Israel’s main international airport resumed operations Sunday morning after briefly closing due to Israel’s preemptive strike on Hezbollah targets in Lebanon in the early hours.
Ben-Gurion International Airport reopened at 7:00 a.m. local time, but many flights were delayed or canceled due to the pre-dawn attack, and disruptions were expected to continue throughout the day.
Some international flights were rerouted to Larnaca, Cyprus, or to Cairo, Egypt, while other Israeli-operated flights landed in a southern Israeli airfield during the temporary early-morning closure.
Several international carriers that were scheduled to fly to Israel on Sunday, including Air France, Ethiopian Airlines, the Hungarian–based budget carrier Wizz Air and Greece’s Aegean Airlines canceled flights to and from Tel Aviv amid the uncertain security situation.
The airport, which was closed at about 5:00 a.m., had initially been scheduled to reopen only at 11:00 a.m.
About 50,000 passengers had been expected to pass through the airport Sunday, divided equally among departing and arriving flights, and by late morning Ben-Gurion was again bustling.
Most flights will take off from Tel Aviv today as scheduled, said Ben-Gurion Airport Managing Director Udi Bar-Oz, but passengers should check with their airline before coming to the airport.
“It will be a complicated day. We suggest passengers keep updated with their airline companies and come to the airport three hours before their flight,” said Bar-Oz.
All three major U.S. legacy carriers are currently not flying to Israel.
