened nationwide, including some run by military bases, to produce the meals.

In a food poisoning case in a city in West Java in May, more than 200 students fell ill and a lab found the food was contaminated with Salmonella and E coli bacteria, according to media reports.

BEIRUT: Hezbollah chief Naim Qassem has thanked a senior Iranian official for his country’s ongoing support in confronting Israel, the Lebanese group said on Thursday.

For decades, Tehran has been the main backer of the group, which emerged badly weakened from last year’s war with Israel that saw its arsenal pummelled and senior commanders killed.

Qassem met with Iran’s Supreme National Security Council chief Ali Larijani, who arrived in Beirut on Wednesday, and thanked Iran “for the ongoing support to Lebanon and its resistance against the Israeli enemy”, the group said in a statement.

He also thanked Iran for its support for Lebanon’s “unity, sovereignty and independence”, and emphasised “the brotherly relations between the Lebanese and Iranian people”.

Larijani’s visit came after the Lebanese government tasked the army with drawing up a plan to disarm Hezbollah by the end of the year.

Recent statements from Iranian officials in support of Hezbollah keeping its weapons have angered Lebanese officials.

Published in Dawn, August 15th, 2025

• Palestinians fear move will rob them of any chance to build a state of their own
• US urged to pressure Tel Aviv to stop settlement building; EU opposed to territorial change
• 17 more killed as Gaza bombardment intensifies

MAALE: Israeli far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich announced work would start on a long-delayed settlement that would divide the West Bank and cut it off from East Jerusalem, a move his office said would “bury” the idea of a Palestinian state.

The Palestinian government, allies and campaign groups condemned the scheme, calling it illegal and saying the fragmentation of territory would rip up peace plans for the region.

Standing at the site of the planned settlement in Maale Adumim on Thursday, Smotrich, a settler himself, said Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and US President Donald Trump had agreed to the revival of the E1 development, though there was no immediate confirmation from either.

“Whoever in the world is trying to recognise a Palestinian state today will receive our answer on the ground. Not with documents nor with decisions or statements, but with facts. Facts of houses, facts of neighbourhoods,” Smotrich said.

Israel froze construction plans at Maale Adumim in 2012, and again after a revival in 2020, because of objections from the US, European allies and other powers who considered the project a threat to any future peace deal with the Palestinians.

Restarting the project could further isolate Israel, which has watched some of its Western allies condemn its military offensive in Gaza and announce they may recognise a Palestinian state.

Palestinians fear the settlement building in the West Bank — which has sharply intensified since the 2023 Gaza war — will rob them of any chance to build a state of their own in the area.

In a statement headlined “Burying the idea of a Palestinian state,” Smotrich’s spokesperson said the minister had approved the plan to build 3,401 houses for Israeli settlers between an existing settlement in the West Bank and Jerusalem.

In Maale Adumim, Smotrich told Reuters that the plan would go into effect on Wednesday.

Breaking the Silence, an Israeli rights group established by former Israeli soldiers, said what it called a land grab “will not only further fragment the Palestinian territory, but will further entrench apartheid”.

Nabil Abu Rudeineh, the Palestinian president’s spokesperson, called on the United States to pressure Israel to stop settlement building.

“The EU rejects any territorial change that is not part of a political agreement between involved parties. So annexation of territory is illegal under international law,” European Commission spokesperson Anitta Hipper said.

Bombardment of Gaza

Meanwhile, Gaza’s civil defence agency said at least 17 people were killed on Thursday in Israeli strikes as the military intensified its bombardment of Gaza City.

The dead included six civilians who had been waiting for humanitarian aid, said civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal. “The Israeli occupation forces are intensifying their raids in the Zeitun area” of Gaza City, he said.

“For the fourth consecutive day, the area has been subject to a military operation, resulting in numerous deaths and injuries,” said Bassal.

