“Cooperation between Israel and the EU, which began in 1996 and continues today, shows just how beneficial this relationship can be,” said Frederique Ries, a member of the European Parliament, as she hosted a conference on ‘‘Innovation across borders’’ that highlighted Israel’s great contribution to innovation and technology which helps countless millions of people around the world.

“Over 3,000 projects submitted by Israeli entities were approved by EU programmes, involving 4,435 participants. Of these, 2,450 were academic researchers, 1,270 were industrial researchers, and 715 researchers from other sectors,” she said.

“Because of these programmes, Israeli and EU scientists have worked together on many challenges ranging from child tumours, smart irrigation to robotics and education science. As a result, pushing further the frontiers of knowledge and contributing to the well-being of our citizens here in Europe and beyond Israeli borders. But we can go even further.” The Belgian Liberal MEP added.

During the conference in the premises of the European Parliament in Brussels, held in partnership with the European Jewish Congress, two innovative projects with already immense contribution to the world in the fields of water supply and cybersecurity were presented.

Arye Kohavi, founder and Co-CEO of WaterGen, presented the devise he created in order to extract drinkable water out of air and how this could bring hope for the 780 million people living in those countries that have difficulty in providing water for their population, due to drought, poor infrastructure and strong demand for farming. This new technology could also help to address the challenges related to climate change.

After the recent world cyber-attacks, Irene Abezgauz, co-founder of Cymmetria, demonstrated with concrete examples how to shift the balance of power to the defender’s side, which means ‘hack the hackers’ and intercept attackers during the reconnaissance phase, reveal them and confiscate their tools. This innovative technology has benefited from EU funding through the Horizon 2020 programme.

“Many devices that are key to European citizens’ health and well-being as well as to Europe’s economy, were in fact originally invented in Israel and most of the time, it is unknown to the general public,” said Raya Kalenova, Executive Vice-President of the European Jewish Congress.