On October 25, 2018 an Israeli plane flew to Oman and then from there – with flight codes changed flew to a country with which Israel did not have any diplomatic relationship. Pakistan. And the passenger on the flight was none other than Israeli PM Bibi Netanyahu.
Israeli ???????? bizjet flew from TLV to Islamabad, #Pakistan ????????, on the ground 10 hours, and back to TLV.
Cleared flight-plan with usual 5min groundtime trick in Amman
M-ULTI glex pic.twitter.com/haHn1NU73L— avi scharf (@avischarf) October 25, 2018
The stopover in Oman legitimized the Israeli flight to go over Saudi Arabia and into Pakistan. How? This is how.
According to Avi Scharf’s tweet, the pilot of that flight did a trick by landing in Amman for five minutes and then flying from there to Islamabad so that it looked as if it was a flight from Jordan. Flight codes get changed when a plane lands an airport and take off again. Remember that Pakistan and Israel have no diplomatic relations and planes registered in either country cannot enter the other’s airspace. (source)
Interestingly, Spectator Index also shared something to this effect the next day.
BREAKING: Reports that Israeli PM Netanyahu has made a secret visit to a country that does not have diplomatic relations with Israel
— The Spectator Index (@spectatorindex) October 26, 2018
This was a time when Saudi Arabia was going through a crisis after the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul.
Just a few days back, Pakistani PM Imran Khan had visited Riyadh and received a package for $6 bn to get past the financial crisis.
PM’s visit to Saudi Arabia: an MoU is signed between the Finance Minister @Asad_Umar and the Saudi Finance Minister, Muhammad Abdullah Al-Jadaan. It has been agreed Saudi Arabia will place a deposit of USD 3 Billion for a period of one year as balance of payment support. pic.twitter.com/Rm2fZDSYO7
— PTI (@PTIofficial) October 23, 2018
It must be remembered that in the whole Jamal Khashoggi episode, Israel was siding with Saudi Arabia.
So, was Imran Khan a messenger between Saudis and Israelis? And what were the Israelis and Saudis planning in terms of geostrategic changes in that region?
For one thing – fixing Iran.
It is known very well that both, the Saudis and Israelis are against Iran and want to bring it to its knees. It is also known that just four months later, a Pakistani suicide bomber killed around 27 Iranian Republican guards in a terror attack just a day before Pulwama attack in Feb 2019.
It may have been possible that someone from Saudi Arabia was also there in Pakistan to meet with Bibi and chalk out a joint plan against Iran.
Featured Image from Flickr / DonkeyHotey
