Azad Essa’s book, Hostile Homelands: The New Alliance Between India and Israel (Pluto Press, 2023), offers detailed insights into the politics of Zionism and Hindutva. With an introduction by Linah Alsaafin, the reader is introduced to India as a purported supporter of Palestine “contingent on Israeli interests”.  Zionism and Hindutva, which shape Israel and India respectively, share historical similarities. For Vinayak Savarkar, who developed the Hindutva ideology, Zionism was a model to emulate. “If the Zionists’ dreams are very realised – if Palestine becomes a Jewish state – it will gladden us almost as much as our Jewish friends,” Savarkar wrote in the 1920s. Drawing upon both ideologies, Essa illustrates how India’s foreign policy shifted from drawing comparisons between Palestine … Continue reading Hostile Homelands: The New Alliance Between India and Israel