Three days after Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Jordanian King Hussein exchanged ratified copies of their historic peace treaty, the first group of Israeli tourists entered Jordan using their Israeli passports.
The group of 35 people passed through the southern border crossing at Eilat on Sunday for a two-day visit to the Jordanian cities of Aqaba and Petra.
“We feel very excited. I think we have the luck to be able to participate in a kind of small personal history,” Moshe Hananel, the manager of Galilee Tours, which organized the trip, told Israel Radio. “This is the real meaning of peace for us.”
A second group of Israeli tourists was due to cross into Jordan this week using the Sheik Hussein Bridge, the northern border crossing that was officially opened last week.
The July 25 Washington Declaration, which officially brought to an end the 46- year state of war between the two countries, called for the opening of the two border crossings, but allowed only third-country nationals to travel between Israel and Jordan.
The Oct. 26 Israeli-Jordanian peace treaty, which paved the way for full diplomatic, economic and cultural ties, enabled Israelis and Jordanians to visit each other’s countries.
As a result of the peace treaty, an Israeli delegation from the Foreign Ministry, headed by Director-General Uri Savir, was scheduled to travel to the Jordanian capital of Amman this week to choose a site for the Israeli Embassy.
Meanwhile, the daily newspaper Yediot Achronot has reported that senior Jordanian diplomat Ziad Al-Majali will this week assume the top post in the Israel department of the Jordanian Foreign Ministry.
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