Israel–Yugoslavia Relations

Yugoslavia was among the early countries to recognize Israel, and the relationship initially included diplomatic representation, trade agreements, political exchanges, and practical assistance to the new state.[1][2] Its subsequent development reflected a tension between those connections and Yugoslavia’s growing alignment with Arab governments and the Non-Aligned Movement.[1] Tito’s leadership continued to recognize Israel’s right to exist even as it increasingly opposed Israeli regional policies and supported Palestinian political demands.[2]

The relationship was not confined to government diplomacy: the emigration of thousands of Yugoslav Holocaust survivors created enduring personal connections with Israel, while Jewish organizations maintained international contacts across periods of political estrangement.[5][6] Economic and cultural activity also survived the absence of diplomatic relations after 1967.[5] Following Yugoslavia’s breakup, Israel’s regional relationships developed separately with the states that emerged from the former federation, rather than continuing as a single bilateral relationship.[7]

In 1947, Yugoslavia participated in the United Nations Special Commission on Palestine, where its representatives expressed understanding for Jewish aspirations to independence but ultimately supported a binational state.[1] Yugoslavia did not vote for the General Assembly’s partition resolution in November that year.[1] It nevertheless recognized Israel on May 19, 1948, after which full diplomatic relations and an initial trade agreement followed.[1]

Practical assistance accompanied recognition during Israel’s War of Independence.[2] On June 15, 1948, Tito’s Communist government agreed that the Kapino Polje airfield near Nikšić, in Montenegro, could serve as a waystation for 60 Spitfire aircraft purchased by Israel in Czechoslovakia.[2] The arrangement reflected both sympathy for Israel among some Yugoslav Communist leaders and financial considerations, since Israel paid dollars for the aircraft and their transfer through Yugoslav territory.[2]

The secret aircraft transfer was known as Operation Velvetta.[2] Its first group of Spitfires departed Kunovice on September 24, 1948, and Kapino Polje received the code name “Alabama.”[2] Gideon Shoshad commanded the Israeli detachment at the airfield.[2] The Yugoslav and Montenegrin portion of the operation ended on December 31, 1948, and the last Israeli personnel returned home on January 5, 1949.[2]

Political, economic, and cultural relations developed favorably during the first years after Israeli independence.[2] Yugoslav public opinion generally viewed Israel positively, with particular interest in kibbutzim and other experiments in socialist-inspired economic and social organization.[2] Between 1949 and 1954, exchanges linked the Yugoslav Socialist Union with Mapai and Yugoslav trade unions with the Histadrut, while the two countries’ legations supported political, social, and cultural contacts.[1]

Two Montenegrin diplomats served as Yugoslav ambassadors to Israel between 1948 and 1967.[2] One, Jovan Vukmanović, headed the mission in Tel Aviv from May 25, 1954, until early July 1956.[2] Yugoslav diplomacy was not consistently favorable to Israel’s positions, but on September 1, 1951, its representative supported a Security Council resolution calling for free navigation for all nations through the Suez Canal, then regarded as a diplomatic success for Israel.[1]

Yugoslavia permitted Jewish emigration to Israel after 1948, unlike most other socialist countries.[4] More than 7,500 Yugoslav Jews made aliyah in four migration waves between 1948 and 1951.[6] A separate demographic accounting gives 7,578 emigrants to Israel out of 12,495 wartime survivors, while an account covering the longer period through 1952 gives more than 8,500 immigrants.[5][8] The departure of so many survivors substantially reduced Yugoslavia’s postwar Jewish population.[4]

Postwar population figures also reflected different forms of identification.[4] The 1948 census counted 6,538 people of Jewish nationality, whereas Jewish communities across Yugoslavia had 11,934 members.[4] Some individuals identified nationally as Croat or Serb while identifying religiously as Jewish, accounting for part of the distinction between census and communal totals.[4]

Obtaining permission to make aliyah was a central concern of the Jewish community in the late 1940s, and the Yugoslav Jewish Communist leader Moša Pijade assisted Jews during that period.[8] Pijade was a close confidant of Tito and served as president of the Federal Assembly from 1954 to 1957.[9] Jews who remained in Yugoslavia included former partisan fighters and people who had intermarried; some rebuilt their lives in different parts of the country rather than returning to their prewar hometowns.[8] Strong Zionist commitments and Jewish identification encouraged some to leave, while attachment to socialism or Yugoslavia encouraged others to stay.[8]

