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Airlines Suspend Flights as Middle East Tensions Rise

The empty arrival hall at the The Beirut-Rafic Hariri International Airport, in Beirut, Lebanon, 03 October 2024. EPA/WAEL HAMZEH
The empty arrival hall at the The Beirut-Rafic Hariri International Airport, in Beirut, Lebanon, 03 October 2024. EPA/WAEL HAMZEH
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Airlines Suspend Flights as Middle East Tensions Rise

The empty arrival hall at the The Beirut-Rafic Hariri International Airport, in Beirut, Lebanon, 03 October 2024. EPA/WAEL HAMZEH
The empty arrival hall at the The Beirut-Rafic Hariri International Airport, in Beirut, Lebanon, 03 October 2024. EPA/WAEL HAMZEH

Concerns over a wider conflict in the Middle East have prompted international airlines to suspend flights to the region or to avoid affected air space.
Below are some of the airlines that have adjusted services to and from the region:
AEGEAN AIRLINES The Greek airline canceled flights to and from Beirut until Nov. 6 and to and from Tel Aviv until Nov. 5.
AIRBALTIC Latvia's airBaltic canceled flights to and from Tel Aviv until Oct. 31.
AIR ALGERIE The Algerian airline suspended flights to and from Lebanon until further notice.
AIR EUROPA The Spanish airline canceled flights to Tel Aviv until Oct. 20.
AIR FRANCE-KLM Air France extended its suspension of Paris-Tel Aviv flights until Oct. 22 and Paris-Beirut flights until Oct. 26. KLM extended the suspension of flights to Tel Aviv until the end of this year at least. The Franco-Dutch group's low-cost unit Transavia canceled flights to and from Tel Aviv, Amman and Beirut until end-March.
AIR INDIA The Indian flag carrier suspended flights to and from Tel Aviv until further notice.
BULGARIA AIR The Bulgarian carrier canceled flights to and from Israel until Oct. 31.
CATHAY PACIFIC Hong Kong-based Cathay Pacific canceled flights to Tel Aviv until Oct. 25, 2025.
DELTA AIR LINES The US carrier paused flights between New York and Tel Aviv through March 2025.
EASYJET The UK budget airline stopped flying to and from Tel Aviv in April and will resume flights on March 30.
EGYPTAIR The Egyptian carrier on Sept. 24 suspended flights to Beirut until "the situation stabilizes".
EMIRATES UAE's state-owned airline canceled flights to Beirut through Oct. 31 and flights to Baghdad and Tehran until Oct. 23. Basra flights were set to resume from Oct. 17.
ETHIOPIAN AIRLINES The Ethiopian carrier suspended flights to Beirut until further notice, it said in a Facebook post on Oct. 4.
FLYDUBAI The Emirati airline suspended Dubai-Beirut flights until Oct. 31, a flydubai spokesperson said.
IAG IAG-owned British Airways canceled flights to and from Tel Aviv through Oct. 26.
IAG's low-cost airline Iberia Express canceled flights to Tel Aviv until Oct. 31, while Vueling canceled operations to Tel Aviv until Jan. 12 and to Amman until further notice.
IRAN AIR The Iranian airline canceled Beirut flights until further notice.
IRAQI AIRWAYS The Iraqi national carrier suspended flights to Beirut until further notice.
ITA AIRWAYS The Italian carrier extended the suspension of Tel Aviv flights through Nov. 30.
LOT The Polish flag carrier canceled flights to Tel Aviv until Oct. 26, while its first scheduled flight to Beirut is planned for April 1.
LUFTHANSA GROUP The German airline group suspended flights to Tel Aviv and Tehran until Oct. 31 and to Beirut until Nov. 30.
It will not use Iranian and Iraqi airspace until further notice, aside from a corridor used for flights to and from Erbil in Iraqi Kurdistan. Israeli airspace will not be used until Oct. 31.
SunExpress, a joint venture between Lufthansa and Turkish Airlines, suspended flights to Beirut through Dec. 17.
PEGASUS The Turkish airline canceled flights to Beirut until Oct. 28.
QATAR AIRWAYS The Qatari airline temporarily suspended flights to and from Iraq, Iran and Lebanon, while flights to Amman will operate during daylight hours only.
RYANAIR Europe's biggest budget airline canceled flights to and from Tel Aviv until the end of December. Group CEO Michael O'Leary on Oct. 3 said the suspension was likely to be extended until end-March.
SUNDAIR The German airline canceled flights to Beirut from Berlin until Dec. 8, Bremen until March 26, and Muenster/Osnabrueck until March 29.
UNITED AIRLINES The Chicago-based airline suspended flights to Tel Aviv for the foreseeable future.
TAROM Romania's flag carrier extended the suspension of Beirut flights until Oct. 22.
VIRGIN ATLANTIC The UK carrier extended suspension of Tel Aviv flights until end-March.
WIZZ AIR The Hungary-based airline suspended Tel Aviv flights through Jan. 14.

