The government of Canada issued an official statement to the government of Israel today, forbidding El Al Israel Airlines from flying over Canadian airspace en route to the United States, due to Israel's refusal to approve additional Air Canada flights to Israel.
The statement was delivered by Canadian Ambassador Michael Bell to Minister of Transportat Yitzhak Mordechai and to the head of the Civil Aviation Administration Yitzhak Herzog.
Canada did not state when sanctions against El Al are scheduled to begin but noted that the ban on flying over Canadian airspace would be in effect until Israel approved a request by the Canadian national carrier for seven weekly flights, year-round, as opposed to the currently approved four. This week, Air Canada reduced the number of flights from seven per week to four therefore, it would appear the sanctions are in effect immediately.
Air Canada is demanding it be allowed to operate daily flights to and from Israel all year round, not only in summer. In recent weeks, the government of Canada had expressed hope that the airline crisis would not develop into a diplomatic one.
Herzog's explanation for the refusal was that El Al did not have code sharing agreements with US airlines and requested that El Al be granted a three year period to sign those agreements. Air Canada claimed in response that there was no connection between its own activities and El Al's commercial considerations or its weaknesses in the US market.
El Al issued a statement today, saying it had appealed to the International Air Transport Authority requesting it review Canada's threats. IATA's president told El Al in response "Carrying out a threat to close air space, as a commercial pressure tactic, is not acceptable within our organization."
El Al added that a ban on its flights over Canada would bring about the cancellation of all other flight-related activities between the two countries, including stopping Air Canada flights to Israel entirely.
The ban on using Canadian air space would force El Al to fly via more southerly routes and would increase flight times by 30 minutes. The US route is El Al's most profitable, with 20 flights a week between the US and Israel.
Published by Israel's Business Arena on November 9, 1999.