The U.S. State Department says that starting Friday it will offer charter flights out of Israel to Europe to help evacuate Americans who wish to leave. Flights will operate to Athens and Frankfurt, while they also plan boat trips from Haifa to Cyprus.
The Wall Street Journal‘s Alison Sider asked during Delta’s third quarter earnings call this morning, “would Delta be open to flying Israel under a charter if the government asks..?”
And Delta’s CEO Ed Bastian replied “we don’t have any plans to be flying into Israel. It’s considered unsafe for a U.S. carrier to operate in that airspace currently.” He said Delta would add flights to Europe, not to Israel.
The American Airlines pilots union told pilots not to fly to Israel – even as American was operating an evacuation flight for employees and non-revenue travelers.
Delta will add flights to Europe. United has announced additional flights to Athens. Who will operate the flights out of Tel Aviv? Approximately 17,000 requests to the U.S. government have been submitted for assistance in leaving Israel. Most commercial airlines have stopped flying to Tel Aviv. British Airways turned a flight around during its approach, as rockets launched, and announced the cancellation of its flights.
There are plenty of charter operators, and Tel Aviv to Athens is less than 750 miles. The number of operators capable of performing that service is incredibly large. Nonetheless it will be very interesting to see what carrier picks up the mission.
Ross Feinstein points out that so far it appears TUS Airways of Cyprus is operating a Tel Aviv – Athens charter flight on Friday.
Perhaps an Emirates A380 can be chartered to fly from TLV to Athens
Funny how first all these people were happy to go an steal other’s land and settle in illegal settlements, but now are running with their tails between their legs back to the US
It may end up that the Air Force will send in some transport aircraft to get those Americans wanting to leave. They’d probably take them to Germany, Italy, etc. and transfer them to commercial carriers.
And what about the hundreds of Americans stuck in Gaza that are stuck there because of the Israeli blockade of all of Gaza’s borders and the shutdown of all exit points? When will the American kids stuck in Gaza be allowed to evacuate with their accompanying relatives?
The federal government can make it a CRAF mission and airlines have to fly civilians out or they will be breach of contract. Airlines wont want to lose the contract so they would fly the rescue missions.
Alan,
It’s a very human instinct for people to want to get their relatives to where they think it is safe for their families. People should not be disparaged for seeking safety.
El Al or other airlines that are willing to fly in a war zone can carry passengers to transit locations. US carriers can take it from there.
Neither the US or Britain will require their civilian airlines to operate in a war zone where they are the highest profile targets.
This will have a very negative impact on Israeli tourism that will take years to overcome. Delta has only committed to cancelling until Oct 31. AA and UA have already made the decision to withdraw for a much longer period or indefinitely.
US practice for arranged evacuation flights is to stick the bill to the evacuated Americans (and any accompanying non-American relatives). We can thank Ronald Reagan for the ramp up of the “user fee” mentality even for the evacuation of Americans.
The most straightforward approach is ground transportation to Jordan. Exactly which route is running and visa requirements may vary. However, the locals in Jordan seem to have an opinion on Israel which does not match the government’s view. From Jordan, there are (or have been) direct flights to the US. The information I saw was quite dated (9 years ago), but at the time there was direct bus service from Nazareth to Amman, but none from Tel Aviv.
Germany and various other European countries are using Jordan to get their nationals out of the area by road. But they, like we, can’t get our nationals out of Gaza because the Israelis made sure to not let even the young kids out of Gaza and we have a general prohibition on US Government personnel going into Gaza to push the issue.
Blinken knows we have American kids stuck in Gaza, but what will he and his boss Biden do before it’s too late when even so many Israeli generals, current and former, are game to level Gaza.
Why would the government not utilize MAC flights? They moved large numbers of troops all over the world. I flew on many of them. They wouldn’t land in a hot LZ but we went to many points in the Middle East.
Germany and various other European countries are using Jordan to get their nationals out of the area by road. But they, like we, can’t get our nationals out of Gaza because the Israelis made sure to not let even the young kids out of Gaza. And we have a general prohibition on US Government personnel going into Gaza so going there to push the issue is a no go.
