JERUSALEM – Israel will close its only major airport for at least a week, authorities said Sunday, effectively sealing itself off from international travel in a bid to vaccinate more of its population before new variants of the coronavirus take hold here.
The cabinet agreed Sunday to bar incoming and outgoing international passenger flights at Ben Gurion International Airport from midnight Monday until at least the end of January, unless a parliamentary committee votes to overturn the plan.
The few exceptions will include cargo flights, medical evacuations and “firefighting flights,” according to the office of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Departures will be banned except for certain extreme cases, including family funerals and legal proceedings, which will require individual approval by health authorities.
Even Jewish immigrants scheduled to arrive under the country’s Right of Return law will be barred during the shutdown, an interruption in the flow of newcomers that reportedly was opposed by the Israel’s Immigration minister.
“No nation has done what we are about to do – we are hermetically sealing the country,” Netanyahu said in a statement. “We do this to prevent the entry of the virus mutations and to ensure that we progress quickly with our vaccination campaign.”
Read the article by Steve Hendrix in Traveller.