Georgia–Israel Relations

Formal diplomatic relations between Israel and Georgia were established on June 1, 1992, following the collapse of the Soviet Union.[1] Georgia was then working to end its international isolation. By December 1992, Israel was among six states with diplomatic missions in Tbilisi, alongside China, Germany, Russia, Turkey, and the United States. By September 1993, Georgia had diplomatic relations with 78 countries.[2]

Israel maintains an embassy in Tbilisi that also serves Armenia, while Georgia maintains an embassy in Tel Aviv.[5] A 1999 memorandum of understanding on defense cooperation is recorded in a timeline, although the available account does not describe its provisions or implementation.[6]

The relationship rests on more than formal state-to-state contacts. Georgian Jewish migration, family connections, tourism, and business have linked the societies, while the two governments and their representatives have pursued cooperation in fields including agriculture, health, security, and tourism.[1][2] Political contacts have included presidential visits, ministerial agreements, and discussions about Georgia’s role in international forums and regional transit.[5][7]

The sources offer different levels of detail about the relationship’s milestones, and some give anniversary dates that do not align neatly with the 1992 establishment of diplomatic relations. A 2019 Israel Week report described its event as marking 30 years of relations, while a Georgian ambassador said in 2022 that Georgia was marking 30 years of diplomatic ties; the reports do not explain whether the earlier anniversary referred to another kind of connection.[8][9]

Georgian Jews began settling in the Land of Israel in 1863, and 439 lived in what was then Palestine by 1916.[1] A later wave of emigration took place in the 1970s: the World Jewish Congress and Jewish Virtual Library each report that approximately 30,000 Georgian Jews made aliyah during that decade, while thousands more left for other countries.[1][5]

Migration was shaped by Soviet restrictions and by public appeals for permission to emigrate. After authorities denied requests following the 1967 Six-Day War, Georgian Jewish families wrote to the United Nations Human Rights Commission seeking the right to leave.[1] The Jewish Virtual Library recounts that 17 Georgian Jewish families appealed in August 1969 and characterizes this as the first public insistence by Soviet Jews on immigration to Israel; that historical priority claim is the source’s characterization.[5]

An archive collection at the National Library of Israel documents a campaign by 18 Jewish families in Georgia. The archive’s Hebrew description dates their public petition to 1969, while its English description gives 1969–1970; the collection includes appeals to international institutions and Soviet authorities, including letters addressed to UN Secretary-General U Thant, Israeli Prime Minister Golda Meir, and Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev.[10] The collection also documents Aharon Krikheli, a historian of Georgian Jews, ethnographer, and Zionist activist under Soviet rule. He initiated the creation of a History and Ethnographic Museum of Georgian Jewry in Tbilisi in 1934, was arrested in 1948 on a charge of Zionist activity, and immigrated to Israel in 1971, later working at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem’s Centre for Research and Documentation of East European Jewry.[10]

Mark Tolts’s demographic study records 25,447 emigrants from Georgia to Israel between 1989 and 2017, with the largest annual number, 3,750, in 1993. Its appendix identifies Israel Central Bureau of Statistics and Israel Ministry of Immigrant Absorption data as the sources for the figures.[11] The study places Georgia within Transcaucasia and notes that Jews and their relatives from Transcaucasia and Central Asia were especially inclined to migrate to Israel. It records 56,500 emigrants from the Transcaucasia region in 1989–2001 and 8,000 in 2002–2017; these are regional totals, not Georgia-specific counts.[11]

Tolts’s figures show a sharp decline in Georgia’s Jewish population over several decades: 55,400 in the 1970 Soviet census, 24,800 in 1989, 3,800 in the 2002 census, and 1,900 in 2014. The study describes the decline by the first post-Soviet census as 85 percent; the 2002 and 2014 figures exclude Abkhazia and South Ossetia.[11] A 2021 article in Mosaic describes a few thousand Jews as still living in Georgia, while a 2026 interview quoted Israel’s ambassador estimating that the community had dwindled to a few thousand at most.[12][13]