Blinken knows we have American kids stuck in Gaza, but what will he and his boss Biden do before it’s too late in this environment where current and former Israeli generals are game to level Gaza.
Canada sent military aircraft today to evacuate their citizens. Two flights operated today to Athens and Air Canada is operating onward flights from Athens to Toronto and Montreal.
@GUWonder: How would you propose that just young kids be evacuated from Gaza?
They are pushing the Palestinians from Gaza into Egypt. Now water/power/food. What other choice do the Palestinians have?
The U.S. is negotiating with Egypt at present, no doubt as to the amount of aid we’ll provide.
Once out, Gaza, it’s tunnels and its munitions will be blasted into oblivion. Gaza will look like a parking lot. And rightly so.
@ Alan: From whom were the lands supposedly stolen? There was never a Palestine.
Pilots are available from Jihad Airlines
1k Brad,
The IDF repeatedly shot up around Rafah to drive people — young kids included — away from escaping into Egypt. That crossing won’t be open unless the Israelis allow it. About the Egyptians not wanting it open either, well let’s see how long that Saudi-Israeli suck-up Sissi dictator can keep Egyptians in line on working with Israel to block out people crossing from Gaza, but he’s going to blink if Blinken and Biden tell him to do so. But Biden and Blinken are showing they are in election mode and not leadership mode, so Sissi is safe in working with the Israelis to let kids in Gaza to get massacred under pretense of being “collateral damage” to filter out Hamas.
I believe once the Israeli made the war declaration, all bets were off for U.S
flagged civil carrier evacuation flights due to the terms of hull insurance.
There was a Palestine, and it’s why the British, the French and others — including even that terrorist-turned-Israeli-Prime Minister Shamir — signed documents mentioning Palestine even while advancing the agenda to create the modern state of Israel as a Jewish homeland to settle people from Europe mainly.
@ GUWonder: Afraid not. There was never a Palestinian state. Every time discussions got underway to provide one, the religion of love and peace assassinated someone.
@ GUWonder: “The IDF repeatedly shot up around Rafah to drive people — young kids included — away from escaping into Egypt.”
Again, incorrect. Egypt has closed the border. Until it is paid by the U.S., Egypt has no intention of opening it. None of those people (and young kids) were getting through at this point no matter what Israel did.
The IDF did not “shot up.” It launched missiles into the no mans land between Gaza and Egypt to stop any movement of water, food, and fuel from Egypt into Gaza. That’s what a blockade does.
@GUWonder: “There was a Palestine”
No, there was never country called “Palestine”. Read the history, please, before you state such non-sense. There was never a country with this name; this land was occupied by many people, and it belonged to many countries (Britain, Ottomans, etc.), going back thousands of years. But never was there an entity called “Palestine”.
And before you ask, “Palestinians” are just Arabs. Their leader, Arafat, like many of them, was born in Egypt. The concept of “Palestinians” was literally invented in the 1960’s by the Soviets.
There are different ways to shoot up a place, and shooting up a place is not limited to just being hit by projectiles unleashed by guns.
The Israelis want the open air prison of Gaza to be locked down as an open air prison, and so it is locked down while they’ve been leveling the place with no real safe place for escape for even the Palestinian children.
Gaza was considered to be hell for kids even before this year: That hell has become more hellish because of the Israeli military’s leveling of Gaza by violent military means is more an act of wild wrath than of justice free from the kind of brutal communal punishment approach that would make Hafez Al-Assad and Saddam Hussein feel like Israel is now their home and Gaza the home of the Kurds.
Gennady, you’re peddling misinformation like Netanyahu and his buddy, your Lord Trump.
Netanyahu finally got around to ditching his bromance with Putin, but Netanyahu only did this because of Hamas’
atrocities this past weekend. This just goes to show how rotten Netanyahu is — so rotten that he stood with Putin until Hamas split the Netanyahu-Putin bromance.
A bit of history for some:
1,000 yrs before Romans controlled this land (which some call “Palestine” today), the Egyptians called the people who came to live there “peleset” (meaning, “sea people”). Because they came from the Mediterranean, from around today’s Greece.
