Turkish Tourism Minister Nabi Avci arrived in Israel on Tuesday as part of the first high-level visit since last year’s reconciliation agreement between Jerusalem and Ankara.

Avci joined representatives from 57 other countries, including 15 foreign ministers, at the International Mediterranean Tourism Market 2017 expo in Tel Aviv.

“The bilateral relations between Israel and Turkey are an essential component to stability in the region and to economic progress,” said Israeli Tourism Minister Yariv Levin. “The visit by my Turkish colleague will lead to a series of measures that will strengthen the strategic ties between Israel and Turkey, that have enormous importance from a geopolitical and tourism point of view.”

Avci welcomed Israeli tourists to Turkey, saying it was his country’s duty “to host tourists coming from Israel in the best possible way.” He expressed his desire to raise the annual number of Israeli tourists in Turkey from 260,000 to 600,000.

The two countries returned ambassadors to each others’ capitals in December, and last week diplomats held their first bilateral strategic talks in more than six years. According to a joint communique released after the summit, “both sides viewed developments in the wide region, particularly in the Middle East and eastern Mediterranean, and reaffirmed the importance of better Turkish-Israeli relations for the stability and the security of the region.”

Israeli-Turkish relations were strained in 2010 after the Israel Defense Forces raided the Turkish ship Mavi Marmara, which was attempting to break Israel’s naval blockade of the Gaza Strip. IDF troops killed ten crew members, while sustaining injuries themselves, after some boat passengers began what a United Nations investigation determined was “organized and violent resistance.”

[Photo: EKOPAZAR – EKOVİTRİN  / YouTube ]