The Moroccan national company will propose as of December 12, three flights per week of Casablanca to Tel Aviv, before passing “in a short time” to five.
Le Monde
The Royal Air Maroc (RAM) company announced Tuesday, November 9, the launch of an airline connecting the economic capital Casablanca to Tel Aviv, first direct line to Israel, ten months after the normalization of relations between the two country.
This new link will be operational as of December 12, the RAM indicated in a statement. It “meets the expectations of the Moroccan community established in Israel that maintains strong links with its country of origin”.
“It also aims to allow tourists, as well as women and businessmen, to go to Morocco or Israel”, is it added to the release relayed by the MAP news agency. The Moroccan company will offer three flights a week, before passing “in a short time” to five.
This announcement comes three months after the launch of commercial flights from Israel to Morocco, followed by the first official visit of the Head of Israeli Diplomacy Yaïr Lapid in the Kherifian kingdom.
A community of some 3,000 people
Morocco is the fourth Arab country to announce the normalization of its relations with Israel – after the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Sudan – in return for an American recognition of its “sovereignty” on the old Spanish colony of Western Sahara.
The Jewish community of Morocco, present since antiquity, is the largest in North Africa (some 3,000 people). And nearly 700,000 Moroccan descent Israelis have often kept very strong links with their country of origin.
Before the coronavirus pandemic, the about 50,000 to 70,000 tourists who came every year from Israel, for many originating in Morocco, had to transit by other countries.
Morocco and Israel maintained official relations from 1993 to 2000, the date of the trigger of the second intifada in the Palestinian territories against the Israeli occupation.