Lufthansa, Swiss and Austrian will be the first European airlines to return to Israel

Lufthansa Group airlines will be the first among European airlines to resume flights to Tel Aviv. They will starting next Jan. 8, initially with a frequency of 20 weekly connections, amounting to about 30 percent of the regular schedule.

Lufthansa, Swiss and Austrian Airlines Had disrupted flights to Israel's main air port last Oct. 9, two days after the attack carried out has Hamas in the south of the country, in which 1,200 Israeli civilians had been killed in a matter of hours. Missile launches from both the Gaza Strip and neighboring areas of Lebanon had led to several air traffic disruptions to and from Ben Gurion Airport in the days following the attack. And the continuing state of war, as well as unsafe conditions for flying had prompted almost all foreign airlines to cancel flights to Tel Aviv indefinitely.

Currently, the only non-Israeli carriers that land and take off from Ben Gurion are FlyDubai, Etihad, Ethiopian Airlines, Air India (to and from Delhi) and China's Hainan Airlines (to and from Shenzen).

The area of fighting in recent weeks has moved further and further south in the Gaza Strip, about 150 kilometers south of the airport, where conditions are of relative safety to the point that on the day of On Sunday, December 17, the national airline El Al operated 61 departures and Israir another 27. But the point is that as the state of conflict persists, passenger traffic between Israel and the rest of the world has been reduced to almost zero and the one put in place by El Al is a kind of 'life line' aimed at averting the country's isolation.

Starting on January 8, at an early stage. Lufthansa will operate four weekly flights from Frankfurt and three weekly flights from Munich, thus ensuring a daily connection between Israel and Germany. Swiss will operate five weekly flights from Zurich and Austrian eight weekly flights from Vienna. All 20 connections will be operated with A320 family aircraft.

"Safety is always our priority and Lufthansa Group is in close contact with local and international authorities to have constant monitoring of safety conditions in Israel. Therefore," a group note explained, "flight schedules and operating days may be subject to change given the changing conditions in the country of destination.

On the day of Friday, December 15 Lufthansa, Swiss and Eurowings have resumed flights from Germany and Switzerland to Beirut, Lebanon, which had been discontinued similarly to those for Tel Aviv.