UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres plans to visit Israel at the end of this month. This is the first trip of Gutteresh to the Jewish state, since his inauguration (after Ban Ki-moon) on January 1 of this year.

As the Jerusalem Post reminds us, Pan carried out the first of his 12 visits to Israel in March 2007 - three months after taking office.

The visit of Guterres will take place after he has already made almost 40 official trips abroad, including eight trips to West Asia and the Middle East region.

Among the countries visited by the UN Secretary-General before arriving in Israel are Iraq, Turkey, Jordan, Egypt, Qatar, Oman, the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia.

Guterres, which, according to the Foreign Ministry, must be in Israel on August 27-29, is expected to combine its visit to Israel with a trip to the Palestinian Authority.

The UN Secretary-General also expressed interest in visiting the Gaza Strip, but this stage of the trip has not yet been agreed upon. Ban Ki-moon visited Gaza four times in 10 years of his tenure as UN head.