Israel welcomed Friday, November 18 the upcoming opening in Tel Aviv of an embassy of Azerbaijan, a country with a Shiite majority with which the Jewish state has maintained relations for 30 years and of which it is one major arms suppliers. “The Azerbaijani Parliament took the historic decision to open an embassy in Tel Aviv,” the Israeli Foreign Ministry said in a statement, without specifying when.
Israel has an embassy in the Azeri capital, but Baku had only opened a trade office in Tel Aviv in July 2021 and a tourist office in March 2022. The opening of an Azeri embassy in Tel Aviv is “the result of the Israeli government’s efforts to build strong diplomatic bridges with the Muslim world“, greeted the outgoing Israeli Prime Minister, Yaïr Lapid. Israeli Defense Minister Benny Gantz visited the Central Asian country in early October where he met President Ilham Aliyev.
Read alsoIsrael chose Azerbaijan over Armenia
The ties between the Jewish state and Azerbaijan, a country bordering Iran, date back to the break-up of the USSR in the early 1990s. They then established diplomatic relations, Israel seeking to establish bridges with countries Muslims and Azerbaijan to extend its network beyond that of Moscow.
In recent years, the Jewish state has become one of Azerbaijan’s top arms suppliers, with sales of more than $740 million (631 million euros), according to the International Research Institute of Stockholm Peace (Sipri).
SEE ALSO – Israel: Netanyahu promises to be “everyone’s prime minister”