Interaction with Mr. Joseph M. Cohen, National Security Advisor of Israel

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On October 22, 2014 Members of VIF faculty interacted with an Israeli delegation led by Dr. Joseph Cohen. He was accompanied by Israel’s ambassador to India H.E. Daniel Carmon. Dr. Cohen briefed the VIF faculty on the talks he had with India’s NSA Mr. Ajit Doval and the ascending trajectory of Indo-Israel relations. He mentioned that both India and Israel share common perceptions on the questions of terrorism and the nature of threat arising there from. He gave out in brief the Israeli perspective on the situation in West Asia and virulence of ISIS threat. He was of the view that international community has to unite together to eliminate this threat. In so far as Indo-Israeli relations are concerned that Israel and India have strengths in some niche areas and both can strengthen their mutually beneficial relationship. Military technical cooperation, co-development and co-production not only in the civil arena but also in defence field, exchanges in developing agriculture in India besides a number of other areas was pointed out by him as the way forward.

Mr. CD Sahay, in his remarks briefed the Israeli delegation about the VIF and its activities. He also pointed out that he had received training in his profession in Israel and he was very proud of it. Intelligence exchanges between the two nations, especially in the area of counter terrorism were very vigourous and useful. Israel has been very supportive of development of India’s defence capabilities in terms of equipment and systems. With PM Modi’s call for ‘Make in India’ there was expanded scope for Israel to shift both civil and defence production lines to India as with rising prosperity levels in Israel the labour and other inputs were becoming costly. Further, the salaries of workers were also going up in Israel. Vice Admiral Raman Puri spoke about the high end technology needs of India especially in the field of defence and was keen that Israel should cooperate further in this area. Gen. Ravi Sawhney also recalled the enhanced cooperation between the two nations in the defence and security areas and epmhasised the need for working towards attaining higher levels especially for joint development and technology transfer. Dr. Cohen while summing stressed the need for cooperation between Israeli think tanks and the VIF.