Israel to boost flights to India, other Asian countries after Saudi Arabia opens airspace

Israeli airlines plan to expand and open new routes to India and other Asian destinations after Saudi Arabia opened its airspace to all carriers, a move that would save fuel costs and reduce flight times.

Riyadh on Friday said its airspace would be open to all airlines - an extension of flyover rights for Israeli planes, which previously had a Saudi corridor only for Gulf destinations such as to the United Arab Emirates, to include various Asia routes too.

Both flag carrier El Al Israel Airlines and smaller rival Arkia have already applied for permission to fly over Saudi airspace, they said on Sunday, which would cut about 2-1/2 hours from flights to India and Thailand.

Present routes to those destinations - which are popular with Israelis - bypass Saudi Arabia airspace by flying south over the Red Sea around Yemen.

Faster, more direct routes would also mean lower fuel burn. This in turn would help efficiency for El Al by allowing it to use smaller aircraft on its route to Mumbai while saving fuel on its nearly daily flights to Thailand, said Shlomi Am Shalom, an El Al official.

"We can take a big airplane and use it in other places like Australia and Japan," he said, adding flying to Melbourne and Tokyo were still in the planning stages and establishing those routes would take time.

Similarly, Arkia said it planned to start flights to Goa, India, in November and was considering new destinations such as Thailand and Sri Lanka using Airbus A321neoLR aircraft.

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