Thursday morning’s American Airlines flight from Doha to Philadelphia took off back for the States. That will be the last trip between the U.S. and Qatar on the airline for a bit, as American suspends Doha service due to risks in the region.
American Airlines has made adjustments to its Doha, Qatar (DOH) operation, temporarily suspending flights between DOH and Philadelphia (PHL) until Sunday, June 22. We will continue to monitor the situation with safety and security top of mind and make any additional adjustments as needed.
American Airlines Boeing 787-9
American Airlines flight 120 from Philadelphia to Doha was cancelled on Wednesday, and remains cancelled through Sunday. Additional cancellations may occur.
The U.S. Embassy in Doha on Wednesday issued an alert telling Americans to keep a ‘low profile.’
Out of an abundance of caution and in light of ongoing regional hostilities, the U.S. Embassy has advised its personnel to exercise increased vigilance and has temporarily restricted access to Al Udeid Air Base. We recommend that U.S. citizens in Qatar take similar precautions.
Museum of Islamic Art, Doha
Qatar and Iran co-own the world’s largest gas deposit (North Dome/South Pars), and Qatar has funded the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas. There are interests in Qatar that are both pragmatically and ideologically supportive of Iran, though the country is broadly aligned with the United States and hosts the Al Udeid Air Base.
Israel has been working to take out Iran’s nuclear program, while Iran responds by attacking apartment buildings and hospitals in Israels.
In addition to this morning’s strikes against the Arak Nuclear Complex (IR-40) in Western Iran, the Israeli Air Force also struck dozens of other targets across Iran. Overnight, 40 fighter jets with the Israeli Air Force, at the precise intelligence direction of the Intelligence… pic.twitter.com/QcfMxweeuL
— OSINTdefender (@sentdefender) June 19, 2025
Smokes continues to rise from Soroka Medical Center in the city of Beersheba, after it suffered a direct impact this morning from a ballistic missile fired by Iran against Israel. pic.twitter.com/IX3Ot5aZqG
— OSINTdefender (@sentdefender) June 19, 2025
U.S. involvement in efforts to eliminate Iran’s nuclear weapons capability, and to defend against Iranian missiles, makes Americans a target there despite a strong security situation on the ground overall. And as far as symbols of America, American Airlines is literally named American Airlines and planes have been high profile targets in the past.
Update: United has cancelled its Newark – Dubai flight. Etihad, Emirates, Qatar and Saudia continue to operate.
Will anyone please tell these folks who Akbar is so they can stop yelling?!
And don’t get me started on hummus! Like, what’s the big deal. It’s delicious!
I kid, I keed… Qatar is better anyway. Be safe out there, everyone!
On a more serious note, will United keep its EWR-DXB route, or are they cowards like American? Meh, likewise, Emirates is better anyway.
And for anyone who can’t take a joke, don’t make me depict your prophet. Oh no, blasphemy! Stone him/her, quick!
Iran has no nuclear weapons capability. But we’ve been through this before with the “Saddam has WMDs” misinformation peddlers.
This is something like Netanyahu’s 29th year of saying Iran is on the cusp of having nuclear weapons.
Iran has no nuclear weapons capability. But we’ve been through this before with the “Saddam has WMDs” misinformation peddlers in 2001-2003 when there were no unaccounted for WMDs beyond that already under seal and neutralized at the time.
This is something like Netanyahu’s 29th year of saying Iran is on the cusp of having nuclear weapons. Netanyahu just likes making more and more countries around SW Asia and North Africa into basket cases if they can’t be made and kept as tinpot dictatorship banana republics.
@GUWonder — Let’s hope they don’t have WMDs yet (key word, ‘yet’), and thanks to Israel (and the US), Iran won’t ever, and ideally it’s people will be freed from the theocratic dictatorship, soon. Oh, and Putin and Xi are about to lose an ally. Honestly, even liberals should be able to get behind all this. Besides, think of all the jobs the meteor will bring! (It’s… ‘Do’ Look Up, this time). “I don’t think that’s a porpoise…” (It’s a Bunker Buster!!)
The wealthy Gulf states (Qatar, UAE, Saudi) should all be in favor of toppling the Iranian Shia fundamentalists to their East. Even Pakistan is majority Sunni. And enough of the proxies already (Hamas must be eliminated, Assad already fled to Moscow, Hezbollah’s pagers got buzzed, and the Houthis hardly exist). C’mon fellas, let’s actually finish this once and for all. Then we can build more Dubais and Dohas around the region. I say, there should be a new era of prosperity for the moderates. See, they promise they’ll let the women drive this time!
Qatar is a country of terrorists – They have invested huge amounts of money in the United States educational system, buying access and brainwashing our kids – Look at the congressional hearings on antisemitism on campus’s – Almost all of it is funded by Qatar either directly or indirectly – The “Choices” program from Brown University was funded by Qatar, this program is used in the majority of our k-12 schools to teach anti-semitism and anti-Israel bias – This is not an opinion, this is fact. By supporting the Muslim Brotherhood, a KNOWN terrorist organization that is outlawed in the moderate Arab world Qatar is blatantly shown their real views. Money buys influence, Qatar has money – The best thing the US could do is cut relations with Qatar, move our base out of Qatar and establish it somewhere else in the Middle East (Gaza???) – Israel is fighting a battle for the freedom of the west- This is not just Israels fight, it should be all of ours – There is NO reason I should have to carry a firearm to protect myself just because I am Jewish – These extremists must be dealt with and the Iranian regime must be toppled with the Crown Prince taking control
@Scrappy — I mean, Qatar certainly sold me on Qsuite. And it seems they ‘bought’ AG Bondi. Hope #47 got his 747, because I think he’s about to disappoint Qatar, if they aren’t on-board with taking out the current regime in Iran. Wacka wacka!
