Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, today (Monday, 8 February 2021), at the Prime Minister's Office in Jerusalem, met with Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis.
Prime Minister Netanyahu:
“Prime Minister Mitsotakis, my good friend Kyriakos, welcome back to Israel. You arrived here directly from Cyprus and the three of us – Israel, Greece and Cyprus have built up a tremendous trilateral partnership.
“Our bilateral relations have grown - our common trade, security and technological cooperation.
“We’ve just discussed a green passport arrangement where Israelis, when we lift the restraints on flights, would be able to go to Greece without any limitations. No self-isolation. Nothing. And I think this is good news for all of us. Our cooperation is good for our countries. It’s good for the entire region.
“We have a common past. We are very proud of our past and eager to seize the future together. We’re two democracies at the edge of the Mediterranean. We have Athens and Jerusalem, as I never tire of saying, are the ones who laid the foundations for our modern Western civilization and we share common aspirations for stability, prosperity and security.
“Our cooperation allows us to seize opportunities on energy. We discussed the EastMed pipelines with some innovative ideas that Prime Minister Mitsotakis brought. We’re discussing how to augment tourism as I told you and how to better meet the challenges to the security and health of our citizens including discussing cooperation in COVID.
“Now yesterday I wanted to meet Professor Arber from Ichilov and I wanted to meet him because of this miracle drug that has been tested on 30 people and found effective if you’re infected by corona and you’re seriously ill. You inhale this with a saline solution and you come out feeling good. We don’t know yet where this will develop. It’s going into trials.
“We called Professor Arber and Prime Minister Mitsotakis volunteered that Greece, their leading hospital, would partake in the clinical trials and I hope that we can approve this because I think this is an example of our cooperation in forging ahead to new areas.
“I want to thank you for all the things that we’re doing together. Our cooperation both on the international level…I think the fact that you’re here during the corona epidemic and the fact that we’re talking again and again and again says that we have a tremendous friendship.
“So welcome to Jerusalem, friend."
Prime Minister Netanyahu added in response to correspondents' questions:
"We have a new pandemic; not in the pure scientific sense, this is a mutation which is very powerful and is at least 50% fatal. This is causing the world to collapse.
“We will carefully open the education system in the coming days in the yellow and green areas. We will open the rest gradually according to the new traffic light plan together with morbidity and vaccines as well. This will allow us to use the green passport to open the economy, commerce, culture and the rest of the education system but with caution.
“Pursuant to my talks with the CEOs of Pfizer and Moderna, in April we expect to receive the results of the children's vaccines and we will then be able to vaccinate the rest of the population. We can exit this, but carefully."