The objective of this agreement is to allow Israel and ESA work together in space engineering and space exploration, space technologies and other fields
Israel signed a Cooperation Agreement with European Space Agency (ESA) on 30 January 2011. The objective of this agreement is to allow Israel and ESA to create the framework for more-intensive cooperation in ESA projects in the future.
The signing ceremony was held as part of the Sixth International Ilan Ramon Conference. Ilan Ramon was Israel's first astronaut and he was killed in the Columbia Shuttle explosion.
The document noted that Israel and Europe will work together in certain fields in particular, among them space engineering and space exploration.
Also included were space technologies, including nano-satellites, Earth Observation - including monitoring environmental contamination and natural disasters - and microgravity research.
The agreement will facilitate the exchange of scientists, engineers, and information between the two space agencies. It will also lead to joint conferences and increased communication.
Israeli researchers have been cooperating for many years in several European space science projects, such as Huygens, Hubble, Cluster and COROT.
