In A First, Saudi Arabia Opens Airspace to ‘Israeli’ Plane Flying to Non-Gulf Destination

By Staff, Agencies

In a first, the Riyadh regime opened the kingdom’s airspace for an ‘Israeli’ commercial flight heading to a non-Gulf destination for the first time since Saudi Arabia opened its skies to all air carriers, including ‘Israeli’ ones, last month.

The flight operated by the second-largest ‘Israeli’ airline Arkia departed Ben Gurion Airport after 1:15 a.m. occupied Palestine time on Tuesday and was scheduled to land in the Republic of Seychelles off the coast of East Africa six hours later.

Zionist media outlets reported that the new route shortened the duration of the flight by 20 minutes.

The development comes hours after al-Mayadeen television news network, citing Hebrew media reports, said an ‘Israeli’ administrative plane [T7-WZZ], in service of Shino Aviation, had landed in the Saudi capital of Riyadh.

The Saudi regime in November 2020 granted permission for ‘Israeli’ airlines to use its airspace for flights to and from the UAE and Bahrain, in a move seen as a precursor of the formalization of ties between the two sides.

Authorization, however, was not extended to flights departing and arriving at other destinations until last month as part of a multilateral agreement to transfer control of a pair of Red Sea islands from Egypt to Saudi Arabia that was brokered by the Biden administration.

In mid-July, Saudi Arabia, in an apparent gesture of openness towards the ‘Israeli’ occupation entity, announced that it was lifting restrictions on “all carriers” using its airspace.

The Saudi General Authority of Civil Aviation [GACA] said in a statement on its Twitter page at the time that the country's airspace was open to all carriers that meet its requirements for overflights, in line with international conventions that say there should be no discrimination between civil aircraft.

Riyadh claimed that its decision had nothing to do with the Tel Aviv regime, but with the kingdom’s geopolitical goals, fueling speculation.

Saudi Arabia did not show any opposition when the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan, and Morocco in 2020 became the first Arab countries in decades to normalize relations with the ‘Israeli’ occupation regime in a deal brokered by former US President Donald Trump.

The oil-rich kingdom is yet to jump on the bandwagon, but the two sides have seen growing contacts and de-facto rapprochement in recent years.