Finance
Continuing its attempts to rescue Indian nationals trapped in war-torn Israel, two additional flights landed in the national capital on Sunday morning, carrying 197 and 274 persons, respectively, under ‘Operation Ajay’.
With 197 passengers, the third aircraft from Tel Aviv arrived at IGI Airport about 4 a.m.
When the Indian nationals arrived, they were greeted with the Indian National Flag by Union Minister Kaushal Kishore.
The fourth aircraft from Israel, carrying 274 Indian people, arrived at Delhi airport at 7 a.m.
On Saturday, 235 Indian nationals landed from Israel on the second trip, while 212 passengers arrived from the flight under ‘Operation Ajay’ on Thursday.
Addressing a flurry of questions on the Israel-Palestine conflict, which escalated last week after the Hamas group launched rocket attacks on Tel Aviv, Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson Arindam Bagchi had said that the government’s prime focus was to bring back 18,000 Indians stuck there.
“Our focus is to bring back Indians who want to come out of Israel. There are 18,000 Indians there, including students,” he said, informing that the government has launched ‘Operation Ajay’ to bring back Indian citizens from war-torn Israel.
At least 1,300 Israeli citizens, the vast majority of whom were civilians, were slain in a surprise attack by Hamas militants. Last Saturday, Hamas launched a surprise attack in Israel.
In retaliation, Israel undertook counter-operations that resulted in the deaths of nearly 1500 individuals.