Emigration did not sever all ties with Georgia. The Library of Congress study says many emigrants remained attached to Georgian culture, language, and people and kept in contact with the country, concluding that “Largely as a result of these ties, relations between Georgia and Israel flourished on many levels.”[2] The continuing connections also appear in an ethnographic study of Georgian-Jewish migrants in Osnabrück, Germany, based mainly on fieldwork in 2021 and 2022. It describes translocal and transnational relationships that include Georgia and Israel, and notes that participants had relatives living in Israel.[14]

One participant in that study recalled Jewish neighbors in Kutaisi leaving for Israel in the 1970s. The participant remembered people crying in the street and described the departure as leaving “a strange feeling of emptiness”; the account is an interview recollection, not a population-wide description of migration.[14] In 2019, representatives of the Euro-Asian Jewish Congress and World Jewish Congress met Prime Minister Mamuka Bakhtadze and President Salome Zourabichvili in Tbilisi. Their discussions included bilateral relations, travel, and possible growth in business and economic ties, and the delegation attended the opening of a Jewish school funded by the Euro-Asian Jewish Congress.[15]

Georgia and Israel have maintained full diplomatic relations, with political contacts extending from presidential visits to defense and tourism agreements.[1] Georgian President Giorgi Margvelashvili visited Israel in October 2015. He and Israeli President Reuven Rivlin discussed prospective cooperation in start-ups, agriculture, real estate, and tourism; the Jewish Virtual Library describes the trip as Margvelashvili’s first visit to Israel.[5]

In 2017, a report described close political contacts and interest in cooperation in high technology, cybersecurity, and agricultural technology. Georgian Parliament Chairman Irakli Kobakhidze said Georgia wanted to develop agricultural ties, noting that about half the country’s population worked in agriculture and that the sector lacked the level of technology the country sought. The report said the countries had signed about 30 bilateral agreements, though it did not list them.[16]

In 2018, Israeli Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman made the first visit to Georgia by a serving Israeli defense minister. He and Georgian Defense Minister Levan Izoria signed a cooperation agreement and discussed Iran and the Middle East. Liberman identified cybersecurity, help establishing a military reserves system, counterterrorism, and homeland defense as four aims for cooperation.[17]

The countries marked diplomatic ties through a variety of public and political events. Israel Week in Georgia in 2019 was organized by the Israel–Georgia Chamber of Business and Beit Israel, with a planned program of about 30 conferences, tours, lectures, and meetings on economics, culture, and tourism. More than 3,000 attendees were expected. Chamber chair Itzik Moshe said the event aimed to strengthen dialogue and economic ties and open channels for further cooperation; Georgian government commissioner Irakli Lekvindze said economic interaction was helping relations expand and described joint projects with the chamber.[8]

In August 2023, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu met Georgian Prime Minister Irakli Garibashvili in Tel Aviv. Both leaders expressed a desire to deepen ties. Netanyahu called Jews who came from Georgia a “living bridge,” while Garibashvili described a special relationship and friendship with Israel and the Jewish people.[7] In 2026, Israel’s ambassador to Georgia, Walid Abu Haya, likewise described the Georgian Jewish community as a bridge between the nations, while noting its reduced size after many Jews moved to Israel during the Soviet era.[13]

Georgia’s political positions in international forums have also been discussed in bilateral contexts. In a 2013 interview, Prime Minister Bidzina Ivanishvili said Georgia supported Israel but explained its vote on a Palestinian statehood measure at the United Nations in terms of its decision-making process; he said the countries had been able to explain the vote to one another. The interview framed Georgia’s value to Israel partly in terms of friendship in international forums and geographic position.[18] In a 2011 interview, Georgian ambassador Vakhtang Jaoshvili said Georgia supported a two-states-for-two-peoples solution and wanted Israel to have secure borders and the ability to defend itself, but he did not specify how Georgia would vote on a planned UN resolution concerning Palestinian statehood.[19]

The Hebrew name used for Georgia in Israel also became a subject of diplomatic attention. In 2005, during his first term as ambassador to Israel, Lasha Zhvania campaigned to replace “Gruzia” with “Georgia” in Hebrew usage. He approached Israeli media, the Academy of the Hebrew Language, and Israel’s Foreign Ministry; the report says they adopted the change. Zhvania argued that “Gruzia” was a Russian name and that the change corrected what he regarded as a historical distortion.[9]

