A statement issued by Flydubai Airlines – today, Thursday – stated that it will resume its flights to Iran, Iraq, Israel and Jordan, starting tomorrow, Friday, October 4th.
Last Monday, the Emirati company announced the extension of the suspension of its flights to and from Rafic Hariri International Airport in the Lebanese capital, Beirut, until October 3, coinciding with the escalation of Israeli attacks on Lebanon.
Since last September 23, Flydubai suspended its flights to Beirut due to the existing tensions, before extending its decision until the 30th of the same month, and then until October 3, but it did not announce the resumption of its flights to Beirut.
Most international airlines have suspended their flights to and from Beirut since last Monday, while Middle East Airlines (the Lebanese national carrier) has maintained its existing flights and added new flights to meet the high demand for travel from Lebanon.
Since October 8, 2023, Lebanese and Palestinian factions in Lebanon, most notably Hezbollah, have exchanged daily bombardments with the Israeli army across the dividing Blue Line, resulting in a total of at least 1,800 martyrs, including children and women, and about 9,000 wounded.
International companies
The skies over Iraq, Jordan, Palestine, Israel, Lebanon, and Iran appear almost empty of passing flights from east to west and vice versa, according to the “Flight Radar 24” website, which tracks global air traffic.
On the other hand, most international airlines have taken somewhat distant shipping routes to avoid tensions in the Middle East, whose skies witness constant flights of Israeli warplanes and missiles between the parties to the conflict.
In the face of tensions resulting from the genocide committed by Israel in the Gaza Strip a year ago, airlines linking Europe to the Middle East and South Asia were forced to fly a more circuitous route using Egyptian and Saudi airspace.
The Middle East has long been a global crossroads for air travel, with hundreds of planes crossing the region every day on long-haul flights linking the United States, Europe and Asia.
But traveling on these routes has become more challenging, as increasing tensions have forced airlines to reduce services as a safety precaution, at a time when the Israeli war in Gaza and Lebanon has added more complications to flying between East and West.
This week was the most avoided of Iranian, Lebanese, and Israeli airspace in particular, and the avoidance of shipping lines over the region coincided with dozens of international airlines suspending their flights to Israel, Lebanon, and Iran, and to a lesser extent to Jordan and Iraq, due to the escalation of confrontations.
Change paths
According to the “Flight Radar 24” website, British Airways, Emirates Airlines, Lufthansa and other airlines have begun diverting services away from Iraqi airspace since the beginning of this October.
This change in shipping lines came after Israel announced that missiles were fired at it from Iran, as many companies switched to flying via Saudi Arabia and over the Sinai Peninsula.
The Dutch airline KLM said – in a statement – that it had rerouted some of its flights and avoided the airspace of Iran, Iraq and Jordan.
Flying on shipping lines far from direct routes is expensive for airlines, in terms of fuel consumption and flight duration, in addition to causing chaos in the take-off and landing times of many flights.