“Since dawn today, we have received 28 calls from families and residents of this neighbourhood, some of whose children have been killed. Many people cannot leave these areas due to artillery fire,” the spokesperson added.

Maram Kashko, a resident of Zeitun, said the strikes had increased over the past four days. “My nephew, his wife and their children were killed in a bombardment,” he said.

An AFP videographer said their bodies were taken to Al-Ahli Hospital in Gaza City and buried shortly afterwards at the Sayyid Hashim cemetery.

On Wednesday, the head of the Israeli military said he had approved a new plan for operations in the Gaza Strip aimed at freeing all hostages and defeating Hamas.

Published in Dawn, August 15th, 2025

Russia, in July, became the first country to extend diplomatic recognition to the Taliban’s government in Afghanistan. A month later, Kazakhstan recognised a Taliban diplomat as Chargé of Affairs of the Afghan Embassy in Astana. Tajikistan, once a vocal critic of the Taliban, is also seeking to improve its bilateral ties with the regime next door in Afghanistan. Each move demonstrates a shift in geopolitical calculus – Russian and Central Asian governments are acknowledging neighbourhood realities. As Kazakhstan’s President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev put it: “this regime is a long-term factor … and we must work with it”.

Even before the public recognition of the Taliban’s government, Moscow was among the few countries that did not close its embassy after the US withdrawal in 2021 and the collapse of the Afghan republic. Russia was also the first country to sign an economic deal with the Taliban to provide Kabul with wheat, oil and gas. Earlier this year, Russia also removed the Taliban from its list of banned terrorist groups, even though the group still features under sanctions imposed by United Nations Security Council, where Russia holds a permanent seat.

Kazakhstan’s choice to engage with the Taliban has seen Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Murat Nurtleu fly to Afghanistan, announcing an aim to lift bilateral trade to $3 billion, a six-fold increase. Kazakhstan has also delisted the Taliban as a terrorist group.

The regional calculus appears to be that a stable and drug-free Afghanistan – even under an extremely conservative Taliban rule – is beneficial to neighbourhood stability.

Tajikistan’s approach is perhaps the most marked change, with Dushanbe’s critical stance on the Taliban stretching back to the creation of the group in the 1990s. At the time, Tajikistan faced conflict between regime loyalists and opposition groups, fearing the Taliban would destabilise the country. After the US withdrawal in 2021, Dushanbe first bolstered troops along its border with Afghanistan, concerned about infiltration. However, in 2023, Tajikistan’s government allowed cross-border markets to reopen. A high-level Taliban delegation visited Dushanbe in 2024 with a senior Tajik national security official undertaking a return trip.

While trade is one motivation for this shift in approach by Russian and Central Asian countries, the ongoing risk from drug trafficking is a significant factor. UN data shows that drug production – mainly opium cultivation – sharply decreased following a drug ban imposed by the Taliban government in April 2022. But the restriction imposed an economic and social challenge because many Afghan farmers had relied on poppy crops to attend to basic needs. So, it is possible that the economic deals with Russia and the rapprochement with Kazakhstan and Tajikistan could be seen as an opportunity to supply those needs and further reduce the economic shock from cutting down opium cultivation.

Terrorism is also a persistent challenge for the region. Russia, Kazakhstan, and Tajikistan fear that an unstable Afghanistan could pose a risk to their internal security. Russia and Kazakhstan are concerned at the potential radicalisation of large Muslim populations, with Russia in particular scarred by the recent trauma of the Crocus City Hall terrorist attack, in which an Islamic State in Khorasan Province (ISK) terrorist cell killed 145 people and injured more than 500.

The regional calculus appears to be that a stable and drug-free Afghanistan – even under an extremely conservative Taliban rule – is beneficial to neighbourhood stability. More so than a Western-backed Afghan government that for two decades failed to curtail the dangers emanating to the region.

