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Representatives of the Ministries of Transport of Israel and Switzerland signed a new aviation agreement that will allow additional airlines to operate regular flights between the two countries.

According to the statement from the Ministry of Tourism, the aviation agreement with Switzerland is one of the few remaining agreements where there is a single carrier from each country operating on all routes, despite the growth in passenger traffic between the two countries.  According to the minister, the agreement will allow two regular airlines from each country to operate passenger flights to destinations between the two countries.

The agreement will also allow each country to operate 24 regular passenger flights, compared to the 17 at present. Currently Swiss International Airlines operates two daily flights between Zurich and Tel Aviv and El Al operates 12 weekly flights to Zurich and Geneva.

At this time it is unknown whether any other airlines have requested to operate regular flights between Israel and Switzerland; however in the past Swiss have considered adding a daily flight between Tel Aviv and Geneva; however the idea was dropped because of the shortage of available aircraft.  For now, with the signing of the new agreement, Swiss may reconsider this idea, once the passenger market starts to recover.

In response, Avner Gordon, the head of Swiss in Israel said that this issue remained on the agenda; but a decision would be taken once there was an improvement in the economic situation in the market.

In the last year, the Ministry of Transport signed 10 new aviation agreements with European countries, allowing additional Israeli airlines to operate regular flights between Israel and those countries; among them Spain, France, Britain, Belgium and Italy.