The term later changed to “philishtims”, then “Philistine”. That’s what Assyrians called them, then Chaldean, then Seleucids.
When Romans took over this area, they destroyed the 2nd Temple (in 70 AD), and exiled the Jews. They totally razed Jerusalem, built a new city in its place, called “Aelia Capitolina”, and named the land “Palestine” (from “Philistine”).
@GUWonder – Gaza was made into an open air prison, hell as you describe it, by Hamas. Israel left the place, completely, in 2005. Hamas won elections the next year, and has been running (ruining) it ever since. Israel, for humanitarian reasons, has been supplying them with water, electricity, fuel, etc. In return, all Israel got was rockets raining on civilians.
Gazan have no one but themselves and Hamas to blame for their current condition.
And BTW, it’s Egyptians who have closed the Rafah crossing, because they don’t want their “brethren” to come to Egypt.
Egypt is ruled by the Saudi-Israeli suck-up dictator Sissi who’s paid for and bought by Uncle Sam and Sheikh Your Oil Booty. When at least two of these three counties make a given demand of Egypt/Sissi, he does it like an obedient lap-dog.
It was the US and EU-backed UN Secretary-General that has called Gaza hell for kids even years before this month’s atrocities in the Israel.
Israel has cut off the food and water and electricity this week. It’s attacked the fishing port to cut off escape that way. It has repeatedly attacked at the Rafah crossing in such a way that American and European passport holders have no way out from Gaza. In the meantime much of Europe is cracking down further on What remains of freedom of speech, assembly and expression, so we shouldn’t really be surprised that freedom for even innocent civilians to leave to their home
countries in “the West” has been eliminated with prejudice.
Egypt doesn’t want the Palestinians. They’ve never wanted them. Egypt relinquished it’s claim to Gaza as soon as Israel made a claim on it–the objective never was to make it part of Egypt, but rather to deny it to the Palestinians. The same thing happened with the West Bank and Jordan.
Yes, there are a lot of unwilling people trapped in Gaza–but it’s Hamas who is trapping them as human shields.
Saying “there never was a Palestine” is like saying there never was a Tibet. It ignores centuries of history of indigenous people living in a place with that name. Otherwise, how was there a Mandate for Palestine passed by the UN in 1918? Palestine predates Israel.
@GU Wonder – why are you not complaining about Egypt closing its border to Gaza? Should Israel who was just mercilessly attacked, continue to leave the border open for more to come in?
According to @Tim Dunn’s latest manifesto on OMAAT, TQO is the next DL mega hub. They announced a single flight before AA/UA, so that makes them smarter than any airline management team on the planet. He’s already moved passed JFK-HND that we’ve heard him ramble on for the last 2 months…. so Stockholm-ish comments like “Delta has only committed to cancelling until Oct 31.” shouldn’t come as a surprise as all of the rest of his “theories” have gone kaput.
@Ahmed – “Mandate for Palestine” was League of Nations directive to assign territory, which for previous 400 yrs belonged to Ottoman Empire, to Britain. The objective of the mandate was to provide “administrative advice and assistance … until such time as they are able to stand alone”. In Palestine, the Mandate required Britain to create “national home for the Jewish people”, alongside the Palestinian Arabs. As we all know, Israel was created in May of 1948, but the Arabs never did form their country. Instead, they attacked Israel.
There was Palestine, like Tibet – but never a country named “Palestine” (nor “Tibet”, for that matter). It’s an area.
Read my post above, please, to see why it was called that, when and by whom.
I am guessing the airline’s insurance policies will not cover aircraft flying into a warzone. The US can use some of its lift capacity as it did in Afghanistan and fly citizens to Doha, Istanbul, or Athens where they can grab a commercial flight.
@Ahmed:
> Saying “there never was a Palestine” is like saying there never was a Tibet. It ignores centuries of history of indigenous people living in a place with that name. Otherwise, how was there a Mandate for Palestine passed by the UN in 1918? Palestine predates Israel.
“Palestine” existed, but it was a region, not a country. The comparison shouldn’t be with “Tibet” but “Himalayas”. It’s a considerably bigger region than the terrorists are trying to claim, but much of it has been split off into other Arab nations.