Rescue flights underway as Israel lifts outbound travel restrictions

Since Israel’s attack on Iran and the ongoing retaliation, air traffic in the Middle East has been heavily impacted. Several airspaces have been closed, and airlines have cancelled flights to and from the region. On Sunday, 22 June, Israel reopened its airspace for a day, and starting from 23 June, a limited number of people will be allowed to either return to Israel or leave the country.

As the conflict between Israel and Iran escalated over the past week and a half, many people have found themselves stranded, both in Israel and abroad. Since the attack, Iran has been launching ballistic missiles at Israel on a near-daily basis, prompting strict security measures and flight restrictions. While some flights were exceptionally allowed to depart from and arrive in Israel, approximately 40,000 tourists were left stranded in the country, some of whom have already left via land or sea. According to Israeli airline El Al, they received about 25,000 applications to leave the country on Sunday, 22 June.

At the moment of Israel’s first attack on Iran, between 100,000 and 150,000 Israelis were stranded abroad. Since last week, El Al, Israir, and Arkia have already carried out some repatriation flights during daytime hours. Transportation Minister Miri Regev has said 84.000 Israeli citizens are still left stranded abroad, and the number of repatriation flights will be increased in order to get them home.

“We expect local airlines to operate 24 incoming repatriation flights arriving from global destinations flying Israelis home on Monday and on each of these flights taking off there will be a limit of 50 passengers leaving on outgoing planes. We need to limit the number of passengers on planes that are on the tarmac during this challenging period when the airport can be a target. I believe that by the weekend we will be able to weigh whether we are able to increase the number of passengers leaving on outgoing flights, as well as hours of flight operations, subject to the security situation and guidelines by the Home Front Command,” Regev told The Times of Israel.

Outbound flight guidelines

According to Israeli airline El Al, eight international destinations would be serviced on Monday, 23 June, in order to allow some of the 25,000 people who requested to leave to do so. Outgoing flights will solely leave from Ben Gurion Airport’s Terminal 3, and only passengers with a valid ticket will be allowed to enter the terminal. As all flights will be able to carry a maximum of 50 passengers, priority was given to life-saving, humanitarian, and national security cases.

Those whose flights have been cancelled since 13 June will be assigned to outbound flights at no extra cost, while El Al has set fixed ticket prices for all other passengers. One-way tickets to Larnaca will sell for $99, to Athens for $149, to Rome, Paris, and London for $299, to New York and Los Angeles for $795, and to Bangkok for $695.

Airline Arkia is scheduled to organise a total of six repatriation flights to Larnaca, Athens, Vienna, Rome, and Barcelona.

Passengers are advised to arrive by public transportation, about two hours before departure, to limit the number of people in the terminal. Cafés inside will be open, while duty-free shops will remain closed. Passengers will only be able to rebook a return flight ticket to Israel at least 30 days after their departure, according to Regev.