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Airlines Halt Flights In and Out of Israel after a Massive Attack by Hamas Ignites Heavy Fighting

Passengers wait at Ben Gurion Airport near Tel Aviv, Israel, on October 7, 2023, as flights are canceled because of the Hamas surprise attack. (Photo by GIL COHEN-MAGEN / AFP)
Passengers wait at Ben Gurion Airport near Tel Aviv, Israel, on October 7, 2023, as flights are canceled because of the Hamas surprise attack. (Photo by GIL COHEN-MAGEN / AFP)
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Airlines Halt Flights In and Out of Israel after a Massive Attack by Hamas Ignites Heavy Fighting

Passengers wait at Ben Gurion Airport near Tel Aviv, Israel, on October 7, 2023, as flights are canceled because of the Hamas surprise attack. (Photo by GIL COHEN-MAGEN / AFP)
Passengers wait at Ben Gurion Airport near Tel Aviv, Israel, on October 7, 2023, as flights are canceled because of the Hamas surprise attack. (Photo by GIL COHEN-MAGEN / AFP)

Major airlines have suspended flights in and out of Israel after the nation declared war following a massive attack by Hamas.
Israel hit more than 1,000 targets in Gaza and Palestinian Hamas group continued firing barrages of rockets, setting off air raid sirens in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. Video posted online appeared to show a plume of smoke near a terminal at Tel Aviv's Ben Gurion International Airport, The Associated Press said.
Scores of arriving and departing flights at Ben Gurion were canceled or delayed, according to the airport’s online flight board, which also showed a steady trickle of flights. Most were operated by Israel's national airline El Al along with others by regional carriers like Türkiye’s Pegasus Airlines and Greece's Blue Bird Airways.
American Airlines, United Airlines and Delta Air Lines suspended service as the US State Department issued travel advisories for the region citing potential for terrorism and civil unrest.
American suspended service to Tel Aviv through Friday. The airline said that it has issued a travel alert providing additional flexibility for customers whose travel plans are impacted.
“We continue to monitor the situation with safety and security top of mind and will adjust our operation as needed,” American said.
United said it allowed two scheduled flights out of Tel Aviv late Saturday and early Sunday and accommodated its customers, crews and employee travelers who were at the airport. The airline said that its Tel Aviv flights will remain suspended until conditions improve.
Delta said its Tel Aviv flights have been canceled through Oct. 31. The airline said it's monitoring the situation and making schedule adjustments accordingly. The company said customers with canceled flights or who want to change their Tel Aviv ticket should check the Delta app, website or call Delta reservations to make adjustments.
Airlines in Europe and Asia also put flights on hold amid the hostilities, offering refunds and waiving rebooking fees for passengers.
Air France said that it has suspended services to Tel Aviv “until further notice” after coordinating with French and Israeli authorities.
“The airline is constantly monitoring the geopolitical situation in the areas served and overflown by its aircraft in order to ensure the highest level of flight safety,” Air France said on its website.
Germany’s Lufthansa, which suspended flights to and from Tel Aviv until Saturday, said Monday that the decision regarding its planes and those of its subsidiaries was made “due to the still unclear developing security situation in Israel and after an intensive analysis of the situation.”
The Lufthansa Group includes Austrian Airlines, Swiss and Brussels Airlines as well as Lufthansa itself.
Hong Kong’s main carrier, Cathay Pacific Airways, said that “in view of the latest situation in Israel,” it was canceling its Tel Aviv flights scheduled for Tuesday and Thursday.
“The safety of our passengers and crew are our top priority. We will continue to monitor the situation very closely,” the airline said on its website, adding it would provide another update on Friday ahead of its third weekly flight on Sunday to the Israeli city.
Virgin Atlantic canceled its service between London’s Heathrow Airport to Tel Aviv on Monday and Tuesday as well as part of that route on Wednesday.
Budget airline Wizz Air, which flies to Israel from Abu Dhabi and more than two dozen airports in Europe, said it was canceling all flights to and from Tel Aviv “until further notice.”
The U.K. discount carrier easyJet said that “due to the evolving situation in Israel,” it has decided to “temporarily pause operations," by canceling its Monday flights from London Luton and Manchester airports to Tel Aviv.
“Our thoughts are with those who have been affected and the safety and security of our passengers and crew is always easyJet’s highest priority,” easyJet said in a statement.
British Airways said it’s planning to continue operating flights to Israel “over the coming days with adjusted departure times.”
Dutch carrier KLM said it’s scrubbing flights to Tel Aviv “until and including Wednesday.”

