As ties heat between Isreal and Türkiye, Israeli President Isaac Herzog invited President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to pay a go to to his nation on Wednesday.
Herzog was talking as he acquired Türkiye’s newly appointed ambassador, Şakir Özkan Torunlar, who introduced his credentials to the president.
Last 12 months, Herzog, whose position is especially ceremonial, was the primary Israeli chief to go to Turkey since 2008, after the 2 international locations started restoring relations and ending a greater than a decade-old diplomatic rift.
They agreed to mutually appoint ambassadors in August and after Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu received an election in November, he and Erdoğan agreed to maintain bettering ties. “I am sure we will all work to strengthen the countries’ relations,” Herzog mentioned.
Netanyahu’s return to energy on the head of a nationalist-religious authorities in December has rattled Palestinians and Western and Arab allies who worry it might heighten tensions within the Middle East. Türkiye final week joined a refrain of condemnation of a go to by Israel’s new far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir to the delicate Al-Aqsa Mosque complicated in East Jerusalem, Islam’s third holiest web site and Judaism’s most sacred.
The international locations withdrew their respective ambassadors in 2010 after Israeli forces stormed a Gaza-bound flotilla carrying humanitarian assist for the Palestinians that broke an Israeli blockade.
The incident resulted within the deaths of 9 Turkish activists. Relations broke down once more in 2018 when Türkiye, angered by the United States transferring its embassy in Israel to Jerusalem, as soon as extra recalled its ambassador, prompting Israel to reply in type. The two international locations haven’t reappointed their ambassadors for a very long time earlier than Irit Lillian introduced her credential to Erdoğan as the brand new ambassador of Israel in December.