Emigration did not end contact between the two communities.[6] Yugoslav Jews maintained family and friendship connections with Israelis, and some younger community members visited or studied in Israel even after the 1967 diplomatic rupture.[6] Such personal exchanges continued although public support for Israel could be risky.[6] Jews remaining in Yugoslavia also maintained contacts with Jewish communities in Western countries during the latter half of the twentieth century.[9]

On November 6, 1955, Tito told U.S. Secretary of State John Foster Dulles that Yugoslavia had good relations with both Israel and Arab states.[3] He recalled receiving an invitation to Israel the previous year but being unable to travel, and expressed a wish to speak frankly with both Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser and Israeli leaders.[3] Tito identified the preservation of peace as Yugoslavia’s principal interest in the region.[3]

Tito also said he had urged Nasser to accept Israel as a “fact of life” and had proposed direct contact between Egypt and Israel.[3] Egyptian officials strongly protested that suggestion.[3] Concerned that the Arab–Israeli dispute could produce war, Tito intended to address leaders on both sides directly.[3]

Relations nevertheless deteriorated as Tito pursued a nonaligned grouping alongside Nasser and Indian Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru following the 1955 Bandung Conference.[1] Closer Yugoslav–Soviet relations from May 1955 also contributed to the shift.[1] During the 1956 Sinai crisis, Yugoslavia adopted a strongly adverse position toward Israel and curtailed bilateral cooperation.[1] After the Suez War, Yugoslav leaders increasingly regarded Israel as serving Western imperial interests, initially those of Britain and France and later principally those of the United States.[2] They did not, however, question Israel’s right to exist or endorse calls to expel or annihilate Jews from their new homeland.[2]

Trade and personal Jewish contacts remained important connections as political relations cooled, and Yugoslavia supported Arab positions against Israel without joining an economic boycott.[1] During the June 1967 Six-Day War, Yugoslavia characterized Israel as the “aggressor” and severed diplomatic relations.[1] Israeli ambassador Avigdor Dagan received official notice on June 13 and informed his government; Israel subsequently expelled members of the Yugoslav mission headed by Ambassador Vojimir M. Šobajić.[2] Relations were not restored before Yugoslavia’s dissolution in 1991.[2]

The rupture affected Israeli sport as well as diplomacy.[10] Yugoslav coaches Ljuba Spajić and Bela Palfi left or ended their work in Israel, while national-team coach Milovan Ćirić departed on vacation and did not return.[10] Israel’s basketball team also canceled its participation in a tournament in Yugoslavia because of the break in relations.[10]

After the Six-Day War, Tito pursued a Middle East settlement initiative through an exchange of letters with U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson from July through September 1967.[11] The exchange began with a message Tito gave Chief Justice Earl Warren on July 27, and the correspondence concerned possible terms for resolving the Arab–Israeli conflict.[11]

In an October 1, 1970, meeting with President Richard Nixon, Tito confirmed that Yugoslavia had broken diplomatic relations with Israel in 1967.[12] He offered to reestablish them if Israel changed its policy, renounced territorial claims, and returned to the pre-1967 boundaries.[12] Tito stated that Israel’s existence was not in question, but argued that its policies and retention of territory impeded peace.[12] He also called for a settlement encompassing Palestinian refugees and security arrangements; these were his positions rather than an agreed Israeli–Yugoslav framework.[12]

A 1986 U.S. intelligence assessment characterized Yugoslavia’s policy as pro-Arab and supportive of the PLO, linking that orientation to Tito’s relationship with Nasser and Yugoslavia’s role in the Non-Aligned Movement.[13] It reported that Yugoslavia permitted Soviet cargo aircraft to cross its territory en route to Egypt during the 1967 war, authorized a PLO diplomatic mission in Belgrade in the 1970s, and supported the 1975 United Nations resolution equating Zionism with racism.[13] Tito nevertheless opposed efforts to exclude Israel from the United Nations, believing that such action could break up the organization.[5]

During a visit to Romania on December 3–4, 1977, Tito explicitly called for Arab recognition of Israel.[1] He declared: “Israel exists for many years as a genuine fact, is recognized by the UN and is a member of it; any other view would be unrealistic. Thus, all the Arab states must recognize Israel as a state.”[1]

After Tito’s death in 1980, Yugoslav policy continued to support the PLO and to forgo diplomatic relations with Israel, with oil and other Middle Eastern imports contributing to its regional priorities.[14] PLO leader Yasir Arafat received a warm reception in Belgrade in 1988 and urged Yugoslavia to act as a Middle East peacemaker.[14] Israel sought a change in Yugoslavia’s diplomatic position in 1989, hoping that the Non-Aligned Movement summit that year could advance peace, but Yugoslavia did not grant the requested recognition.[14]

