 and we have always known how to return to dialogue and cooperation. Nations with long histories always know how to close one chapter and open a new one. That is what we are doing here today. Following the Abraham Accords, a new partnership of strength has been created in the Middle East against terror, against attempts to undermine stability. In recent months, 19 Israelis have been killed in terrorist attacks. In the last such attack, three Israelis were slaughtered on the street with axes. We are fighting terror with determination and we expect our friends to cooperate with us in this battle. In this context, I want to take this opportunity to thank President Biden and Secretary of State Blinken for their decision to keep the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps on the list of terrorist organizations subjected to sanctions. In recent months, Prime Minister Bennett, Defense Minister Guns and I have worked closely with the Americans on this matter and the American decision is prefer the proof of the unbreakable alliance between us and the United States and lies based on deeply held shared values and core strategic interests. Following this visit, the first by a Turkish Foreign Minister to Israel in 15 years, the two of us are expecting to see progress not only in our diplomatic and security relationship, relations but in our economic ties as well. The goal is to form and expand economic and civil cooperation between our countries, to create business to business and people to people ties, and to leverage our two countries' comparative advantages regionally and globally. Even during the pandemic and even in times of political tension, economic cooperation between our countries has been constantly on the rise. This past year, the cooperation reached an unprecedented scope. This is a welcome process, but we cannot settle. With good work, we can expand it much, much further. In our conversation today, Mr. Minister, we agreed to relaunch our joint economic commission and to begin working on a new civil aviation agreement between our two countries. Beyond diplomacy, Mr. Minister, Israelis simply love Turkey. Every day, tens of flights depart Israel for Turkey with thousands of Israelis who love your culture and music, beautiful beaches and colorful bazaars. I commend you on your visit, Mr. Minister, and for the fruitful, honest and productive conversation we had this morning. Today we're initiating a new framework for improving our relationship that not only we, but our children, will benefit from for years to come. Thank you so much. And welcome again. Thank you, Minister Yair Lapid. My now welcome Minister Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Turkey. Your Excellency, Mr. Mevlut Çağuşulu, to deliver your message, please. Thank you. Let me thank Minister Lapid Yair Yair for the kind invitation and for the warm hospitality extended to myself and my delegation that we have been enjoying since we arrived. And let me also thank Minister Lapid for Candid and Frank discussions we had today at Tetetet meeting and also at the meeting with our colleagues. And we agreed that despite our differences, the continuation of a sustainable dialogue will be beneficial. And this should be based on mutual respect to one another's sensitivities. This will be beneficial not only for our bilateral relations, but also for peace in our region and today in our discussions. During our discussions we also have exchange of views on regional issues and I appreciate that. Working on a positive agenda can also help us to address our disagreements in a more constructive manner. Indeed, during the last Ramadan, the dialogue that we established at the head of state level contributed towards the efforts to maintain calm. And we also agreed to re-establish technical meetings between our ministries and governmental agencies. I'm sure as they did in Turkey, my deputy minister, Ambassador Sadat Donal and Director General Ushpis will take up these issues in further detail in the upcoming period. And as Minister Lapid mentioned, we agreed to re-energize our relations in many areas and to resume the convening and the meetings of different mechanisms as well as to resume talks on the civil aviation. And we will be happy to see flying your national carrier and the Israeli other companies to different destinations in Turkey between different cities in Turkey and Israel. And our geographical proximity and complementing economies make Turkey and Israel natural trade partners, as you also rightly mentioned. Turkey and Israel are among each other's top ten trade partners and despite all the challenges like COVID and the differences between us, our trade volume has been increased constantly. And last year our bilateral trade volume actually surpassed $10 billion. And I just look at the figures of this year. First quarter is very promising. And there is a record in our export as well. $1.8 billion exports from Turkey to Israel by the end of April. And so we are determined to increase the trade volume and economic cooperation. It's mutually beneficial. And renewed political dialogue and technical contacts will increase these figures, we believe. And you just mentioned how much Israelis love Turkey. This is what I heard from every single Israeli since I arrived. And a number speaks itself, themselves. Last month, Istanbul as a city and Turkey as a country were ranked number one among destinations for Israeli tourists. So we are hoping to receive more tourists in different parts of the city. I see that Israelis, of course, they love Istanbul. They do come to my hometown, Antalya. But they are also interested to visit Black Sea cities and every part of Turkey and we will facilitate that. And there are many opportunities in areas such as clean energy, high tech and agri-tech tourism, as we just mentioned, agricultural products and many others, I can't tell. Of course, we obviously discussed the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. As you know, yesterday I was with President Abbas and Foreign Minister Malki. We also had good discussions with them and we had extensive discussions with them on the Israel-Palestine issue. And we believe that the two-state solution with UN parameters is only the solution for a durable peace that what we really want to see, lasting durable peace here in Middle East. I also, of course, share our sensitivity concerning Jerusalem and the sanctity of Harami Sharif. We believe that normalization of our ties will also have positive impact on the peaceful resolution of the conflict. And as always, as in the past also, we played a very constructive role and now Turkey is ready to take responsibility and continue to the efforts towards dialogue. And once again, thank you very much for the warmest hospitality and thank you very much for candid discussions we had today. And looking forward, having your visit in Turkey to continue our open and candid discussions and to discuss how to further our cooperation in many areas. As long as Duna Kabab is going to be involved, I'm coming. Thank you very much, Ministers.