Hamas al Aqsa flood severely hits the Israeli economy amid a state of panic and paralysis in all sectors
According to economic experts, it’s inevitable that operation al Aqsa Flood – which was launched by Hamas on Saturday morning, against Israel – will have direct economic impacts, and others in the future.
In this regard, Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper’s economic affairs correspondent, Gad Lior, said that the war with the Gaza Strip broke out at a time when the Israeli market was awaiting fateful decisions regarding interest rates by the Bank of Israel, and at a time when the Israeli currency continued to decline, and the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange continues to decline for the fourth day in a row.
According to Lior, the war on the Gaza front would deepen the crises in the Israeli economy, which could lead to the continued decline of the shekel against the dollar and stocks on the Israeli stock exchange.
According to the instructions of the Israeli Home Front Command, school will be suspended from the greater Tel Aviv area to the Gaza enclave areas, and hundreds of industrial zones and thousands of commercial establishments and shopping complexes will be closed, which constitute the backbone of the economy in the region and serve about 3 million Israelis.
The size of Israeli losses in previous military confrontations with the Palestinian resistance was estimated at tens of billions of dollars, for the economic, commercial and tourism sectors.
According to economic experts, the Israeli economy will suffer heavily, and will face enormous negative effects, and also threatens the migration of 7,000 emerging companies from Tel Aviv and the transfer of their money, workers, and even their headquarters outside of Israel, or the layoff of Israeli workers, in addition to huge losses.
In the tourism, aviation, transportation and infrastructure sectors, losses are expected to reach $100 billion.
While economic affairs analyst Yedioth Ahronoth believes that the financial losses and the cost of the war will deepen Israel’s general budget deficit.
Several airlines canceled their flights to Tel Aviv this weekend following the Hamas military attack on the occupation, according to arrival data at Ben Gurion International Airport published online.
Hotels also reported frequent calls to service centers, and cancellation of future bookings by tourists.
“There are massive cancellations of future bookings, and many tourists in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv are looking for flights to escape” Danny Lipman, CEO of Atlas Hotels said.
Among the companies that canceled their flights are Lufthansa, Emirates Airlines, Ryanair, Aegean Airlines, Air France, and US companies.
According to Israeli “The Marker” website, the Israelis are stranded abroad, while Swiss Airlines, Wise Air, Turkish Airlines, and Polish Airlines have already canceled their flights in the morning.
On Saturday evening, Delta, United, Virgin, EasyJet, Transavia, Ryanair, Aegean, Iberia, and Georgian canceled their flights to Israel.
Following the cancellations, Israeli Airlines flights became heavy, and there were no seats on most incoming flights.
