Bahrain national carrier Gulf Air is launching direct flights between Tel Aviv and the Bahrain capital Manama from tomorrow. Gulf Air will operate two weekly flights in each direction on Mondays and Thursdays. The flight over Saudi Arabia will take just under three hours and Gulf Air is also offering a range of connection flights to destinations in Asia. Fares begin from $550 return, Trend reports with reference to Globes.
Gulf Air acting CEO Waleed AlAlawi said, "We are delighted to announce the launch of our Bahrain-Tel Aviv route as part of the historic Bahraini-Israeli relations. As the national carrier of the Kingdom of Bahrain; we take great pride in supporting our leadership and Kingdom in their role of preserving peace and prosperity in the region. We hope this is merely the beginning of developing further opportunities."
The launching of the new route follows the signing of the normalization agreement last year between Bahrain and Israel as part of the Abraham Accords, and the political, commercial and civil aviation agreements signed last year between the two countries.
Flights between Tel Aviv and Manama had been scheduled to start in June but were postponed due to the Covid restrictions at the time.