In view of the cross-border escalation with the Lebanese Hezbollah group, ten foreign airlines canceled their flights to Israel on Sunday.
According to Israeli public broadcaster KAN, major airlines, including Air France and Dutch Transavia, have suspended operations in Israel.
Other airlines that canceled flights include Hungary’s Wizz Air, Malta-based Corendon, Ethiopian Airlines, Greece’s Aegean Airlines and Greece’s Universal Airlines.
Air France, which canceled its flights between Paris and Tel Aviv, was one of the few major international airlines still operating in Israel.
Since late July, 20 international airlines have canceled flights to Israel as fears grow of a possible regional war in the Middle East.
Israeli warplanes launched more than 40 airstrikes on southern Lebanon early Sunday, the heaviest attack since cross-border attacks with Hezbollah began on October 8, 2023. The Israeli army claimed the strikes were aimed at preventing an impending Hezbollah attack.
For its part, the Lebanese group said it had fired hundreds of rockets and drones deep into Israel in the “first phase” of its response to the assassination of its commander, Fouad Shukr, in Beirut last month.
Since October 8, 2023, Hezbollah has been engaged in daily exchanges of fire with the Israeli army on the Lebanese-Israeli border, resulting in hundreds of casualties, most of them on the Lebanese side.
The escalation comes against the backdrop of a brutal Israeli war in the Gaza Strip, which has seen more than 40,400 Palestinians killed since October 7 last year following a Hamas attack. The military operation has left large parts of the area in ruins and most people homeless, hungry and vulnerable to disease.