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Arab World

New Gaza-bound Flotilla Sets Sail from Türkiye

Global Sumud Flotilla Steering Committee members Susan Abdallah, Muhammad Nadir Al-Nuri, Suemeyra Akdeniz Ordu, Maimon Herawati, Thiago Avila and Saif Abukeshek, Eva Saldana, Greenpeace Spain; Maria Serra, GSF Catalunya and Oscar Camps, Open Arms attend a press conference as humanitarian flotilla prepares to depart for Gaza, from Barcelona, Spain, April 12, 2026. REUTERS/Albert Gea
Global Sumud Flotilla Steering Committee members Susan Abdallah, Muhammad Nadir Al-Nuri, Suemeyra Akdeniz Ordu, Maimon Herawati, Thiago Avila and Saif Abukeshek, Eva Saldana, Greenpeace Spain; Maria Serra, GSF Catalunya and Oscar Camps, Open Arms attend a press conference as humanitarian flotilla prepares to depart for Gaza, from Barcelona, Spain, April 12, 2026. REUTERS/Albert Gea
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New Gaza-bound Flotilla Sets Sail from Türkiye

Global Sumud Flotilla Steering Committee members Susan Abdallah, Muhammad Nadir Al-Nuri, Suemeyra Akdeniz Ordu, Maimon Herawati, Thiago Avila and Saif Abukeshek, Eva Saldana, Greenpeace Spain; Maria Serra, GSF Catalunya and Oscar Camps, Open Arms attend a press conference as humanitarian flotilla prepares to depart for Gaza, from Barcelona, Spain, April 12, 2026. REUTERS/Albert Gea
Global Sumud Flotilla Steering Committee members Susan Abdallah, Muhammad Nadir Al-Nuri, Suemeyra Akdeniz Ordu, Maimon Herawati, Thiago Avila and Saif Abukeshek, Eva Saldana, Greenpeace Spain; Maria Serra, GSF Catalunya and Oscar Camps, Open Arms attend a press conference as humanitarian flotilla prepares to depart for Gaza, from Barcelona, Spain, April 12, 2026. REUTERS/Albert Gea

Dozens of ships set sail from southwestern Türkiye as part of a Gaza-bound aid flotilla on Thursday, an organizer told AFP.

"Around 50 ships sailed from Marmaris around an hour ago," Gorkem Duru, a member of the Türkiye branch of the Global Sumud Fleet said.

"They will be joined by four or five ships from the Freedom Flotilla Coalition in international waters. Now they are sailing for Gaza," he added, AFP reported.

The Global Sumud Flotilla will be the third initiative in a year aiming at breaking an Israeli blockade on war-ravaged Gaza, which has suffered severe shortages of food, water, medicine and fuel since the Israel-Hamas war broke out in October 2023.

Israeli forces intercepted the second flotilla in international waters off Greece on April 30, expelling most of the activists to Europe, but arrested two of them who were held for 10 days.

Rights groups said the arrests were illegal and that the men suffered abuse while they were in Israeli detention.

Israeli authorities have rejected the abuse allegations but have filed no charges against them.

Arab World

Palestinian President Pledges to Hold Elections, Pursue Reforms

FILED - 16 August 2022, Berlin: Mahmoud Abbas, President of the Palestinian Authority, answers questions from journalists at a press conference after his meeting with the German Chancellor. Photo: Wolfgang Kumm/dpa
FILED - 16 August 2022, Berlin: Mahmoud Abbas, President of the Palestinian Authority, answers questions from journalists at a press conference after his meeting with the German Chancellor. Photo: Wolfgang Kumm/dpa
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Palestinian President Pledges to Hold Elections, Pursue Reforms

FILED - 16 August 2022, Berlin: Mahmoud Abbas, President of the Palestinian Authority, answers questions from journalists at a press conference after his meeting with the German Chancellor. Photo: Wolfgang Kumm/dpa
FILED - 16 August 2022, Berlin: Mahmoud Abbas, President of the Palestinian Authority, answers questions from journalists at a press conference after his meeting with the German Chancellor. Photo: Wolfgang Kumm/dpa

Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas on Thursday pledged to press ahead with reforms within the Palestinian Authority, saying he was prepared to hold long-delayed presidential and parliamentary elections.

Abbas's Fatah party began a three-day conference to elect a new central committee, its highest leadership body, for the first time in 10 years as it faces existential challenges in the wake of the Gaza war.

"We renew our full commitment to continuing work on implementing all the reform measures we pledged... We are ready to hold presidential and legislative elections," Abbas said in an address to the congress, though he did not provide a timeline for the vote, AFP reported.

"The Palestinian people are the only people in the world living under occupation. Holding our conference today on our homeland's soil confirms our determination to continue on the democratic path and open the way for youth and women," the 90-year-old veteran leader said.

Fatah's central committee is expected to play a key role in the post-Abbas era, with many observers wondering whether he might finally step down after more than two decades at the helm, despite the lack of a clear successor.

