October 13, 2026

The Mattei Plan and the India-Middle East-Europe Economic Corridor (IMEC) should not be treated as separate but overlapping corridors. Rather, they represent complementary layers of an emerging Indo-Mediterranean connectivity architecture. IMEC provides the east–west spine linking India, the Gulf, and Europe while the Mattei Plan extends European connectivity southward into Africa. Italy sits at the intersection of the two, leveraging its Mare Nostrum strategy to link the economic zones of the Indo-Pacific with those of the Euro-Atlantic by placing an EU leg in IMEC. Within this triangle, India provides technological scale and the eastern anchor, Israel brings a critical security and technological hinge in the Eastern Mediterranean, and Italy ensures a European institutional gateway and linkage to Africa through the Mattei Plan. As geopolitical realignments reshape global trade, connectivity, and data flows, IMEC is emerging as more than a network of ports, railways, and logistics infrastructure. The corridor’s long-term strategic significance will also depend on the digital architecture that underpins it: secure data networks, cybersecurity, artificial intelligence, critical infrastructure protection, and resilient technological supply chains. The potential emergence of an India–Israel–Italy technology triangle is a critical component of IMEC’s future development.

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