It’s official: the prime minister’s plane Wing of Zion, which was mothballed by the previous government, will be the official aircraft of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and may also be used for state visits by President Isaac Herzog.
Prime Minister’s Office director general Yossi Shelley wrote this evening to the director general of the Ministry of Defense, Amir Eshel, requesting him to instruct Israel Aerospace Industries to prepare the aircraft for upcoming trips by the prime minister.
The aircraft is currently in the Israel Aerospace Industries hangar at Ben Gurion Airport. Certain action needs to be taken on the aircraft itself before it can be commissioned, and the crew to operate it needs to be prepared. The first flights will apparently be operated by Israel Aerospace industries pilots. Israel Air Force pilots will later be allocated to the plane.
The plane was adapted at a cost of hundreds of millions of shekels, and the project was fiercely criticized by the State Comptroller for the upgrades to the cabin demanded by the Prime Minister’s Office under Netanyahu. Nevertheless, the main expense was in adapting Wing of Zion to meet strict safety and security requirements and in installing advanced communications equipment to enable the prime minister to remain updated at all times and to transmit decisions.
There has been no official statement yet of the prime minister’s first destinations, but he may wish to attend the World Economic Forum in Davos in ten days’ time. It is doubtful whether Wing of Zion will be ready in time for that. The next trip is expected to be to the UAE for a meeting with the president, Mohamed bin Zayed, Netanyahu’s partner in forming the Abraham Accords.
Published by Globes, Israel business news – en.globes.co.il – on January 5, 2023.
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