Posted on 05/01/2005 6:04:33 PM PDT by Valin
JERUSALEM, May 1 - In a rare visit by the leader of a Muslim country, Turkey's prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, came to Israel on Sunday offering to serve as a Middle East peace mediator and looking to build on trade and military ties.
Relations between Turkey and Israel had been developing steadily since they established full diplomatic relations more than a decade ago. They became strained last year when Mr. Erdogan sharply criticized what he called Israel's violent policies toward the Palestinians, and his government briefly recalled two diplomats.
But Mr. Erdogan's visit suggested that any damage had been repaired.
"The significance of this visit is that it is business as usual between Israel and Turkey," said Efraim Inbar, director of the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies in Israel. "The two countries have strong mutual interests that are continuing to grow."
Mr. Erdogan brought a large group of businessmen on his two-day trip, which included talks on Sunday with Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and President Moshe Katsav. Mr. Erdogan also laid a wreath at the Holocaust memorial, Yad Vashem, though he broke with protocol by not putting on a Jewish skullcap.
"I came here to contribute to the peace process," he said at a news conference with Mr. Sharon.
Mr. Erdogan is the latest of several leaders to visit the region recently. Russia's president, Vladimir V. Putin, last week became the first Kremlin leader to come to Israel. Other visitors have included the United Nations secretary general, Kofi Annan, and Prime Minister Tony Blair of Britain.
Such visits have been relatively rare since the fighting that erupted in September 2000. But the violence has declined significantly in recent months, with the two sides declaring a truce in February that is mostly holding. Still, the Israelis and the Palestinians have shown little movement toward full peace negotiations.
Meanwhile, Turkey is considering a $400 million deal that would involve Israel in upgrading some 30 of Turkey's F-4 Phantom jets, the Israeli news media reported.
Turkey is one of Israel's few friends in the Muslim world, and Mr. Erdogan's visit is the second by a Turkish prime minister; the first was by Tansu Ciller in 1994.
Still, Turkey strongly supports Palestinian aspirations, and Mr. Erdogan will meet Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian leader, on Monday in the West Bank city of Ramallah.
In another development on Sunday, Stanley Fischer, a prominent American economist who had held posts at the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, received Israeli citizenship and was sworn in as the governor of Israel's Central Bank several hours later.
His appointment, announced in January, had drawn some criticism in Israel because he was not a citizen. But Mr. Fischer, who speaks Hebrew, was able to become an Israeli under the Law of Return, which grants citizenship to all Jews who move here.
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