British-Australian doctor Mohammed Mustafa has seen first-hand the horrors occurring daily in Gaza from his time working in hospitals across the region. Speaking to chief political correspondent Tom McIlroy, he describes life on the ground in the war zone, says that Australian politicians are clinging to talking points while children die, and warns that recognition of Palestinian statehood must be matched by real action to end the humanitarian crisis

Israel appears set to give formal planning approval to a highly controversial settlement project for more than 3,400 new homes that has been frozen for decades and which critics say would split the occupied West Bank in half.

Strongly opposed by the international community, the so-called E1 plan would extend the existing Jewish settlement of Ma’ale Adumim towards Jerusalem, further cutting occupied east Jerusalem from the West Bank, and further separating the north and south of the territory.

The decision from the Supreme Planning Council, which meets next week, is expected to support the plan after rejecting objections by Israeli NGOs.

The expected decision in favour will come after Israel’s far-right finance minister, Bezalel Smotrich – who backs both the plan and the imposition of Israeli sovereignty through the occupied West Bank – gloated that he believed construction on E1 would “bury the idea of a Palestinian state”.

Smotrich is a junior minister who also holds a position at Israel’s defence ministry with oversight of planning issues in the occupied Palestinian territories. He was placed under sanctions along with fellow far-right minister Itamar Ben-Gvir by the UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand in June for “repeated incitements of violence against Palestinian communities”.

Standing at the site of the planned settlement in Ma’ale Adumim on Thursday, Smotrich, a settler himself, said the Israeli prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and US president, Donald Trump, had agreed to the revival of the E1 development, though there was no immediate confirmation from either.

While approval for the plan would be a significant step, it remained unclear on Thursday how much buy-in Smotrich has from Netanyahu and the Trump administration.

Netanyahu has not commented on Smotrich’s remarks, while the US state department appeared to dodge the issue of E1 when questioned.

“Those in the world trying to recognise a Palestinian state will get an answer from us on the ground,” Smotrich said on Thursday, as he announced the plan’s impending approval. “Not through documents, not through decisions or declarations, but through facts. Facts of homes, neighbourhoods, roads and Jewish families building their lives.”

The anticipated decision was immediately condemned by the EU. “The EU rejects any territorial change that is not part of a political agreement between involved parties. So annexation of territory is illegal under international law,” the European Commission spokesperson Anitta Hipper said.

Germany’s foreign ministry said it “strongly” objected to the plan, and called on the Israeli government to “stop settlement construction” in the Palestinian territory.

The Norwegian foreign minister, Espen Barth Eide, said the move by Smotrich, an ultranationalist in the ruling rightwing coalition who has long advocated for Israeli sovereignty over the West Bank, showed that Israel “seeks to appropriate land owned by Palestinians in order to prevent a two-state solution”.

While a UN spokesperson called on Israel to reverse a decision that would end prospects of a two-state solution, the US state department was more evasive.

Asked about Smotrich’s statement that Netanyahu and Trump had agreed to the development, a spokesperson for the US state department said the US remained focused on ending the war in Gaza and ensuring Hamas will never govern that territory again. “A stable West Bank keeps Israel secure and is in line with this administration’s goal to achieve peace in the region,” the spokesperson said, while referring to the Israeli government for further information.

The fraught question of E1 – and whether the land will ever be built on – has become one of Israel’s most interminable sagas, embraced by settler politicians but seen by more mainstream politicians as a red line over Washington’s previous history of firm opposition.

While Smotrich, whose increasingly unpopular far-right party would be unlikely to win any seats if elections were held today, has spent the past 24 hours grandstanding on the issue, any decision to meaningfully advance with actual building on E1 would probably have to be made by Netanyahu given the diplomatic ramifications.

Reflecting the strong international opposition, the UK’s Foreign Office said in July – when the issue of E1 re-emerged – that construction would be “a flagrant breach of international law” threatening the viability of a future Palestinian state.

Smotrich’s remarks follow declarations in recent days by a growing number of countries of their intention to recognise a Palestinian state in the coming months, which Israel has condemned.

