BERLIN (dpa-AFX) – A week after the devastating terrorist attack on Israel by the Islamist Hamas, the armed forces German citizens home from the conflict area. Three Air Force planes landed on Sunday with a total of 162 people on board at the Wunstorf Air Base in Lower Saxony and in Berlin. The campaign follows on from the special civil flights organized by the Foreign Office in recent days and will be continued if necessary.
Due to the escalation of violence in the Middle East, the Foreign Office also issued travel warnings for Israel, the entire Palestinian territories and Lebanon on Sunday. Such a step only takes place in countries where there is a risk to life and limb. There are now 16 countries worldwide, including Ukraine, Afghanistan and Syria. Partial travel warnings apply to other countries such as Russia and Egypt. The classifications can make it easier for travelers to cancel flights, but they are not travel bans.
There has recently been a lot of criticism of the Foreign Office’s strategy for repatriating German citizens. Initially only civilian options were used for this purpose. On Saturday, the Foreign Office announced that it had supported around 2,800 German citizens and family members to leave Israel. People would have left the country by land, air and sea. Lufthansa special flights were predominantly used.
The first A400M military transporter arrived at the military airfield in Wunstorf, Lower Saxony, early on Sunday morning. According to the Bundeswehr, there were 51 passengers on board. A second transport plane with 29 people landed there around 7 a.m., as the Bundeswehr announced on the online platform X. At around 4 p.m. an Airbus (Airbus SE (ex EADS)) A321 from the Bundeswehr arrived at Berlin’s BER airport. We were able to take 82 passengers on this flight.
If necessary, further air force flights could be set up, according to a statement from the Foreign Office and the Ministry of Defense. If the situation worsens, the Bundeswehr is ready for a larger military evacuation operation. Further preparatory measures would be taken. The crisis team also decided to strengthen the crisis support teams already deployed to the region.
CDU parliamentary group vice-president Johann Wadephul called the federal government’s actions in the repatriation campaign “chaotic”. “Now the Bundeswehr must and will fix it again. It is a stroke of luck for our state, which has shown its bad side for citizens in need,” said Wadephul to the “Rheinische Post” (Monday).
The CDU foreign politician Jürgen Hardt said that the federal government should have used the Bundeswehr much earlier to fly Germans out. “The route chosen by the Foreign Office via Lufthansa did not work quickly and unbureaucratically.”
FDP defense expert Marie-Agnes Strack-Zimmermann told the “Rheinische Post” that it was the order of the day for the Bundeswehr to offer support. In addition to the many international flight offers “that are available to leave Tel Aviv, the current measure is not yet a special operation like we know from Kabul or Sudan, but rather additional support,” said Strack-Zimmermann./mfi/ DP/he
Selected leverage products on Lufthansa
With knock-outs, speculative investors can participate disproportionately in price movements. Simply select the lever you want and we will show you suitable open-end products on Lufthansa
The leverage must be between 2 and 20
Advertising