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Chandigarh: Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s two-day visit to Israel, beginning February 25, places defence and military cooperation at the forefront of bilateral ties between New Delhi and Tel Aviv. His trip comes amid deepening strategic convergence, with both sides expected to review ongoing projects, expand joint research, and explore collaboration in advanced weapons, air defence, and unmanned aerial systems.

Over nearly three decades, Israel has emerged as one of India’s leading defence equipment suppliers, with bilateral military trade running into billions of dollars and encompassing missile systems, surveillance platforms and electronic warfare equipment.

Officials in New Delhi’s defence establishment said Modi’s Israel visit will not only reaffirm the political and strategic commitment underpinning this long-standing partnership, but also seek to accelerate co-development and local materiel manufacturing initiatives, in line with India’s drive for greater Atamnirbharta or self-reliance in its defence equipment needs.

According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, India accounted for around 34% of Israel’s total arms exports between 2020 and 2024, worth an estimated $20.5 billion. During this period, it was also India’s third-largest materiel supplier after Russia and France, accounting for around 13% of all its defence imports, either through outright sales or via local collaborative ventures involving technology transfer.

Yet despite this exponentially expanding military partnership – arguably amongst Israel’s most consequential – it remains strikingly opaque, conducted largely beyond public scrutiny. Ever since formal diplomatic ties between Delhi and Tel Aviv were established in 1992, Israel has routinely understated the scale of its security cooperation with India, and Delhi has reciprocated, constrained by domestic political sensitivities and decades of strategic caution.

Reciprocal visits to Delhi and Tel Aviv by military, security and intelligence officials, Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) technicians and scientists and armament company executives too remain strictly under wraps, as does all bilateral military commerce executed through both private and public sectors.

Long-range strike systems and more

Israel’s contribution to India’s defence arsenal extends well beyond individual systems, reflecting a broad and substantial supply of advanced materiel.

Industry officials said the defining feature of Israel’s defence exports to India is ‘modular integration’, as Tel Aviv rarely supplies complete heavy platforms. Instead, it provides missiles, seekers, radars, sensors, electronic warfare suites, UAV technologies and a host of force multipliers that seamlessly integrate with India’s Russian, Western, and indigenous systems, enabling rapid capability upgrades without full platform replacement. Combined with the Indian military’s talent for jugaad or creative innovation, Israeli military goods create a potent synergy, allowing systems to be continuously upgraded, cross-integrated, and operated with enhanced effectiveness across both offensive and defensive roles.

Over the past few years, Israel has supplied India with a suite of advanced long-range strike systems, several of which were employed in Operation Sindoor. One of these packages, valued at around $8 billion, includes SPICE (Smart, Precise Impact and Cost Effective)  GPS/INS kits developed by Rafael Advanced Defense Systems that convert conventional bombs into precision-guided munitions. This provides the Indian Air Force (IAF) stand-off strike capability, along with missiles like Rampage for deep-penetration strikes, Air Lora for rapid strategic engagement, and Ice Breaker for persistent long-range attacks. Together,........

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