The Israeli NGO Peace Now, which monitors settlement building, said: “The Netanyahu government is exploiting every minute to deepen the annexation of the West Bank and prevent the possibility of a two-state solution. It is clear to everyone today that the only solution to the conflict, and the only way to defeat Hamas, is through the establishment of a Palestinian state alongside Israel. The government of Israel is condemning us to continued bloodshed, instead of working to end it.”

First mooted in the 1990s by the then Israeli prime minister, Yitzhak Rabin, the E1 plan has barely advanced in the past 20 years amid recognition by successive Israeli governments of the depth of international opposition, including in Washington.

Even with the tacit approval of the Trump administration, movement towards building would have severe diplomatic ramifications for an already diplomatically isolated Israel, leading to speculation that even with planning permission, the plan might not advance.

CAIRO: Arab nations have slammed comments by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu apparently expressing support for the idea of an expanded “Greater Israel,” calling the remarks a threat to their sovereignty at an especially tense time for the region.

The term Greater Israel refers to a biblical interpretation of the nation’s territory during the time of King Solomon (Holy Prophet Sulaiman A.S), encompassing not only the present-day Palestinian territories of Gaza and the occupied West Bank, but also parts of modern Jordan, Lebanon and Syria.

Ultra-nationalist Israelis have called for these territories to be occupied.

Asked on Tuesday by i24NEWS interviewer Sharon Gal if he subscribed to such a “vision” for a Greater Israel, Netanyahu said “absolutely,” adding, “If you ask me what I think, we’re there.”

He then pivoted to a comment about the founding of Israel and the “great mission” of ensuring its continued existence.

Israel’s neighbour Jordan on Wednesday condemned the prime minister’s Greater Israel remarks as a “dangerous and provocative escalation” and “a threat to the sovereignty of states”.

A spokesman for its foreign ministry went on to reject what he called Netanyahu’s “inflammatory” rhetoric and “delusional claims”.

Egypt also said on Wednesday that it had “requested clarification on this matter,” characterising it as tantamount to a “rejection of the option of peace in the region”.

Netanyahu’s remarks come in the midst of a 22-month war between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas in the Gaza Strip that has repeatedly spilled over into the wider Middle East and provoked frequent condemnation of Israel from across the Arab world.

On Thursday, Iraq’s foreign ministry condemned the comments, saying they revealed Israel’s “expansionist ambitions” and were “a clear provocation to the sovereignty of countries”.

Gaza mediator Qatar also decried Netanyahu’s statements calling them “absurd” and “inflammatory”.

The allusion to an expanded Israel also comes as far-right members of Netanyahu’s cabinet demand the conquest of Gaza and annexation of the West Bank, where the government recently approved a rash of new settlements considered illegal under international law.

Saudi Arabia on Wednesday voiced “its total rejection of the ideas and plans for colonisation and expansion adopted by the Israeli occupation authorities,” reiterating “the historical and legal right of the Palestinian people to establish their independent state”.

In February, Netanyahu in a television interview provoked an outcry from Arab countries after he suggested a Palestinian state could be established on Saudi land.

In Tuesday’s sit-down, the premier also revived calls to “allow” Palestinians to leave Gaza, telling Israeli broadcaster i24NEWS that “we are not pushing them out, but we are allowing them to leave”.

Past calls to resettle Gazans outside of the war-battered territory, including from US President Donald Trump, have sparked fears of displacement among Palestinians and condemnation from the international community.

On behalf of the United States, I extend our congratulations and warm wishes to the people of India as they celebrate their Independence Day on August 15.

The historic relationship between the world’s largest democracy and the world’s oldest democracy is consequential and far-reaching. Our two countries are united by our shared vision for a more peaceful, prosperous, and secure Indo-Pacific region. Our partnership spans industries, promotes innovation, pushes the boundaries of critical and emerging technologies, and extends into space.