Irish low-cost airline Ryanair has removed Tel Aviv from its online destination map, after previously announcing it would not operate flights to Israel in the 2025–2026 winter season, Hebrew-language daily Maariv reported on Wednesday.
The move leaves the future of the carrier’s operations in Israel unclear and comes with no formal announcement from the airline on whether flights might resume.
According to Maariv, Tel Aviv has been completely removed from the list of destinations on Ryanair’s website, rather than simply marked as suspended.
The change reinforces the company’s earlier decision to freeze all Israeli operations until at least summer 2026, and strengthens concerns in the Israeli aviation market that Ryanair has no concrete plans to resume service.
The company has not issued any new public statement about a permanent withdrawal from Israel, beyond its earlier notifications about suspending flights for the coming winter season. For now, Israeli passengers searching the site will not find Tel Aviv among Ryanair’s destinations at all.
Slots, Terminal 1, and regulatory uncertainty
Ryanair has previously attributed the suspension of its Israel flights to two main factors: the lack of approved slots for the summer 2026 season at Ben-Gurion Airport and uncertainty over the continued operation of Terminal 1, Maariv reported.
The airline stressed that without regulatory clarity on slot allocation and terminal usage, it could not plan its medium-term activity in the Israeli market.
The freeze ahead of winter 2025–2026 led to the cancellation of about 22 direct routes and the loss of roughly one million seats that had been planned for that season, according to the report. That decision significantly reduced low-cost options on several popular European routes from Tel Aviv, adding pressure on the remaining carriers.
Ryanair’s latest step follows months of escalating tension with Israel’s aviation authorities. In late September, The Jerusalem Post reported that the airline would not resume Tel Aviv operations for the winter, saying slot delays and the closure of Terminal 1 had made its Israel program unworkable, while Ben-Gurion Airport rejected that claim and accused the airline of mismanaging its own schedule.
In that report, Ryanair confirmed it was scrapping 22 winter routes to Tel Aviv and shifting capacity to other markets, signaling that Israel had fallen sharply in its internal priorities. The current removal of Tel Aviv from the carrier’s destination map appears to cement that shift, at least for the coming seasons.
Will Ryanair return to Israel?
In September, Ryanair had already warned that it might not return to Israel at all, urging Jerusalem to “get its act together” on aviation regulation and airport operations, according to a separate Jerusalem Post report.
Earlier in the year, the airline also said it had been “forced” to cancel flights to Israel due to circumstances beyond its control, highlighting the security situation and operational challenges foreign airlines faced when flying to Ben-Gurion.
At the same time, other foreign airlines have gradually restored service to Israel following periods of tension and temporary suspensions, with at least 14 carriers announcing a resumption of operations earlier this year.
For now, however, Ryanair’s complete removal of Tel Aviv from its destination map, coupled with the cancellation of 22 routes and about one million planned seats, underlines the scale of its pullback from the Israeli market.