Israel to sign unprecedented visa waiver deal with UAE

Israel and the United Arab Emirates will sign a visa waiver treaty on Tuesday marking the first time the Jewish state has reached such an agreement with an Arab country.

The accord will officially be adopted during a signing ceremony in Tel Aviv, attended by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and two ministers from the United Arab Emirates.

The UAE delegation will also be the first to make an official visit to Israel from a Gulf State.

The waiver agreement between Israel and the UAE will allow citizens of both nations to enter one another’s territory without having to apply for a visa.

However, the agreement with still need to be ratified in Israel Parliament before it can go into effect.

Alongside the visa waiver deal, bilateral agreements in the fields of aviation, investment protection, science and technology are expected to be signed at the ceremony, which will be held at Ben-Gurion airport.

It will take place the day after lawmakers in the UAE and Bahrain approve their respective normalization agreements with Israel.

The Emirati delegation, to be led by its finance and economy ministers, is expected to arrive in Israel at noon on Tuesday for a five-hour visit, during which bilateral talks will be held aimed at implementing the historic Abraham Accords signed last month in Washington.