A recently launched $300M China-Israel project seems to signal a new intimacy in relations between the two countries. From a May 25, 2014 article by Ruthie Blum for Israel21c.org,

The launch of a $300 million joint research project between Tel Aviv University and Tsinghua University in Beijing has the academic communities and political echelons in both countries buzzing.

The opening of the XIN Center was announced at Tel Aviv University in mid-May amid great fanfare. The name is a play on words; “xin” means “new” in Chinese, and in English the “X” coupled with the “in” can stand for cross-innovation, cross-intelligence and/or cross-ingenuity.

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The endeavor, to be funded by government and private sources, will initially focus on nanotechnology, with an emphasis on medical and optics applications, and later branch out into fields such as biotech and energy.

So far, nearly a third of the money has been raised for the project, which will involve recruiting research fellows from among the best and brightest of the graduate students of both universities to work in tandem (and fly back and forth) to develop products for eventual commercialization.

To raise the rest of the money, an investment fund is being established by Infinity Group, Israel’s largest investment firm, to seed ventures initiated by XIN fellows.

According to Blum, the deal is the outcome of a trip,

The idea for the ambitious program began inauspiciously, during a trip by Israeli scientists to meet with their counterparts in China.

“The project started bottom-up in Beijing,” said Klafter [TAU President Joseph Klafter]. “We fell in love with one another.”

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… language is not the main gap between the Israeli and Chinese students. As both Hanein [Prof. Yael Hanein, head of the Tel Aviv University Center for Nanoscience and Nanotechnology] and Jining [Tsinghua University President Chen Jining]  pointed out, it is the cultural differences that are the most pronounced – and also a positive contrast that can be mutually beneficial.

“The Israelis are less obedient than the Chinese,” observed Hanein.

“The Israelis challenge authority,” said Jining. “And the Chinese bring harmony. The two groups learn from each other and create a balance.”

Jining added that though Tsinghua University collaborates with other academic institutions around the world, “This is the first that is so in-depth. We see it as a vehicle for nurturing future leaders of innovation – for cultivating and training a new generation of entrepreneurs.”

Israel’s Prime Minister, Binyamin (Benjamin) Netanyahu provides an economic perspective,

“China is Israel’s largest trading partner in Asia and fast becoming perhaps Israel’s largest trading partner, period, as we move into the future,” Netanyahu said during a meeting with Vice Premier Yandong at his office in Jerusalem following the XIN launch in Tel Aviv.

There are more details in a May 20, 2014 article written by Niv Elis & Victoria Kezr for the Jerusalem Post,

The first round, which will focus only on nano-technology, will recruit only seven advanced degree students from Tel Aviv University and 14 in China this summer.

While governments are pitching in some money for the $300m. price tag, the universities will seek private donations for the rest.

Israel’s Infinity group set up $16m. fund, comprising investors from Chinese industries and Tsinghua University alumni to help foot the bill.

The Jerusalem Post article mentions this opening, which took place on the same day,

Also on Monday [May 19, 2014], students and delegates from across the globe gathered to see Vice Premier of The People’s Republic of China Lui Yandong speak at the inauguration of the Confucius Institute at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Confucius Institutes have been established at universities around the world by the Chinese Ministry of Education to promote the learning of Mandarin Chinese and Chinese culture.

This is the second such institute, following the founding of Tel Aviv University’s Confucius Institute in 2007.

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“The institute in Tel Aviv is for basic Chinese teaching. Here in the Hebrew University they have East Asian studies and they’ll be cooperation with that. Here there’ll be advanced study of Chinese history and culture,” said 21-year-old student Noa Yang, who not only helped organize the event but also sang during the ceremony.

Both the XIN Center and the new Confucius Institute are part of a much larger initiative according to the Jerusalem Post article,

The initiatives are the latest in a wave of cooperative agreements between Israel and China, not just in education, but also politics and business.

In September [2013], Technion-Israel Institute of Technology in Haifa received a $130m. grant from the Li Ka Shing Foundation to build an academy called the Technion Guangdong Institute of Technology as a joint venture with China’s Shantou University.

Blum’s article mentions yet another project, an agricultural technology incubator (Note: A link has been removed),

More recently, as ISRAEL21c reported in early May, a joint-venture agricultural technology incubator is slated to be built in Anhui Province, China. It will operate under the auspices of Trendlines Agtech, a specialized investment unit of Israel’s Trendlines Group, which supports early-stage, promising medical and agricultural technology companies in Israel.

These kinds of cooperative efforts are part of a comprehensive plan by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to strengthen economic and technological ties with the People’s Republic. It was the impetus for his trip to China last year [2013].

Both these articles indicate that China and Israel are, as noted in the beginning of this post, developing more intimate relations both cultural and economic.

ETA May 28, 2014: JTA.org published a May 28, 2014 news item about a new Israel-China publication (Note: Links have been removed),

Introducing the Times of Israel Chinese on Wednesday [May 28, 2014], Times of Israel founding editor David Horovitz said in a column that it “focuses on the evolving high-tech and innovation areas of the Israeli-Chinese relationship.”

He added, “It also dips into Israeli culture and society, giving Chinese readers insights into Israel beyond the spheres of business and high-tech.”

You can find Times of Israel Chinese here but you will need Chinese language reading skills to fully appreciate it.