Pedestrians walk on a boulevard after Israel rescinded its mandate to wear face masks outdoors, in Tel Aviv, April 18, 2021. Photo: Reuters/Amir Cohen

Jerusalem: Israelis went about barefaced on Sunday after the order to wear masks outdoors was rescinded in another step towards relative normality thanks to the country’s mass vaccination against COVID-19.

With about 81% of citizens or residents over 16 – the age group eligible for the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine in Israel – having received both doses, contagions, and hospitalizations are down sharply.

But entry by foreigners is still limited and non-immune Israelis who return from abroad must self-isolate, due to concerns that virus variants could challenge the vaccine. The health ministry said it had detected seven cases of a new Indian variant in Israel, whose potency was being assessed.

“We are leading the world right now when it comes to emerging from the coronavirus,” Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu told reporters. “(But) we have still not finished with the coronavirus. It can return.”

“Breathing Freely,” read the cover headline of the mass-circulation daily Israel Hayom.

“Being without a mask for the first time in a long time feels weird. But it’s a very good weird,” Amitai Hallgarten, 19, said while sunning himself at a park. “If I need to be masked indoors to finish with this – I’ll do everything I can.”

With Israeli kindergarteners, elementary and high school students already back in class, middle school pupils who had been kept at home or attended class sporadically returned to pre-pandemic schedules.

Teachers were instructed to continue ventilating classrooms and to maintain social distancing in lessons and breaks. Extra-curricular activities such as children’s theatres remain off-limits.

“This is still a non-vaccinated population (children under the age of 16) that we want to safeguard,” Health Ministry official Sharon Alroy-Preis told Israel‘s Army Radio.

Israel counts East Jerusalem Palestinians among its 9.3 million population and has administered the vaccines there.