Airlines Boost Flights From Israel Ahead of Summer Peak and Jewish Holidays

Foreign and Israeli airlines are expanding their operations at Ben Gurion Airport in preparation for the peak summer travel season and the upcoming Jewish holidays of Tishrei. This includes adding flights, increasing frequencies, and offering more seats to destinations across Europe, North America, and the Far East. Israeli carriers are also preparing for high demand in August and September, with Israir relaunching its subsidized route to Eilat.

The Lufthansa Group, which includes Lufthansa, Swiss, Austrian Airlines, Brussels Airlines, and Eurowings, announced it will operate about 67 weekly flights to and from Israel in September, up from 54 weekly flights in August. Lufthansa will run two daily flights each on the Frankfurt-Tel Aviv and Munich-Tel Aviv routes. Swiss will double its Israel operations with two daily Zurich-Tel Aviv flights. Austrian Airlines will maintain two daily Vienna-Tel Aviv flights and add a third flight on select days. Brussels Airlines resumed daily Brussels-Tel Aviv flights and plans three weekly flights in September. Eurowings will continue four weekly flights from Israel, three to Dusseldorf and one to Hamburg.

Israeli airlines are also increasing summer flights. El Al, operating about 900 weekly flights to over 50 destinations, added 7-8 extra flights to Tokyo in August and reached a peak of 55 weekly flights to North America, including up to seven daily flights to New York. Arkia introduced its new Boeing 787-900 Dreamliner earlier this week to boost flights to New York, Paris, and Amsterdam during August and September.

Israir has increased its flights to Eilat to five daily flights from early morning until late evening. This route is subsidized by the Israeli government with a 10 million shekel annual grant, requiring Israir to offer 40 seats per flight to Eilat residents at a discounted fare of 99 shekels one way.