PAKISTANI Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi claims India and Israel had planned a deadly missile attack that could have possibly taken the countries to the “point of no return.”

Following the downing of an Indian warplane and the capture of an Indian pilot last week, French reports claim India was prepared to launch a deadly attack on Pakistan with the help of Israel.

“The armed forces were alerted … our intelligence was confirmed,” Mr Qureshi said. “Diplomatic and military contacts played a role in stopping the attack. The civilian and military leadership was also in contact [over the matter].”

The planned attack de-escalated after Pakistani agencies warned Indian spooks that Islamabad was ready to retaliate if it was attacked.

Mr Qureshi said that Pakistan was fully aware of the links between India and Israel, which was apparently included in New Delhi’s reported plan to strike Pakistan from its Rajasthan airbase.

“They are in contact for a long time and regularly share intelligence reports with each another,” he said.

Pakistan’s leading English language newspaper Dawn claimed there is a growing relationship between India and Israel, with Tel Aviv aligning itself with India’s ruling nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), in an “unofficial and unacknowledged alliance.”

India, on the other hand, has been claimed to be the largest weapons market for the Israeli arms trade.

The foreign minister added that further escalation between the two countries would likely be in the form of militant attacks or economic measures rather than air or missile strikes.

As tensions flare between the two nuclear powers, the Communist Party of India (Marxist) has warned of growing nationalism and attacks on India’s minority communities.

CPI(M) general secretary Sitaram Yechury accused the BJP of rousing “jingoistic nationalism” and turning the battle against terrorism into one against Muslims and Kashmiris.

Figures show a sharp increase in Kashmiri youths joining terror groups, from 16 such cases in 2013 to 164 in 2018.

Mr Yechury accused Narendra Modi’s BJP government of failing to address the “deepening alienation” of young people after failing to stick to its promises of dialogue in the contested Kashmir region.

He warned the BJP against “politicising the issue” for electoral gain and called for the government to step up diplomatic efforts to defuse the crisis and bring an end to the deepening “communal polarisation.”