An executive plane used in the past by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu took off from Ben-Gurion Airport to Saudi Arabia on Sunday as Secretary of State Mike Pompeo met with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, sparking reports that Netanyahu might have traveled to Saudi Arabia….
The plane returned to Israel after only a few hours, Avi Scharf of the Haaretz newspaper published aviation tracking data showing that a business jet had made a brief trip from Tel Aviv to Neom, on Saudi Arabia’s Red Sea coast, where Bin Salman and Pompeo had a scheduled meeting on Sunday.
Israeli media reported that sources in the government stated that Netanyahu and Mossad chief Yossi Cohen were on the flight and met with Pompeo and bin Salman, possibly to discuss normalization or issues concerning Iran.
Riyadh has so far declined to normalize ties with Jerusalem, saying Palestinian statehood goals should be addressed first. But the Saudis have allowed Israeli airliners to overfly their territory to newly available Gulf destinations as well as to Asia.