Economic relations encompass trade, investment, travel, and development cooperation, although published figures vary substantially by year and definition. The Israel–Georgia Chamber of Commerce was established in 1996 to support trade.[4] A 2017 report cited estimates by chamber president Itzik Moshe of about $500 million in direct investment in Georgia from Israeli and Diaspora Jewish sources, much of it related to real estate, and about $20 million in annual direct bilateral trade.[16] In a 2019 report, Moshe estimated that Israeli investments in Georgia exceeded $500 million; the article attributed the figure to him and did not independently substantiate it.[8]

An Israeli ambassador interviewed in 2026 put bilateral trade at approximately $50 million to $60 million in 2024, while saying hundreds of millions of dollars flowed from Israel to Georgia annually through tourism, real estate investment, agriculture, medicine, and other activity.[13] Because the published estimates use different years and descriptions, they should not be treated as directly comparable.[16][13]

Tourism has been an important channel of interaction. A 2020 analysis described tourism as an important income sector for Georgia and reported that more than 115,000 Israelis visited in 2017, even though neither Israel nor the United States was among Georgia’s leading trading partners that year.[4] Israel Week organizers estimated that about 25,000 Israelis visited Georgia in the first quarter of 2019 and spent about $27 million, and forecast roughly 200,000 Israeli visitors for the full year; these were attributed estimates and a forecast, not independently verified totals.[8]

In 2023, Israel and Georgia signed their first tourism agreement. It provided for cooperation between their tourism organizations, exchanges involving tourism experts and travel agents, and work within the UN World Tourism Organization. The countries also planned joint programs, marketing materials, and information on tourism investment, and encouraged visits to sites associated with Georgian and Jewish heritage.[20] A report on the agreement said it was to remain in force for five years and renew automatically.[21]

Tourism continued to grow according to figures cited by Abu Haya in 2026: more than 400,000 Israelis visited Georgia in 2025, making Israel the country’s fourth-largest source of tourists after Russia, Turkey, and Armenia. The ambassador estimated that about 100,000 Israelis were of Georgian origin and said many visited Georgia several times a year.[13]

Agricultural cooperation has included practical projects and training. A joint potato project in southern Georgia covered seed preparation, planting, harvesting, irrigation, post-harvest work, and processing. The Rural Economic Development Project involved Georgia’s Agriculture Ministry, Israel’s MASHAV, DANIDA, and SDC, operated in two areas, and included capacity building for extension officers; an Israeli agricultural expert also traveled to Georgia for a short-term consultation. The available account gives neither a specific project date nor measured outcomes.[22]

MASHAV, Israel’s development cooperation agency, has also trained Georgians in Israel. Abu Haya said more than 2,000 Georgians had received training there over the preceding 30 years in agriculture, early childhood education, security, health, and medicine, and that Georgians continued to attend seminars.[13] Israel has also provided humanitarian assistance to Georgia on multiple occasions, including aid connected with drought and earthquakes, although the available source gives no dates, amounts, or further details.[5]

Industrial investment has included a plant opened in Tbilisi in 2018 by Cyclone, an Elbit Systems subsidiary. Israeli Economy and Industry Minister Eli Cohen attended the inauguration. The reported investment was $93 million, mostly from a Georgian industrial-investment fund, and the facility was expected to employ 300 people at full capacity producing composite aircraft parts for civil aviation, mainly for Boeing.[23] The project was described as another milestone in Georgia’s relations with Israeli defense industries, but the stated production was for civil aviation.[23]

Security cooperation has included defense agreements, equipment sales, training, and information sharing, but sources disagree about the timing and extent of Israeli military ties with Georgia. The Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies says that until 2005 Israel provided substantial security assistance, including upgrades to MiG-25 aircraft, ammunition and small-arms sales, and military experts to train Georgian troops. It reports that Russian pressure in February 2005 led Israel to restrict military ties to equipment not intended for attack.[4]

The Foundation for Defense of Democracies gives a different chronology, describing Israeli soldiers training Georgian forces and Israeli defense firms trading with Tbilisi from 2001, and saying the military relationship ended after the 2008 war.[3] These descriptions may refer to different stages or forms of cooperation, but the sources do not resolve the difference. A 1999 defense memorandum is recorded, but its terms and implementation are not detailed.[6]