The conference comes as the Palestinian national movement faces some of its "most serious challenges in our struggle", Jibril Rajoub, the current secretary general of the committee, told AFP ahead of the congress.

He expressed hope that the conference, repeatedly delayed, would contribute to "ensuring and protecting the establishment of a Palestinian state on the world's agenda and protecting the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) as the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people".

Key figures competing to replace Abbas include Rajoub and PA deputy Hussein al-Sheikh.

Meanwhile, the president's eldest son, Yasser Abbas, is on the ballot to join the central committee, having risen in prominence over recent years after he was named the president's special representative despite largely residing in Canada.

Arab World

Palestinian Fatah Party to Elect Leaders for First Time in Decade

President Mahmoud Abbas presiding over a meeting of Fatah's 'Revolutionary Council' (Archive - WAFA)
President Mahmoud Abbas presiding over a meeting of Fatah's 'Revolutionary Council' (Archive - WAFA)
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Palestinian Fatah Party to Elect Leaders for First Time in Decade

President Mahmoud Abbas presiding over a meeting of Fatah's 'Revolutionary Council' (Archive - WAFA)
President Mahmoud Abbas presiding over a meeting of Fatah's 'Revolutionary Council' (Archive - WAFA)

Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas's Fatah movement is due on Thursday to elect a new central committee for the first time in 10 years, as it faces existential challenges in the wake of the Gaza war.

During the three-day general conference, the movement will vote on the central committee, its highest leadership body, even as analysts warn of Fatah's diminishing legitimacy in the face of endemic corruption and its lack of progress on Palestinian statehood -- especially amid an intensified Israeli settlement drive, reported AFP.

The committee is expected to play a key role in the post-Abbas era, with some wondering whether the 90-year-old leader might finally step down after more than two decades at the helm, despite the lack of a clear heir apparent.

The conference comes as the Palestinian national movement is facing some of "the most serious challenges in our struggle", said Jibril Rajoub, the current secretary general of the committee.

He expressed hope that the conference, repeatedly delayed, would contribute to "ensuring and protecting the establishment of a Palestinian state on the world's agenda and protecting the Palestine Liberation Organization as the sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people".

Fatah has historically been the main component of the PLO, which includes most Palestinian factions but excludes Hamas and Islamic Jihad groups.

In recent decades, Fatah's popularity and influence have dwindled amid internal divisions and growing public frustration over the stagnation of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process.

The sense of disappointment led to a surge in support for rival Hamas, which made huge political gains in the occupied West Bank in 2006 elections that it won handily, before going on to expel Fatah from the Gaza Strip almost entirely after a bout of factional fighting.

Hani al-Masri, director of the Palestinian Center for Policy Research and Strategic Studies (Masarat), told AFP that Fatah now merely uses the PLO to provide itself with legitimacy, "a legitimacy that is eroding in the absence of a unified national project, elections and national consensus".

He added that Thursday's conference was overshadowed by competition over seats on the central committee, "while the national project is conspicuously absent from the discussions".

Rajoub nonetheless declared that the conference was a first step towards "putting the Palestinian house in order, to build a partner for establishing a (Palestinian) state".

- Succession -

The conference will be held over three days, with approximately 2,580 Fatah members participating, the majority of them in Ramallah, though several hundred are also spread across Gaza, Cairo and Beirut.

They are expected to elect 18 representatives to the central committee and 80 to the movement's parliament, known as the revolutionary council.

Fatah is the main party within the Palestinian Authority (PA), which has been touted abroad as a natural partner in rebuilding and running the Gaza Strip after Israel's devastating war with Hamas there.

But Fatah remains marginalized in the territory, and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has repeatedly vowed that it, the PA and Hamas will have no role in post-war governance.

Despite repeated declarations from the movement that it is working as a "united front", major figures will be absent from Thursday's conference, notably Nasser al-Qudwa, a key Palestinian leader who is boycotting the gathering.

"This conference is illegitimate, and this leadership that has usurped power is illegitimate and its time is up," said Qudwa, a nephew of late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat.

Key figures competing to replace Abbas include Rajoub and PA deputy Hussein al-Sheikh.

Also missing is Marwan Barghouti, who is considered a uniquely unifying Palestinian leader often cited as a possible successor to Abbas, but is serving a life sentence in Israeli prison after being found guilty of involvement in deadly attacks.

Meanwhile, the president's eldest son, Yasser Abbas, is on the ballot to join the central committee, having risen in prominence over recent years after he was named the president's special representative despite largely residing in Canada.

Al-Masri said the president's son's bid for a seat "indicates a trend towards dynastic succession", which is "extremely dangerous for Fatah, the Palestinian Authority and the Palestinian cause".