@1990: Saudi despises Iran, to the point where it wouldn’t surprise me if they actually helped Israel without telling anyone. The UAE doesn’t like the Iranian regime but takes a publicly neutral stance. As for Qatar, they like to play both ends of the field. They host large US military bases yet are somewhat friendly with Iran’s mullahs too. It’s a complicated region.
That said, AA are pussies for suspending flights to Doha. There, I said it.
So, y’all would boarding a flight and fly through airspace that has missiles whizzing around like mosquitoes? You do you.
You may be okay with that but no reasonable business would take that risk, or did everyone forget Malaysia Airlines flight 17 getting shot down by a missile?
Regardless of where one stands on what’s happening over there, commercial airlines have no business flying around in such a volatile situation. I’m sure they’re taking precautions but this could turn into a regional conflict quickly.
@GUWonder – “Iran has no nuclear weapons capability.” Technically accurate, as far as we know. They are clearly trying to build one. IAEA declared Iran in violation of its safeguards agreement. The UN says it has lost track of Iran’s near-weapons grade uranium.
What to do here is genuinely hard. I am largely a non-interventionist. But it is not honest to compare this to Iraq and weapons of mass destuction or simply say Iraq does not (today) have nukes and leave it at that.
@1990 – United has cancelled EWR-DXB
There is no crown prince in Iran. There is the US-residing former crown prince of Iran who is a Netanyahu and Trump kiss-up and hopes that the US and Israel destroy the theocratic regime in Iran no matter how many Iranians get killed and maimed. He is just a man-child who wants to have a throne in Iran since he never got to be king and only got to play king in his own imagination.
All the armchair generals have great solutions as to how Israel, the U.S. or the West can “win” (or at least end) the problems in this region. Having studied the area for decades, visited several times and crossed it overland from one end to the other (France to Nepal in quieter times) I doubt any outsider can change things much for the better. Sure getting rid of the fundamentalist government in Tehran would be a blessing for the people, but it is not going to happen because an outside power demands it, real change comes from within.
Basically the people in this area have long, long memories. In Kabul my host showed me a road and proudly talked about how “they” beat Alexander here. Evidence of the Crusaders, the thought of their extreme violence and eventual defeat is evident in the Levant, and the US/UK overthrow of the Iranian government in 1953 is well remembered there, and until America realizes that this deep historical background can’t be ignored, we won’t improve things. (Incidentally the same mistake occurred in Vietnam where 2000 years of the people fighting invaders was ignored.)
And so getting rid of the terrible dictator Saddam, who kept a lid on things led to chaos (and ISIS). Then in an illustration of madness helping do the same with Gaddafi led to exactly the same result. Bombing a country of 91 million (plus many more abroad, including 10% of Qatar’s population) with a strong fundamentalist branch of Islam is not going to make friends. But it sure it will make more enemies who will fight back every way they can, and we have a lot of exposed bases there as well as narrow and vulnerable oil routes.
And remember, we already are seen as acting on behalf of a small nation that lets its people occupy the West Bank. (It put 2 million in the cage of Gaza and then was surprised that some acted like animals, and how’s that little bombing campaign going?) Israel most likely has its own atomic bombs and would use them as a last resort too. So while stopping Iran from building their own ones would be a good thing (thought Trump killed a program designed to do just that) they still will have the knowledge, the raw materials and even more anger to do it again. Maybe they will get help from North Korea or somebody, or just use the fissile material in dirty bombs. A little time is bought but the level of tension has also gone way up.
For the U.S., getting away from the endless excitement of this region and doing everything possible to cut the use of foreign (and eventually domestic) oil are logical strategies. However logic does not apply to this administration. So not making things worse is the best we can hope for.
@GUWonder – sounds like a familiar profile of a few autocrats and would-be despots looking to feed their fragile toxically masculine egos.
I’m reminded of the phrase “if women ruled the world…” but then the entire military industrial complex would likely collapse. War is, after all, good for business.
Thank you for the clarification, Gary.
Welp, this is a first… @AngryFlier and I are in agreement for the most part.
@Parker — Look at FlightAware or any other flight radar; no one is flying near Israel-Iraq-Iran; or Ukraine; or the Himalayas. Seems reasonable. Quite different than MH17. Also, DOH and DXB are still accessible via Saudi airspace, so I think UA and AA are cowards here. Glad QR and EK are still flying like a normal Thursday. Good for them. They’ll still get my business.
@1990 great…then I’m sure you’d be happy to line up for a flight into the region. Don’t worry. You’ll be safe. Flyover over Saudi Arabia, a country known to sponsor terrorists and murder people who speak out against their government seem perfectly safe. What could go wrong? And god knows the countries bombing the hell out of each other have never screwed up and hit a civilian target, ship or aircraft. You seem to be under the impression that war is clean and there is no collateral damage.
Americans have no…absolutely zero business being in that part of the world right now. I just watched the news this morning and saw Americans WHO TOOKS THEIR KIDS over to parts of the region smack dab in the middle of this conflict and are now whining that they can’t safely exit the region and the US is not helping. All these people think it’s totally fine to make irresponsible, stupid choices, subject their children to unbelievable risk and then expect the US to come rescue them.
Somehow it’s safer to take kids to war-torn regions than it is to a drag show…just ask the governors of Florida and Texas.
“Israel has been working to take out Iran’s nuclear program, while Iran responds by attacking apartment buildings and hospitals in Israels.”
Excuse me. Just how many hospitals did Israel destroy so far in Gaza?
what about QATAR flights from ORD to Doha or, Etihad ot Emirate flights to and from ORD?
Now, DOH – PHL and back cancelled until June 26. Through June 25 confirmed.