Middle Eastern countries

An Israeli company said on March 2 it has started exporting gas from an offshore field to Jordan, marking the country's first ever exports of natural gas.

The exports to Jordan began in January, Delek Drilling -- part of a consortium leading the development of Israel's offshore gas reserves -- told AFP.

Summer bookings to Turkey by German holidaymakers are down by more than half after a spate of bombings, with tourists instead heading to Greece and Egypt, according to German market researcher GfK.

A settlement in the Cyprus dispute would "accelerate" energy cooperation between Israel and Turkey, as the two countries possess potential in the area, Israeli Ambassador to Ankara Eitan Na'eh told reporters on March 1.

As more and more people are coming to believe that the black clouds hanging over tourism in Turkey will not be so easily dispersed, the country is developing new strategies to achieve its $500-billion target in exports in 2023. 

One of them is the Turkish Trade Centers project carried out by the Turkish Exporters Assembly (TİM) and the Economy Ministry. 

A three-party agreement between Greece, Cyprus and Israel was signed by travel agency association representatives during the IMTM 2017 travel show in Tel Aviv last week, for the creation of a new entity to contribute toward the growth of tourism in the three countries and the broader Eastern Mediterranean region.

A 10-year-old Turkish girl took the podium of the U.N. General Assembly on Feb. 10 to deliver a short speech as part of the Feb. 11 International Day of Women and Girls in Science. 

Turkish Culture and Tourism Minister Nabi Avcı's visit to Tel Aviv set another milestone in the reconciliation process between Turkey and Israel, as it marked the first ministerial visit from the former to the latter since 2010.  

The results of the "Turkish Policy Elites' Perception on Turkish Foreign Policy and Greek-Turkish Relations" study conducted by the Center for International and European Studies (CIES) at Kadir Has University were recently released. The survey was conducted by CIES director Dimitrios Triantaphyllou with the assistance of International Relations PhD candidate Cihan Dizdaroğlu.

Turkey will host the United Nations' new secretary-general, Antonio Guterres, and his special envoy on Cyprus this week to discuss ongoing efforts to resolve the decades-old divide on the eastern Mediterranean island and review the refugee problem stemming from Syria's civil war. 

"Conflicts can only be solved when they are still hot," Henry Kissinger once famously said. But Cyprus seems to overrule this quote since the 50-years old question seems to be defrosting at last.