Daily Times

During a cabinet meeting in September 2012, Netanyahu urged his ministers to multiply their visits to China while cutting their international travels to all other places due to budgetary constraints. Israel and China signed a 10-year multiple entry visa agreement in 2016. Under the new programme, Chinese businesspeople and tourists can enter Israel multiple times with the same visa. The same applies to Israeli citizens visiting China. With the new visa policy, China quickly became Israel’s fastest-growing source of tourists in 2017, when, for the first time, the number of Chinese tourists surpassed 100,000, doubling the figure for 2015. The two sides hope to increase Chinese tourists to 400,000 in the next five years, and the Israeli Tourism Bureau is training Mandarin-speaking tour guides.

To facilitate travel, direct flights have been established. As of 2018, over a dozen weekly nonstop flights between Tel Aviv and five Chinese cities-Hong Kong, Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Chengdu-were provided by Cathay Pacific, Air China/El Al, Hainan Airlines and Sichuan Airlines. Hainan Airlines has recently planned a new direct flight between Tel Aviv and Shenzhen.

Growing Chinese investments in crucial Israeli infrastructure, particularly the port of Haifa, have sounded the alarm in the US. Haifa is where the US Sixth Fleet regularly visits and home to Israel’s nuclear submarine force. The US suspects that China may monitor the entrance to the port’s military facilities in the future. Since 2017, the new Haifa port has become an issue against the backdrop of the US-China trade war. It may rapidly become a problem as big as the 2000 Phalcon surveillance aircraft sale to China. Critics of the new Haifa port argue that allowing Beijing a foothold in a so strategically important location could compromise Israeli intelligence assets and even lead US military vessels to avoid docking at Haifa altogether. However, some Israeli officials are countering that the concerns are overblown. During their visits to Israel in January and March 2019, respectively, both John Bolton, then National Security Advisor to Trump, and then Secretary of State Pompeo warned Israel of security risks from Chinese investments. They threatened to reduce security cooperation between the USand Israel. On the other hand, amid tensions between China and South Korea in 2016-2017 regarding the US deployment of THAAD in South Korea, China’s special envoy on the Korean Peninsula, commented that “China supported South Korea’s effort to defend itself from the North Korean threat, if South Korea introduced the weapons system from Europe or Israel, China would have no problem.” Thus, Chinese officials presume that the real target of the US missile defence system in South Korea is China; they do not view Israel with such suspicion.

Growing Chinese investments in crucial Israeli infrastructure, particularly the port of Haifa, have sounded the alarm in the US. Haifa is where the US Sixth Fleet regularly visits and home to Israel’s nuclear submarine force

Regarding as Chinese relations with other states in the Arab world, China established diplomatic relations with all twenty-two Arab countries between 1956 and 1990 before it did so with Israel in 1992. China’s 2016 Arab Policy Paper stated that China firmly supports Arab national liberation movement, firmly supports Arab countries’ struggle to uphold the sovereignty and territorial integrity, pursue and safeguard national interests, and combat external interference and aggression, and firmly supports Arab countries’ cause of developing the national economy and building up the countries. In the Israel-Arab conflict, China will stand with Arab nations. Though the China-Israel relationship is named a “comprehensive innovative partnership” by both sides, China has forged “comprehensive strategic partnerships”-the highest level in its diplomatic hierarchy-with Iran, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt in the Middle East.

The Israeli government has attempted to form a thoughtful balance between commercial and national security interests, banning trade with China in most military products while at the same time welcoming infrastructure and technology investment. China is overwhelmingly interested in civilian technologies like health, agriculture, fintech, mobility, and advanced manufacturing. In these areas of Israeli strength, Chinese companies are as free to purchase products and services as they are throughout the West, including in the US.

Israel, like other third parties involved in the great power competition, will be experiencing some agonising moments as US-China rivalry intensifies. In 2000 when Israel faced pressure from the US regarding its arms sales to China, its reaction was relatively simple: yield to the US coercion and cancel the sales. Today, as China has become a significant power with increasing investment in Israel, it is no longer so easy for Israel to simply ignore Chinese interests. Some scholars believe that Israel does not have a systematic China policy yet, and its ability to develop a completely independent China policy is still unclear. Instead, it appears to have developed “an opportunistic policy,” trying to maximise its benefits by manoeuvring between the two big powers. It is taking a hedging strategy and not putting all eggs in one basket. With China’s market and capital, Israel’s hi-tech industries, and both nations’ innovative spirit, China-Israel relations have much room to grow

(Concluded)

The writer can be reached at saudzafar5@gmail.com