The 1st Flight from Israel to UAE
In an historic first flight that flew directly over Saudi Arabia, the El Al Boeing 737 was the first direct flight from Tel Aviv, Israel to Abu Dhabi, UAE on Monday, August 31st at 11:14AM local time.
The El Al Flight 971 made history yesterday by flying over Saudi Arabia in a direct flight from Tel Aviv to Abu Dhabi because the Saudi airspace had previously been banned for the Israeli airline. The original route that was planned for the flight was to go over the Jordinian territory, but 40 minutes after take off, the flight crossed into Saudi Arabian airspace.
The aircraft had the word “peace”painted on its side in three languages, Arabic, Hebrew, and English. It was carrying members of the US-Israeli delegation led by US president Donald Trump’s son-in-law/adviser, Jared Kushner, and the National Security Advisor to Israel, Meir Ben Shabbat. This flight is the first step that came after the Israel-UAE agreement from last month that was made to begin normalising relations between the Middle Eastern and Gulf countries.
Here are the reasons why this flight holds importance of an historic level:
1. Donald Trump considers this a foreign policy success.
2. Palestine considers this as a “stab in the back”.
3. The flight’s number “971” is the international dialling code for UAE, while the return flight’s number “972” is the code for Israel.
4. Arrivals from UAE are no longer required by Israeli health ministry to self-isolate for 14 days.
5. The aircraft was equipped with an anti-missile system and carried security agents from both the US Secret Service and the Israeli Shin Bet.
Jared Kushner (USA) said about the Palestines, “They have to come to the table. Peace will be ready for them, an opportunity will be ready for them as soon as they are ready to embrace it.”
Upon landing, Benjamin Netanyahu (PM Israel) called the incident “a historic day”, adding, “You have no idea how excited the citizens of Israel, myself included, are over this day. We dreamed about it and worked for it and here it is happening before our eyes. Be blessed and do great things!” Later, he told a press conference, “It will be a warm peace because it will be based on cooperation in the realm of economics, with an entrepreneurial economy like ours, with vast economic capabilities, with big money looking for investment channels.”
Meanwhile, Saeb Erakat (Palestine) reacted to the Israeli-UAE relations by tweeting, “Peace is not an empty word used to normalise crimes and oppression. Peace is the outcome of justice… Peace is not made by denying Palestinians’ right to exist and imposing an apartheid regime. Apartheid is what Netanyahu means by ‘peace for peace’.”
Stay tuned with Media Quotient Inc. for details on the upcoming relations between all involved countries and politicians, and the next return flight from UAE to Israel. Credit: FlightRadar24/Independent
