TEL AVIV — The first direct flight between
Tel Aviv and Egypt’s Red Sea resort of Sharm El-Sheikh took off on Sunday,
Israeli national airline El-Al said.
اضافة اعلان
Flight 5193, operated by El-Al subsidiary Sun d’Or,
departed
Ben Gurion International Airport at 0715 GMT, the carrier said in a
statement.
Direct flights have long been in operation between
Tel Aviv and Cairo, since Egypt in 1979 became the first Arab country to sign a
peace accord with Israel.
The two countries have lately bolstered their ties.
Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett has twice
visited Egypt after coming to power in June, and met President Abdel Fattah
Al-Sisi in September.
In early October, a plane branded with the logo of
Egypt’s national carrier Egyptair landed in Israel for the first time, a flight
described as “historic” by the Israel Airport Authority.
Prior to that, Egyptian flights to Israel had been
operated by an Egyptair subsidiary, Air Sinai, set up exclusively for the
Israeli route and without displaying the Egyptian flag on the exterior of its
planes.
Some in Egypt continue to oppose ties with Israel.
The Egyptian branch of the Boycott, Divestment, and
Sanctions movement, which opposes Israel’s occupation of Palestinian
territories, has called for a boycott of two Israeli-organized dance festivals
due to take place in Sinai over the coming days.
Until 2020, Egypt and Jordan were the only
Arab governments to have normalized relations with Israel.
That year, they were joined by Bahrain, Morocco, and the
UAE, which all now operate direct flights to Israel.
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