Aviv Kohavi, the commander-in-chief of the Israeli Defense Forces, arrived in Morocco on Monday, becoming the first Israeli army commander to officially visit the North African country.
Since his arrival, Israel’s Chief of Staff had a full 3 days agenda starting with his Tuesday meetings with Moroccan counterpart, Defense Minister Abdellatif Loudiyi, Royal Armed Forces Commander-in-Chief Belkhir El Farouk, Intelligence Chief Brahim Hassani and other senior defense officials.
The visit was part of an expansion of military bilateral cooperation efforts, as the Moroccan army chief said in his statement, talks centered around “interest in jointly setting up industrial defense projects in Morocco.”
During the meetings, officials discussed opportunities for military security cooperation between the two countries in the areas of exercise and training, as well as operations and intelligence.
The purpose of the visit is to learn from each other and share knowledge, and is part of an overall effort to expand military cooperation with other third-party countries.
The discussions of this visit are a continuation of Israel’s defense Minister Benny Gantz’s last visit to Morocco in November, when the official signed a memorandum of understanding with his Moroccan counterpart, marking the first agreement of its kind between Israel and an Arab country.
Chief of Staff Kohavi continued his official trip by visiting, on Wednesday, the Ben Guerir air base and meeting with its commander, Hassan Mewar.
The two officials talked about establishing cooperation between the air forces of the two militaries, including the participation of the Israeli army in the “African Lion” exercise in Morocco under the command of AFRICOM.
Israel did participate in the latest edition of the African Lion military exercise, along with 20 other participating nations.
In addition to the aforementioned meetings, Kohavi visited Jewish Moroccan sites and had the chance to interact with the Jewish community in Marrakesh.
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