The August 2008 Russia–Georgia war tested the relationship. On August 10, Israel’s Foreign Ministry said it was following developments in South Ossetia and Abkhazia “with great concern,” recognized Georgia’s territorial integrity, and called for a peaceful solution. In Israel’s statement: “Israel recognizes the territorial integrity of Georgia and calls for a peaceful solution.”[4] On August 15, demonstrators in Tel Aviv formed a human chain and called on Israel’s government to increase its support for Georgia.[4]

Accounts differ in how they characterize Israel’s wartime posture. Contemporary reporting described Israel as not taking either side and as signaling a shift away from Georgia, while another account said Israel supported Tbilisi by recognizing its territorial integrity and noted earlier arms sales and training.[24][17] A report also said the Foreign Ministry advised restricting or freezing arms sales so Russia would not view them as a hostile act.[25] In a 2011 interview, Georgia’s ambassador said Georgia had requested defensive weapons in the context of the 2008 war, not offensive ones; the report did not identify the weapons or say whether Israel supplied them.[19] The available accounts differ in emphasis and do not establish a single, fully detailed account of the weapons request and response.

The war also prompted efforts to assist civilians. Israeli MK Leon Litinetsky traveled to Tbilisi with personnel from the Jewish Agency’s Nativ organization and the Israeli Embassy to help Jewish families move to safer locations.[26] Israeli citizens also sought assistance leaving Georgia. Arkia and Israel’s Foreign Ministry considered ground transport to Azerbaijan followed by flights to Israel, after damage to the civilian airport’s radar prevented normal air access; the report describes planned coordination, not a completed evacuation operation.[26] Another report said Israeli companies in Georgia began evacuating personnel and Israeli tourists were returning home during the conflict.[25]

In June 2013, a Georgian delegation that included Prime Minister Bidzina Ivanishvili and Defense Minister Irakli Alasania sought to renew arms deals and acquire defensive weapons, including drones and anti-tank and anti-aircraft missiles. The available account says the proposed deal apparently did not come to fruition.[27]

Security ties were publicly renewed in later years. In 2018, Liberman and Izoria signed a cooperation agreement covering areas such as cybersecurity, counterterrorism, homeland defense, and military reserves.[17] In 2026, Abu Haya described current security cooperation as good and transparent, involving mutual respect for each country’s capabilities and information sharing, but declined to discuss details.[13]

Community institutions and cultural ties have complemented official diplomacy. In January 2001, the Georgian Orthodox Church and Georgia’s Jewish community signed a cooperation agreement described as one of mutual respect and support. It was an agreement between religious and community bodies, not between the governments of Georgia and Israel.[5] The Jewish Virtual Library calls it a “first step toward establishing relations,” but that wording should be understood in the context of the formal diplomatic relations established in 1992.[1][5]

Georgian Jewish organizations and Israeli institutions have also supported community needs in Georgia. The Jewish Agency for Israel and the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee have permanent representatives in the country. The JDC and Hesed Eliyahu distribute food and medical aid to elderly members of Georgia’s Jewish community, whom the Jewish Virtual Library describes as more than half of the community.[5]

The 2019 visit by Euro-Asian Jewish Congress and World Jewish Congress representatives brought community, governmental, and educational contacts together. In addition to discussions with the Georgian prime minister and president about travel and economic ties, the delegation attended the opening of a Jewish school in Tbilisi funded by the Euro-Asian Jewish Congress.[15]

Georgia’s Jewish community has also faced documented antisemitism. On February 28, 2022, the NGO Israeli House reported a swastika drawn on the wall of a Jewish cemetery in Tbilisi’s Samgori district. The investigation remained ongoing at the end of that year. Antisemitic social-media posts were also recorded, including statements reposted by Georgian Orthodox Church clergy.[28]

Georgia allocated 500,000 lari, approximately $188,000, to the Jewish community in 2022 as partial compensation for damage experienced during the Soviet regime; the 2021 allocation was 300,000 lari, approximately $113,000. These payments formed part of a compensation scheme for four religious communities.[28]

