By Paul Ronzheimer, Nadja Aswad and Burkhard Uhlenbroich
The Bundeswehr has sent two “A400M” military aircraft to Israel to fly out German citizens. BILD learned this exclusively from government circles.
As BILD learned, the military transporters initially started to bring military material to Israel. The planes are scheduled to land in Tel Aviv on Saturday evening.
► To ensure that the giant machines do not return empty, 50 Germans and their families are taken along at the request of the Foreign Office. Why so few? The freight planes only have folding seats on the sides.
According to BILD information, the first plane landed in Israel on Saturday evening at 9 p.m. local time and is preparing the evacuation of German citizens there. The second machine is on the way to support the evacuation.
The Foreign Office crisis team has prepared another flight for Sunday. Then the plane should have proper seating and be able to take many more people with it.
Previously, German citizens were brought out of Israel on special flights operated by commercial airlines.
However, the government was heavily criticized for not being able to fly out enough Germans. In addition, Germany – in contrast to other countries – only sent its own Lufthansa special flights from Thursday.
► A total of 5,500 Germans registered in Israel on the Federal Foreign Office’s crisis list (“ELEFAND”). According to the ministry, it was able to support 2,800 German citizens and their relatives with leaving the country by land, air and sea this week.
► Only just under 100 Germans accepted an offer from the German embassy to be taken by bus to the airport in Amman in Jordan in order to take flights home from there.
After all: On Friday it became known that the government plane with which Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock (42, Green Party) flew to Israel will return with over 80 Germans.