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World

Huge Power Outage Paralyzes Parts of Spain and Portugal

This photograph shows a flamenco dress factory without light and workers during a massive power cut affecting the entire Iberian peninsula and the south of France, in Seville on April 28, 2025. (AFP)
This photograph shows a flamenco dress factory without light and workers during a massive power cut affecting the entire Iberian peninsula and the south of France, in Seville on April 28, 2025. (AFP)
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Huge Power Outage Paralyzes Parts of Spain and Portugal

This photograph shows a flamenco dress factory without light and workers during a massive power cut affecting the entire Iberian peninsula and the south of France, in Seville on April 28, 2025. (AFP)
This photograph shows a flamenco dress factory without light and workers during a massive power cut affecting the entire Iberian peninsula and the south of France, in Seville on April 28, 2025. (AFP)

A huge power outage hit large parts of Spain and Portugal on Monday, paralyzing traffic, grounding flights, trapping people in elevators and leaving power operators scrambling to restore power to millions of homes and businesses.

Some hospitals halted routine work and the two countries' governments convened emergency cabinet meetings, with officials initially saying a possible cyber-attack could not be ruled out. Outages on such a scale are extremely rare in Europe, and the cause could not immediately be established.

Reuters witnesses said power had started returning to the Basque country and Barcelona areas of Spain in the early afternoon, a few hours after the outage began. It was not clear when power might be more widely restored.

Hospitals in Madrid and Cataluna in Spain suspended all routine medical work but were still attending to critical patients, using backup generators. Several Spanish oil refineries were shut down and retail businesses shut.

The Bank of Spain said electronic banking was functioning "adequately" on backup systems, though residents also reported ATM screens had gone blank.

"I'm in a data center, and everything has gone off. All the alarms popped up, and now we're with the groups, waiting to find out what happened," said Barcelona resident and engineer Jose Maria Espejo, 40.

In a video posted on X, Madrid Mayor Jose Luis Martinez-Almeida urged city residents to minimize their journeys and stay where they were, adding: "It is essential that the emergency services can circulate."

In Portugal, water supplier EPAL said water supplies could also be disrupted, and queues formed at stores by people rushing to purchase emergency supplies like gaslights, generators and batteries.

The main Portuguese electricity utility, EDP, said it had told customers it had no forecast for when the energy supply would be "normalized", Publico newspaper said. It warned it could take several hours.

Parts of France also suffered a brief outage. RTE, the French grid operator, said it had moved to supplement power to some parts of northern Spain after the outage hit.

Play at the Madrid Open tennis tournament was suspended, forcing 15th seed Grigor Dimitrov and British opponent Jacob Fearnley off the court as scoreboards went dark and overhead cameras lost power.

TRAFFIC JAMS

Spanish radio stations said part of the Madrid underground was being evacuated. There were traffic jams in Madrid city center as traffic lights stopped working, Cader Ser Radio station reported.

Hundreds of people stood outside office buildings on Madrid’s streets and there was a heavy police presence around key buildings, directing traffic as well as driving along central atriums with lights, according to a Reuters witness.

One of four tower buildings in Madrid that houses the British Embassy had been evacuated, the witness added.

Local radio reported people trapped in stalled metro cars and elevators.

Portuguese police said traffic lights were affected across the country, the metro was closed in Lisbon and Porto, and trains were not running.

Lisbon's subway transport operator Metropolitano de Lisboa said the subway was at a standstill with people still inside the trains, according to Publico newspaper.

A source at Portugal's TAP Air said Lisbon airport was running on back-up generators, while AENA, which manages 46 airports in Spain, reported flight delays around the country.

Such widespread outages are unusual in Europe. In 2003 a problem with a hydroelectric power line between Italy and Switzerland caused a major outage across the whole Italian peninsula for around 12 hours.

In 2006 an overloaded power network in Germany caused electricity cuts across parts of the country and in France, Italy, Spain, Austria, Belgium, Netherlands and as far as Morocco.