Skies Over Jordan Open Up to Israeli Flights

Skies Over Jordan Open Up to Israeli Flights

On Thursday, the Israel Ministry of Transportation announced that an agreement had been reached with Jordan allowing commercial flights to overfly each country’s airspace. Though negotiations have been in the works for several years, the recently-signed Abraham Accords facilitated the agreement with Jordan. The agreement will drastically shorten routes to Gulf states and East Asia for all involved parties. As stated in the Abraham Accords which called for such cooperation in transport, it will also allow the UAE and Bahrain along with other countries in the region, to fly over Israeli airspace.

The official announcement states that the move “will lead to substantial savings in fuel, will reduce polluting emissions, and contribute to the quality of the environment.”

“This is a successful conclusion to negotiations that started several years ago but that were accelerated and completed only after the signing of the peace agreement with the UAE and the historic permit for Israeli flights over Saudi Arabia,” the joint announcement says.

Transportation Minister Miri Regev said “we are once again breaking new boundaries, and this time it is in the air.”

“Thanks to this agreement, Israel is better integrated into the region,” she added. “We are opening new routes for cooperation in transportation, economics and diplomacy with the states sharing borders and shared interests with us, and a partnership in the vision for regional peace.”

Last week, Saudi Arabia and Bahrain agreed to allow flights between Israel and the United Arab Emirates to use their airspace. Following the U.S.-brokered agreement between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, a joint U.S.-Israeli delegation flew from Israel to the UAE on Aug. 31 and used Saudi airspace to do so.