Interfaith activity has included the Peace Project in Tbilisi, a former warehouse housing the Peace Cathedral, the Masjid al-Salaam Mosque, and the Beit Knesset HaShalom Synagogue. In June 2022, inaugural Jewish and Islamic services were held there. Founded by Bishop Malkhaz Songulashvili, the project was intended as a place for interfaith dialogue as well as worship.[28]

Recent diplomatic initiatives have emphasized tourism, investment, and people-to-people ties. The 2023 tourism agreement established a framework for cooperation between tourism organizations, exchanges of expertise, joint programs, marketing, and promotion of visits to Georgian and Jewish heritage sites.[20][21] The same year, Netanyahu and Garibashvili publicly expressed a desire to deepen relations, linking the relationship to the Georgian Jewish community and shared connections between the societies.[7]

The relationship also has a regional economic dimension. In 2026, Abu Haya said that 50 to 60 percent of Israel’s oil imports from Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan transit through Georgia, describing the route as one reason for Georgia’s importance to regional stability.[13] The same interview reported security information-sharing and substantial Israeli development and commercial activity, alongside the ambassador’s estimate of comparatively modest direct bilateral trade in 2024.[13]

A 2021 Mosaic article characterized Georgia as a pro-Western country with good relations with Israel and noted that Georgia regained independence after the Soviet Union’s collapse in 1991. That assessment was commentary, rather than a detailed account of diplomatic agreements or milestones.[12] Across the sources, the relationship’s distinctive features are its formal diplomatic framework, Jewish migration and continuing family connections, practical cooperation in tourism and development, and a security relationship shaped by the regional environment.[2][13] The history also shows that close contacts have not prevented legal disputes or disagreements over the timing and degree of military cooperation.[3][4]

The arrest and prosecution of Israeli businessmen Rony Fuchs and Ze’ev Frenkel became a significant strain in bilateral relations. An international arbitration tribunal ordered Georgia in March 2010 to pay Fuchs $102 million, according to the Foundation for Defense of Democracies account. The two men were arrested in Georgia in October 2010 and convicted of bribery in April 2011.[3] A separate report described a $98 million arbitration award connected to a proposed oil pipeline; the available accounts give different award amounts and do not explain the discrepancy.[29]

Israeli President Shimon Peres and Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman lobbied on the businessmen’s behalf. A planned March 2011 visit to the Knesset by Georgian parliamentary speaker David Bakradze was canceled by his Israeli counterpart. Georgia maintained that the case was separate from bilateral relations, while a Georgian analyst quoted in the FDD account said relations were deteriorating because of it.[3] In December 2011, President Mikheil Saakashvili pardoned the men after about 14 months in jail. Fuchs accepted $37 million in exchange for his freedom, according to that account.[3]

The episode produced competing public characterizations. In 2011, Saakashvili said the arrests had not affected relations, which he called excellent, and that bilateral ties would not influence the legal proceedings or judges’ decisions.[30] A 2013 interview with Prime Minister Ivanishvili said relations had “ups and downs,” described the 2010 arrests as having nearly ruined the relationship, and presented restoring confidence in Georgia’s business environment as part of rebuilding ties.[18] An N12 report said the release followed diplomatic efforts and a personal request by Peres; it also relayed Frenkel’s allegations of mistreatment and his claim that the case was a setup. Those allegations were the businessman’s claims, not findings established by the report.[29] Peres called the pardon “a generous gesture,” while Saakashvili described the episode as “difficult and uncomfortable for both sides.”[3]

Other differences in the record concern defense policy and historical interpretation. Accounts disagree on when Israeli military cooperation was curtailed.[4][3] They also differ on whether Israel’s actions during the 2008 war amounted to support for Georgia or a more cautious posture.[17][24] A 2025 ethnographic study reports that interlocutors repeated a narrative of 26 centuries of Jewish presence in Georgia and an absence of outbreaks of violence, antisemitism, or serious conflict; the author says verifying that narrative was beyond the paper’s scope.[14] That narrative should be distinguished from documented contemporary incidents, including the 2022 cemetery swastika and antisemitic online posts recorded by the U.S. State Department.[28]