Morocco Receives First of Four Advanced G-550 Spy Planes from US-Israeli Deal

The agreement, concluded on May 18, 2009, and estimated at $142 million, provided for the delivery of 4 business jets with a range of 12,000 kilometers. According to a statement from the "Defense Security Cooperation Agency, the aircraft are manufactured in the United States and equipped with Israeli technologies. The subcontracting would have been entrusted to the Israeli group Elta Systems, a subsidiary of Israel Aerospace Industries, a giant of the aerospace technology of the Hebrew state.

In a publication, published in 2018, the site Intelligence Online had mentioned the signing, in 2016, of an agreement between the United States and Saudi Arabia for the acquisition of 4 Gulfstream G-550 aircraft for the benefit of the FAR. The bill would have been paid by Riyadh and Abu Dhabi.

During the same period, the Algerian Chief of Staff, Mohamed Gaid Salah, had negotiated for $1 billion the purchase of 3 aircraft of the same type, integrating the best technologies in the American manufacturer’s catalog. However, the contract did not come to fruition and Algiers had settled for Italian aircraft equipped with ISR technology, but with a much lower range.