The Indian Express, Dec. 6, 2021
“The intimacy between the two countries is such that whatever India will ask will be seriously and positively looked at.”
The Indian Express interviews Israeli Ambassador Naor Gilon
Shubhajit Roy: This year, we mark 13 years of 26/11 terrorist attacks in Mumbai. What changed in the relationship between Israel and India post 26/11?
I wasn’t here to witness the changes but since the attack, the cooperation between the nations on the issue of counter-terrorism has been intimate. Be it the methods of work or technology, the two countries are working closely.
Shubhajit Roy: What if today a similar attack happened, do you think an Israeli operation is possible here?
The intimacy between the two countries is such that whatever India will ask will be seriously and positively looked at. We also worked together during the COVID pandemic. When most of the world stopped the export of shielding equipment for medical staff and people, India decided to export to Israel at a very sensitive time. When the second wave hit here (India), Israel also sent oxygen and other things. We look at each other as very close friends and help in whatever way we can.
Shubhajit Roy: Israel suffered the pandemic early on but it was also one the fastest movers when it came to vaccination. What lessons did you learn?
Israel was one of the first countries to close the country because, initially, we didn’t know what was happening. Because of a lack of information, you’re nervous. Once Pfizer had the vaccines, Israel was able to convince them that we can be a real test bed because Israel is a very small country — 9 million people.
We have been living in a sense of emergency from Day 1, so we are well-organised in executing things. We told Pfizer that every Israeli is under one of four health service providers. All of them are non-profit organisations. We are also very digitised, we have a good database. Therefore, we told Pfizer that if you allow vaccination in Israel, we’ll be able to provide microdata on side-effects, problems and age groups. Most of the initial information that was released by Pfizer was based on Israeli database. We were the first to vaccinate. One of the problems was that we are a young country. Thirty per cent of our population is under 16 (years of age). The most we could do was vaccinate 70 per cent of the population, and we vaccinated 90 per cent of this 70 per cent. We also have a lot of anti-vaxxers. We went for the first and second vaccination and we were the first ones, unfortunately, to realise that the second dose’s effect faded after six months. So we went for the booster dose before it was approved by the FDA (Food Drug Administration), because we had the experience. We started vaccinating children from the age of five last week.
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