TEL AVIV — The Israeli newspaper Haaretz has
reported on what it described as an 'unprecedented' air and sea bridge in
Israel's history, aimed at supplying the country with US weapons to support
military operations in the Gaza Strip, Khaberni reported.
اضافة اعلان
According to Haaretz, this bridge involved at
least 100 flights originating from US bases worldwide and hundreds of flights
operated by air and sea shipping companies, constituting a continuous military
supply operation five months after the onset of the war on Gaza.
Flight tracking data, relied upon by Haaretz,
indicated that 140 military transport planes had arrived in Israel since the
war began, including about 70 C-17 aircraft belonging to the US Air Force, most
of which landed at the Nevatim air base in the Negev Desert. Additionally,
additional weapons and ammunition arrived aboard 150 cargo ships.
US media reports also revealed that Israel had
been supplied with weapons and ammunition in 100 secret operations since the
start of the war, including tens of tonnes of 155mm shells, tens of thousands
of guided bombs, air-to-ground missiles of the ‘Hellfire’ model, and drones.
According to lawmakers, the administration of
US President Joe Biden chose not to inform Congress about these operations
because the price of the items was relatively low, exempting them from the
required procedures. However, these secret deals represent only a small
fraction of the extensive bridge to Israel since the war began.
The pace of US cargo flights was significantly
high in the first three months before declining in the past two months.
According to Haaretz, the matter was not limited to US aircraft, as there was
also significant activity of Israeli Air Force cargo planes to and from US
bases and other countries.
In addition to 30 flights by an Israeli air
cargo company between the Nevatim base and Dover in the US, the Israeli
Ministry of Defense stated that it participated in the transportation of
weapons and ammunition, and these flights did not decrease in frequency in the
past two months.
Foreign
companies
Haaretz also highlighted 30 cargo flights
operated by foreign companies that leased US military transport aircraft,
originating from the US, Italy, and Greece, but these flights almost completely
stopped in the past two months.
Open-source data also showed 11 cargo planes
belonging to national air transport companies and to the Israeli Cargo Airline
‘CAL,’ departing from three US bases in Guam, South Korea, and 70 other flights
for national air transport companies and 20 for the Azerbaijani company ‘Silk
Way,’ some of which were for cargo planes apparently fully leased by the
Israeli Ministry of Defense.
These planes carried special heavy loads from
New York, Hong Kong, and Liege, Belgium, where airport workers' unions at the
beginning of the war stated that US weapons were passing through the airport,
and requested not to participate in loading and unloading them.
CAL also used its European fleet to operate
hundreds of flights from Belgium and Hong Kong, but it is unknown whether they
are directly related to the war or if they are compensating for the decrease in
cargo loads aboard passenger aircraft after the significant decrease in
commercial flights arriving in Israel.
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