Low-cost airline Flydubai on Thursday launched the first direct flights to Tel Aviv, two months after relations between the United Arab Emirates and Israel were normalized under the aegis of the United States.
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The plane, which took off Thursday morning from Dubai International Airport, landed at the end of the morning at Ben-Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv, under the satisfied gaze of Israeli Prime Minister Benyamin Netanyahu.
"
It is the realization of a dream
", declared on the spot the head of the Israeli government affirming that the Israeli and Emirati nationals would soon be able to travel from one country to another "
without visa
".
“
We are changing history, and not by walking but by flying,
” Netanyahu said, saying he wanted to put the “
Middle East at the center of the world
” and make it an “
example
” for the rest of the world. humanity with these normalization agreements between Israel and Arab countries.
The President of the United Arab Emirates, Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyane, for his part declared Thursday in Abu Dhabi that the agreement with Israel would meet the "
aspirations of the peoples of the region to achieve prosperity and progress
".
"
We have always had to adapt our policy to what ensures the security and stability of our state and our region,
" said the head of state, quoted by the official WAM news agency.
The United Arab Emirates signed an agreement brokered by the United States to formalize its relations with the Jewish state in September, the first such agreement concluded by an Arab Gulf state.
They are the third Arab country to have normalized relations with Israel, after Egypt in 1979 and Jordan in 1994, which thus ended the state of war with their Israeli neighbor.
