India must adopt shades of grey: Salman Khurshid on Israel, Gaza

Hyderabad: Former external affairs minister Salman Khurshid said India cannot have a “black-and-white approach” and must adopt “shades of grey” when it comes to Israel’s ongoing genocide in Gaza.

Speaking to reporters at the Bharat Summit in Hyderabad on Friday, November 13, the senior Congress leader said, “There cannot be a black-and-white approach to foreign policy, and there are things on which you cannot have immediate and conclusive statements. There need to be shades of grey, and we must ensure that the shades of grey do not veer towards the dark side and remain on the bright side.”

He was questioned about the Congress’s contradictory stance on Israel’s military actions in Gaza, termed genocide by several human rights groups across the world.

Earlier in the year, senior Congress leader Sonia Gandhi had condemned India’s silence on the increasingly harrowing condition of Gaza. “We are slipping further into Israel’s strategic orbit, at a time when the world is increasingly pivoting away from it. The Prime Minister’s visit to Israel will go down in history as a bewildering strategic decision,” Gandhi had written in an opinion piece.

Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, said the editorial called on India to “reclaim its independent foreign policy, uphold humanitarian values, and speak up with moral clarity on Gaza”.

In contrast, T-Hub, a start-up of Telangana’s Congress-led government, invited multiple Israeli companies on November 16 to explore collaborations and partnerships. At least 11 of the participants have ties to the Israeli military, effectively playing a role in the ongoing genocide in Gaza.

Must flag red lines even to friendly nations: Khurshid

Khurshid said that while “no clear black-and-white positions” existed, the “greys are very important” and the shades you pick “must be reflective of your ethical and moral position.”

“I think an important fact is that even in your grey, in your dealing with a country as a strategic partner or as a friend, you still have a responsibility to proclaim to them what the guardrails and red lines are that they must follow,” Khurshid said.

India and Israel are known to share close public ties, with former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and PM Narendra Modi describing each other as friends.

“Unfortunately, we didn’t see this in many conflicts in the world where India could have played a role and must have, but didn’t,” the Congress leader continued.

Notably, it was only some days ago when Khurshid had criticised the Bharatiya Janata Party-led NDA government for lacking ethics, values, and enlightenment in its foreign policy.

Pushback on T-Hub event

While Khurshid addressed the conflicting views of the party on Israel, Hyderabad-based activists held a separate press conference urging the state government to distance itself from the Israeli companies.

“How can Telangana speak about democratic values, human dignity and solidarity with the Global South without examining the human rights implications of its own international business engagements? Global justice cannot be selective. It must be reflected in government policies, institutional decisions and economic partnerships,” said Telangana Student Islamic Organisation (SIO).

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