I think the losses taken by German paratroopers/gliderborne troops during invasion of Create were enough to deter Hitler from another airborne attack ( besides this time on a heavily fortified target. Malta was no Create. Its defenses was much more stronger ) Besides Hitler's priority was Eastern Front during that time. Most of the reinforcements , material and resources were going to Russia. In fact he was barely convinced by General Student for Operation Mercury , invasion of Create in 1941. After the heavy casaulties taken Hitler lost his faith for airborne operations and often remarked "Airborne troops are a thing of past"

In 1940-42 period a possible invasion of Malta , "Operation Hercules" required a massive Italian involvement. Unfortunetely Italian Navy was not in a shape to fight. ( but Mussolini insisted that invasion of Malta should be a complate Italian operation and Hitler who wished to keep his blundering ally happy complied it. Besides he didn't want to involve Mediterenian Front personally at all ) Their commanders are very hesistant after defeats they have suffered at Taranto and Matapan. Moreover they had very little fuel. So Italian battleships were not able to leave harbour. Italian merchant fleet and naval units which already suffered heavy losses during this period ( they couldn't replace the ships they lost ) , were barely conducting supply operations for German/Italian units in North Africa and that was it. They had no more resources for both supplying Rommel and invading Malta. ( or so Italian commanders assumed ) When General Student presented his plan "Operation Hercules" for an airborne and seaborne attack on Malta to Hitler in April 1942 , Hitler was under the influance of negative reports about state of Italian Navy sent to him by German commanders in Mediterenian theatre. So he postponed Hercules to an indefinite time.

But of course meanwhile he and German General Staff forgot to put a leash on Rommel. When Rommel won Battle of Gazala and captured Tobruk he didn't stop and entered Egypt meanwhile outrun his supply lines. Then Kesselrings Luftwaffe units based on Mediterrenian began both participating supply operations for North Afrika and covering Afrikakorps on the ground while it advanced beyond their range as well as surprassing Malta and trying to stay alive. Predictably they failed in all of them.

Only Malta incident shows how uncoordinated Axis operations are in strategic level even in a local theater like Mediterrenian.