In October 1966, World Jewish Congress representative Armand Kaplan visited Sarajevo at the invitation of the Yugoslav Federation of Jewish Communities to commemorate the community’s 400th anniversary.[15] The visit enabled contact with representatives of other Eastern European Jewish communities who could travel to Yugoslavia and helped prepare a subsequent visit by WJC president Nahum Goldmann.[15]

Goldmann led a delegation to Belgrade in March–April 1967 as part of a tour of Central and Eastern European Jewish communities.[15] The journey sought to build relations with Jewish communities and governments and to pay official homage to victims of Nazism.[15] After returning to Geneva, Goldmann said on April 17 that governments understood and appreciated Jewish identification and collaboration with the WJC “as the expression of the unity of the Jewish people.”[15]

Tito and Goldmann met several times during the 1960s, discussing possible solutions to the Middle East conflict and the circumstances of Jewish communities in Eastern Europe and Muslim countries.[15] Their meetings took place while Tito sought his own diplomatic channels with the West alongside his leadership ambitions in the Non-Aligned Movement.[15] Yugoslav Jewish communities remained active in the WJC during the 1970s, and an official delegation headed by Edgar Bronfman visited Yugoslavia in 1987.[15]

Bilateral commerce began in 1949 at a few hundred thousand dollars in each direction and reached six million dollars by the signing of the third trade agreement in 1966.[1] Exchange continued after the diplomatic break and remained fairly balanced and growing in 1971, despite Yugoslavia’s unilateral suspension of the payments agreement in April 1970.[1]

Israeli imports included Yugoslav meat, wood, furniture, citrus-packing boxes, metal products, and sugar.[1] Israeli exports included cement, citrus fruits and concentrates, phosphates, tires, textile rayons, and plastic products.[1] Trade nevertheless remained small compared with Yugoslavia’s commerce with other Middle Eastern partners.[5]

Sport occasionally provided opportunities unavailable through formal diplomacy.[16] A retrospective commentary in The Jerusalem Post recounts that Belgrade hosted the April 1977 European basketball final between Maccabi Tel Aviv and Italy’s Varese, despite Yugoslavia’s lack of diplomatic relations with Israel.[16] The commentary presents Tito’s aim as promoting Yugoslavia as a place where athletes from every country could compete, and describes special permission for Maccabi and visa-free entry for its supporters.[16] It puts the number arriving from Israel and Western Europe within days at about 4,000.[16]

Commercial and cultural links, sports cooperation, and tourism expanded during the 1980s.[1] Thousands of Israeli tourists visited Yugoslavia, with their numbers rising steadily through the decade.[5] Yugoslavia’s state news agency, Tanjug, reopened its Tel Aviv bureau in 1987 after a 20-year absence.[5] Slovenia’s Adria Airlines began direct flights to and from Israel in 1989.[1]

Belgrade’s attitude began changing after Tito’s death in 1980 and as Yugoslavia’s role in the Non-Aligned Movement weakened.[5] A widely reported July 1987 meeting brought together Yugoslav president Lazar Mojsov and Israeli foreign minister Shimon Peres.[5] Some Yugoslav leaders subsequently indicated willingness to normalize relations.[5]

A Serbian-Jewish Friendship Society formed in Belgrade with the stated objective of restoring Yugoslav–Israeli diplomatic relations.[5] Its membership reached 3,500 within six months.[5] The society’s political backing also generated criticism within Yugoslav Jewish communal life, particularly as relations between Jewish organizations in Belgrade and Zagreb became strained.[17]

Diplomatic relations were reestablished in January 1992, and Israel subsequently opened its embassy in Belgrade.[4] This development occurred amid Yugoslavia’s breakup and coincided with the emergence of separate post-Yugoslav Jewish communities.[4] Belgrade continued maintaining ties with Palestinian authorities after renewing relations with Israel.[18]

At a December 2017 event marking 25 years since the restoration, Serbian foreign minister Ivica Dačić called the 1967 rupture a mistake.[19] During the same anniversary observances, he said Israel’s then-refusal to recognize Kosovo’s independence had positively affected relations with Serbia and emphasized Kosovo’s significance to Serbs.[19]

