NEW DELHI — Some counter-terrorism experts in India are convinced that the country's growing ties to Israel were a prime factor behind the targeting of a small Jewish center in the deadly Mumbai attacks.
These experts, despite an ongoing investigation of the assailants' motives, have concluded that the assault on the obscure Nariman House was more sophisticated than those on the city's two luxury hotels, an indication that it was a prime target in the November operation.
"Their aim was to humiliate India, that is aim No. 1," said retired Indian Vice Adm. Premvir S. Das. "Two [was to] tell the Indians clearly that your growing linkage with Israel is not what you should be doing. I think the rest is peripheral."
Das and other members of a high-level delegation of Indian government and business leaders met in Washington in December with senior U.S. State Department and Pentagon officials, including then-Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, and discussed the Mumbai violence, in which more than 170 people were killed.
The relationship between India and Israel has grown into one of the most important for both countries, particularly in arms sales. India has become Israel's largest customer, acquiring about $1.5 billion in weapons every year. Only Russia sells more arms to India.
Bruce Riedel, a former South Asia analyst at the CIA, said the Indian space agency launched a highly sophisticated Israeli spy satellite a year ago, the first of what is expected to be three such launches.
Israel's ambassador to India, Mark Sofer, declined to discuss the security relationship between the countries, saying Israel never talks about it publicly. But Sofer acknowledged that they had grown closer in nonmilitary areas in recent years, noting that Israeli-Indian trade has increased from $80 million in 1991, the year the nations established diplomatic ties, to more than $3.5 billion last year.
Israeli companies also have invested heavily in India, particularly in the real estate and agriculture sectors, and India, especially the western city of Goa, has become a prime tourist destination for Israelis. According to data compiled by the Indian tourism ministry, the number of Israelis visiting India has more than quadrupled over the last decade, to more than 40,000 annually.
Direct evidence, however, that the Mumbai attackers were targeting this increasingly friendly relationship remains piecemeal.
