As global lockdowns ease, Amazon and Next restart limited shipping to Israel
US retailer offers costly delivery, presumably due to lack of passenger flights to take parcels; UK clothing giant restricts number of orders per day to ensure workers’ safety
Amazon resumed limited shipping to Israel on Friday as lockdown restrictions began to ease in the country and around the world.
In a blow to Israeli consumers and the postal service, Amazon blocked the shipment of most items to Israel on March 22 as it began to focus on essential items for customers in the US and Europe.
It also ended its offer of free shipping to Israel on orders over $49, which started in November 2019.
According to the Ynet news site, orders can now only be shipped to Israel using the express delivery option, which comes at a price. It is believed this could be due to the reduced number of passenger planes, meaning that deliveries can only be made using dedicated freight flights.
Amazon was not the only online retailer to resume shipments to Israel on Friday — British retailer Next also started to take orders from Israel after their website was closed for a number of weeks.
The clothing giant said that to ensure the safety of warehouse staff, it will only take a limited number of orders each day — a practice it also used in its domestic market at the very start of the pandemic — then slowly start rolling service out to other territories.
According to the Globes financial newspaper, the local retail industry estimates that Next makes hundreds of millions of shekels worth of sales in Israel every year, helped in part by its policy of free delivery on orders over NIS 100 (approximately $28).
The resumption of deliveries to Israel by Amazon and Next comes as Israel has begun easing restrictions to contain the coronavirus after six weeks of closures, with malls, outdoor markets and gyms reopening Thursday.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said that all lockdown restrictions could be removed by the middle of June and the government on Monday canceled the 100-meter limit on Israelis traveling from their homes for activities deemed nonessential, as well as restrictions preventing people from visiting with family.
Netanyahu warned, though, that Israel could have to reassess enforcing social distancing measures if there are more than 100 new coronavirus cases a day, a doubling of cases within 10 days, or over 250 people with serious symptoms in hospitals.
Israel’s National Emergency Authority fears a second wave of coronavirus infections and is calling on the government to use the relative lull in cases to prepare hospitals for a substantial increase in respiratory ventilation and treatment capacities.
