The European airline low-cost Ryanair plans to offer full services to Tel Aviv this summer, one of the airline’s executives said Thursday.
The airline – like most others – has canceled flights to Israel for the near future amid a multi-front war that began when the Hamas terrorist group carried out a pogrom in southern Israel, massacring more than 1,200 people and taking 251 people hostage.
“We have a full program for Tel Aviv… so we will be back for the summer, like the majority of other airlines, I think,” commented Eddie Wilson, general manager of the Ryanair subsidiary DAC to Reuters. .
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He clarified that the airline was following the advice given by the European authority in charge of aviation regulation, the EASA. The latter had again recommended not using Israeli airspace at the end of September, in a context of escalation of fighting between Israel and the Hezbollah terrorist group in Lebanon. She nevertheless withdrew at the beginning of October.
A ceasefire with Lebanon has been in effect since December.
When asked if he expected Terminal 1 at Ben Gurion Airport, which is used by carriers low-costreopens its doors, Wilson responded that “we hope that the decision to open this terminal will be made”.
Since the start of the war and since the Hamas pogrom 15 months ago, foreign airlines have repeatedly suspended and resumed services to and from Israel.
Faced with the decline in the number of flights, Israel closed Terminal 1, which angered low-cost carriers as they were forced to use Terminal 3, which has higher costs.
Passengers search for their flights at Ben Gurion Airport, August 6, 2024. (Credit: GIL COHEN-MAGEN / AFP)
In recent months, American airlines – as well as the majority of European carriers – had completely cut off their connections with Israel due to the escalation of fighting in Gaza and Lebanon, against a backdrop of worsening tensions in the Middle East.
The Israeli national company El Al therefore remained the only one to offer direct flights to North America from Tel Aviv. The lack of competition had led to a severe shortage of available seats, while driving up airline ticket prices by 100% – and at times much more.
Faced with these high prices, Israeli MPs decided, earlier this month, to make legal changes to the compensation rights of passengers whose flights are canceled, with the aim of alleviating the financial cost of disruptions that occurred during the war and to help foreign airlines return to the country.
Additionally, a forum of tech executives and investors finally launched TechAir, a new Israeli airline, which plans to operate a total of 36 direct weekly flights departing at midnight from Tel Aviv and landing in New York early in the morning, every day of the week – only one flight departing on weekends. TechAir will launch its activities at the end of January.
El Al has also capped the prices of its economy class flights to four key international transit hubs – Athens, Vienna, Dubai and Frankfurt – in a bid to reduce costs for travelers.
Sharon Wrobel contributed to this article.
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