At the same time, India-Israel partnership is making giant strides. What do you have to say about it?

This is indeed a great partnership because I think our leaders think alike. They have an agenda of development. They want to create entrepreneurs. They believe in freedom. They believe in free markets and in reform. This has brought them together. We have been working with India on many issues on defence, on defence industry, on irrigation and water-related issues. We have a challenge to work on additional issues on high tech and innovation that can create a huge effect on the economy. So, we are thinking about ways of doing that. We had two weeks ago a huge delegation from Israel led by our Minister of Economy Nir Barkat. About 80 to 100 companies came here to do business. They met with Indian companies, we also want to work together in the field of infrastructure. India has a lot to offer in the field of infrastructure. So, we have a huge task ahead of us. We want to sign agreements to ease business with us, agreements on trade and on the financial realm. We have mapped all these things we want to do together. We are working very seriously together with the Indian government. I hope that this year in which we are coming out of this war and we are energized to do more things, we will achieve it. We’ve been having a number of visits lately where a Minister of Transport came, the Minister of Economy came twice, a Minister of Tourism came. We are also working to bring additional ministers here. We have been seeing presidents of universities from Israel coming here. They want to not just do academic cooperation but also connect together the innovation units of universities to work together on the technologies of tomorrow. India is a rising power in the world. It is becoming important to us, not just as a business partner, but also as an element in our supply chain. This will become, I believe, part of our national security strategy and that’s why I’m very happy to be here.

US President Donald Trump has offered to sell F-35 fighter jets to India. Israel also uses these state-of-the-art jets, what difference could its acquisition bring?

I think that the advanced technologies in the military realm are very important to create an edge over adversaries. We already have received several squadrons of F-35s, and they are proving themselves to be very efficient in creating Israeli supremacy over the skies of the Middle East. If India manages to do the same and acquire F-35s, no doubt it will give it a similar edge.

Indian diplomacy has come in for huge praise for its balanced approach in recent times... What is your take on it?

Well, diplomacy is always a balancing act. I think that we have seen during this last year and a half that the support we needed from India came and it was a good support, both orally and also in deeds. It wasn’t on the account of any other thing that India does. So, it proves that you can have good relations with us without being detrimental to the relations you have with other countries in the world.

India and Israel are also working together on connectivity initiatives, including IMEC and the port of Haifa...

Logistics indeed works in networks. So the question is, what is the level of efficiency of the networks that you have that allow you to do trade in a way that is cheaper, that is more effective and is faster? So in this context, the quest of India to create connectivity is very understandable. We want to be part of that. It also has to stand on stable strategic foundations. So the fact that we have security cooperation in our region between Israel and our Arab countries, between Israel and the Gulf under an American umbrella, gives me the confidence that we will be able to execute these corridors of connectivity that are coming from India to Europe, passing through the Middle East, and vice versa. This has huge potential. It’s going to happen not instead but, you know, in addition to current, logistic ways in which trade happens. We are not talking only about trade, we are talking about connectivity in communications, in energy, in many other fields. So if we are going to be able to realise it, I think it’s going to serve not only India, but also all the countries in the region.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has emerged as a powerful global leader, how do you view his leadership?

We are actually looking with admiration to the achievements of India under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. His friendship is very dear for us. We saw he was the first to call us following the 7th of October. We saw how he stood by us during the last year and a half. We know that we think alike on many things. We look at things in a similar way. We have similar challenges. Therefore, I am confident that in the coming years, we will be able to do many more things together.

How special is the partnership between India and Israel - from defence to agriculture to tech and in several other areas?

I will tell you why this is so special. First of all, when it comes to our defence cooperation, Israel has been the first country, I think, that adapted to the ‘Make in India’ policy. We today stand in a situation in which we have created a lot of joint ventures here. We’re producing together on Indian soil, advanced drones. We are producing autonomous helicopters, autonomous amphibious machinery. We are producing ammunition together. Israel industries have established factories here that do maintenance for the equipment that we have supplied to the Indian Army. We are beginning to do R&D together. So this is something that is very special and shows the level of trust that exists between the security establishments and also between the companies. This is not something you can take for granted. This was something that was built with many years of hard work. It’s very important for both countries. In the field of agriculture, the fact that India has decided to bet on Israeli technology paid off big time because today many farmers in India use these technologies and they have been able to increase their crops and to create not only food security but also has made India into a net food exporter which is also important.