JERUSALEM, Dec. 20 (Xinhua) -- Israel, Greece and Cyprus signed a cyber cooperation agreement, Israel's National Cyber Directorate at the Prime Minister's Office announced on Thursday.

The agreement was signed during the trilateral summit of the heads of the three countries, which was held in the Israeli Cyber Innovation Arena CyberSpark in the southern city of Be'er-Sheva.

The agreement includes knowledge sharing and operational cooperation among the three countries.

In addition, a bilateral agreement was signed between Israel and Cyprus to strengthen the joint defense with an emphasis on critical infrastructures.

During the summit, Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras and Cypriot President Nicos Anastasiades were introduced with Israel's Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT), which identifies cyber attacks from all over the world through advanced Israeli technologies.

The leaders also visited the Israeli Cyber and Finance Continuity Center, where they were presented with tools and methods for dealing with cyber events in the financial field, as well as an exhibition on Israeli innovation in cyber security.

During the summit, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu held bilateral meetings with the visiting leaders in which he discussed with them the deepening of economic and security cooperation of the countries.

At the meeting, the barriers were lifted ahead of the signing of the intergovernmental agreement to build the EastMed natural gas pipeline.

The pipeline is expected to export gas from Israel through Cyprus and Greece to European countries. The leaders agreed to allow other countries to join the project in the future.