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Jerusalem – Jordan and Israel signed an agreement on Thursday, after years of negotiations, allowing commercial flights to operate through the airspace of both sides, coming weeks after the UAE and Bahrain normalized relations with Israel.
Israel said Thursday that it had signed an agreement with Jordan that would allow flights from the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain to fly over Israeli-Jordanian airspace.
The Israeli Transport Ministry stated that the agreement had been discussed for years, but that the two countries were only able to complete it after Israel signed two landmark agreements last month to normalize relations with the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain.
The Israeli ministry said the deal would allow commercial jets flying through the Israel-Jordan route to shorten flight times for some routes between Asia, Europe and North America, including flights from Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates.
There were no comments from Jordanian officials, and their statement did not specify any other countries that could benefit from the new agreement.
“The agreement will significantly reduce travel times to the Gulf countries, Asia and the Far East, leading to fuel savings and reduced pollution,” the statement said.
The ministry added that the European Air Control Agency, based in Brussels, helped finalize the deal.
Giving a boost to civil aviation was an important part of two landmark diplomatic agreements signed between Israel, the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain last month in Washington during a ceremony hosted by US President Donald Trump.
The three countries agreed on the importance of ensuring regular and direct flights to strengthen ties.
In the context of the historic agreement, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday that he would present diplomatic agreements with the United Arab Emirates to the Knesset on October 12.
Netanyahu has said he intends to get cabinet and Knesset approval for the deal, which represents a strategic shakeup of Middle Eastern countries vis-à-vis Iran.
The Tel Aviv Stock Exchange said on Thursday that it had started talks with the Abu Dhabi Stock Exchange to discuss cooperation between them on a new indicator of economic synergies between Israel and the United Arab Emirates after the conclusion of a landmark agreement. among them.
“The two sides are holding discussions on the signing of a memorandum of understanding to structure an agreed framework designed to investigate the possibility of regional cooperation in various fields of activity,” the stock exchange said in a statement.
He added that this is only an initial stage of the analysis of the potential cooperation and that a memorandum of understanding has not yet been implemented and no agreement has been formulated.