After Yugoslavia’s breakup, Israel established diplomatic relations across the former federation, but the resulting relationships differed substantially according to domestic and external considerations.[7] Political, economic, and cultural cooperation became principal areas of engagement with the former Yugoslav states.[20] Israel recognized Montenegro’s independence in 2006.[7]

Relations with Croatia were not formally established until 1997 and strengthened afterward.[7] Israeli political figures have often regarded Serbia as a particularly close regional partner, in part because of perceived parallels between Serbian and Jewish experiences during World War II and the Holocaust.[7] In 1999, Israeli foreign minister Ariel Sharon condemned NATO’s bombing campaign against Belgrade.[7] During that campaign, the Federation of Jewish Communities of Serbia evacuated around 600 members from bombed cities to Hungary and onward to Israel and other countries.[9]

Defense contacts were evident in 2003, when Serbia and Montenegro’s defense minister, Boris Tadić, visited Israel and met Israel Military Industries officials.[21] IMI chairman Arie Mizrachi and chief executive Ehud Ganani discussed potential cooperation, including upgrading Russian-built tanks and armored vehicles with Western technology.[21] Other possibilities included protective armor for personnel carriers developed with Rafael, while the delegation viewed the Tavor rifle and IMI security capabilities.[21]

In February 2004, Israel initialed an investment-promotion and protection agreement with Serbia and Montenegro.[22] It aimed to protect investors against discrimination and provided a framework for consensual arbitration in foreign-investment disputes.[22] The agreement formed part of Israel’s broader efforts to integrate into the global economy.[22]

President Reuven Rivlin visited Belgrade in 2018, in the first visit there by an Israeli president.[18] Rivlin and Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić pledged to improve bilateral and economic cooperation, including by abolishing double taxation.[18] Rivlin also praised Serbia’s 2016 law providing restitution to the local Jewish community of unclaimed and heirless Jewish property seized during the Holocaust.[18]

Tourism expanded following an agreement removing visa requirements, and before the COVID-19 pandemic approximately 5,000 Serbian tourists visited Israel annually.[23] Most bilateral trade consisted of Israeli exports of goods and services to Serbia.[23] Trade and investment remained limited, while Serbia was reported to have sold arms to Israel.[7]

The persistence of trade, tourism, and Jewish personal connections during the long diplomatic rupture distinguished practical relations from official political estrangement.[1][6] The early aircraft transfers and large-scale aliyah also linked Yugoslavia directly to Israel’s establishment and the rebuilding of Jewish lives after the Holocaust.[2][5] Later cooperation with Serbia and other successor states extended those connections into investment, defense, cultural exchanges, and Holocaust remembrance.[18][21]

Kosovo’s status became a significant issue in Israel’s relations with Serbia.[23] Israel initially refrained from supporting Kosovo’s independence in order to preserve good relations with Belgrade.[23] At a September 2020 meeting involving U.S. President Donald Trump, Vučić, and Kosovo Prime Minister Avdullah Hoti, Israel and Kosovo announced plans to establish diplomatic relations.[23] Serbia simultaneously agreed to move its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem in July 2021.[23]

Israel recognized Kosovo in 2020, and Kosovo opened an embassy in Jerusalem in 2021.[7] Serbia subsequently abandoned its agreement to move its own embassy and downgraded its representation in Tel Aviv.[7] These developments illustrated how Israel’s separate relationships across the former Yugoslav region could affect one another.[7]

Several aspects of the relationship remain politically sensitive, particularly Yugoslavia’s support for the PLO, its endorsement of the 1975 resolution equating Zionism with racism, and disputes over territorial withdrawal and Palestinian claims.[12][13] These positions were Yugoslav policy choices rather than bilateral agreements with Israel.[12]

The delay in establishing relations with Croatia has been attributed to Israeli concerns about President Franjo Tuđman’s history of antisemitism and Holocaust revisionism.[7] More serious allegations concerning the Bosnian War include claims that Israel supplied arms to Bosnian Serb forces in exchange for safe passage for Jews fleeing the conflict.[7] Those allegations, together with interpretations linking later Israeli–Bosnian tensions to disagreements over the recognition of the Srebrenica massacre as genocide, require particular caution rather than treatment as independently established conclusions.[7]

Jewish communal diplomacy also faced charges of political manipulation.[17] Jewish leader Slavko Goldstein criticized ruling-party backing for the Serbian-Jewish Friendship Society as an effort to manipulate the Jewish community and said Zagreb’s community had needed to distance itself from Jewish associates in Belgrade.[17]