Israeli president due in Turkey mid-March

Turkey and Israel are on the same page for the reconciliation of bilateral relations after a nearly four-year incommunicado, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has said, announcing that Israeli President Isaac Herzog will pay a visit to Turkey in mid-March.

"[The visit of the Israeli president] will take place in mid-March," Erdoğan said at a press conference before his departure to Ukraine on Feb. 3. He was responding a question about the timing and the scope of Herzog's visit.

Turkey and Israel have lowered their diplomatic ties after the former's strong reaction against the killing of scores of Palestinians by security officials during a protest against the United States' decision to move its embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem in 2017.

Erdoğan informed that the special envoys of the two sides are in a process of preparing the necessary conditions and infrastructure for Herzog's trip to Turkey through reciprocal visits. He also hinted that Turkey's special envoy may hold talks with the Israeli counterparts in the coming days in Israel.

"We will exert efforts to move our bilateral relations to a very different place. I can tell that they also have the same approach," Erdoğan stated. "We will carry out the preliminary work and then start the process," he added.

Erdoğan and Herzog had exchanged phone conversations in the past months. Similarly, the two countries' foreign ministers, Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu and Yair Lapid, also talked on the phone, in the first such conversation in the past 13 years.

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