Which Way to Jerusalem?

"El Al has the Jews. We have the Moslems. Now we're going to fight El Al for the Christian trade." So says Aly Ghandour, managing director of the five-plane Royal Jordanian Airlines. With a new twist on an ancient feud, the Amman-based, government-owned line is challenging its larger Israeli counterpart for what Ghandour calls "the Bible traffic"--Westerners traveling in tour groups to Jerusalem.

Since 1971, Israeli border officials have allowed foreign tour groups from Amman to cross the Jordan River to the Israeli-occupied West Bank, which contains most of the sites mentioned in the Bible. Many of the tourists are destined for Jerusalem. "We consider Amman the proper gateway to Jerusalem," says Ghandour, 42, who was educated in aeronautical engineering at New York University and gained practical experience as a mechanic with American Airlines. So Royal Jordanian, also called Alia after King Hussein's eldest daughter, is offering Westerners a chance to go to the Middle East via Amman and see both the Arab and Israeli worlds at essentially the same price as a tour to Jerusalem by way of Tel Aviv on one of the Western airlines.

Verge of Profit. The Jerusalem-via-Jordan route has its drawbacks. Tel Aviv's Lod Airport, the traditional gateway to Jerusalem, is less than an hour's drive from the Holy City. But a trip from the Amman airport can take up to five hours--including a bus drive through the Jordan Valley, a stop at the border for passport and baggage check, and a second bus trip to Jerusalem. The airline offers each tour customer a free excursion flight to the seaside resort of Aqaba in Jordan to offset the inconvenience. Right now, Americans must first fly to Europe and take Alia from a major European city, but the Jordanian line will soon apply to the Civil Aeronautics Board for a weekly flight from New York's Kennedy Airport.

Alia is ten years old and on the verge of showing a profit for the first time; it survived its first decade on government subsidy. Cabin service is up to the standards of Western airlines. Pilots and their crews, once mostly foreigners, are now 80% Jordanian. They fly one 707, two 720s and two Caravelles--which will doubtless be sold to make room for two new 727s recently approved for purchase by the Jordanian Cabinet. The line's major customers are still Palestinians from round the world returning home for a visit and Moslems from Arab states and Black Africa visiting Mecca for the hajj or pilgrimage that every devout Moslem is supposed to make at least once in his life. But Alia sees the growth of "the Bible traffic" as its real future.

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