Airlines rush to fill Israel vacuum left by Ryanair

While the Irish low-cost airline has no plans to return to Israel, other carriers have introduced flights on Ryanair’s former Tel Aviv routes.

Ryanair is not showing the slightest signs of resuming flights to Israel. The controversial Irish low-cost Airline, which provides minimal services to keep fares as low as possible, operated 16 routes from Tel Aviv last year including five routes to Italy alone: Rome, Naples, Venice, Turin, and Bari, and was a major reason for keeping fares low to Italy. In its absence, Israeli and foreign airlines are already seizing the opportunity and aiming to take over the routes to Italy.

El Al subsidiary Sun Dor announced last week that it will begin operating flights to Cagliari and Catania starting at the end of May. About a month ago, the company announced additional flights to Naples from April. This is in addition to the routes El Al already operates to Rome, Venice and Milan. Wizz Air is also expanding in southern Italy: about two weeks ago, the company announced additional flights from Tel Aviv to Palermo, after already adding a route to Venice in December and to Naples in October.

Israeli-owned airlines have also entered the Israel-Italy fray. Blue Bird will soon launch a route to Milan, and TUS Airways plans to add a route to Bologna. In December, Israir announced that it would launch flights to Bologna and Bari starting in 2026, which would be added to its existing destinations in Italy - Rome, Verona and Naples.

The vacuum left at German airports

Unlike Italy, the vacuum left at secondary airports in Germany - Baden-Baden and Memmingen - to which Ryanair operated flights, has not been filled. Today, these destinations cannot be reached by direct flights from Israel.

easyJet, which is expected to resume Israel flights in April, does not fly to Germany, and as it did not maintain a continuous commitment to the Israeli market throughout the war, might have a change of heart over security concerns., Thus only Israeli companies and Israeli-owned companies still fly to Berlin.

However, another player will operate another German route. Condor Airlines (known for its colorfully striped planes) is expected to begin operating in Israel this May and offer direct flights to Frankfurt. It will join Lufthansa and El Al, which currently operate regular flights on the route. This is in addition to Munich, to where only Lufthansa and Israeli companies operate flights.

In addition, Ryanair also operated a route between Tel Aviv and Vilnius in Lithuania. The companies that are currently filling this vacuum are Wizz Air, which operates flights to Vilnius, as well as Israir and Arkia, which announced additional flights on this route earlier this week.

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The value of Ryanair in Israel cannot be underestimated

The value of Ryanair in Israel cannot be underestimated. Last April, the Irish low-cost carrier resumed flights to Israel for a short time, and was offering some of the lowest fares available, sometimes for less than $50 for a round-trip ticket, with minimal services that are profitable for those who want to fly with only a backpack.

But due to security instability Ryanair halted operations in Israel. The Houthi missile that fell on Ben Gurion Airport in May 2025 and the war with Iran saw all flights cease for months. When Ryanair asked to return, about six months later, it discovered that the takeoff and landing slots that it thought were reserved for it at Terminal 1 had been transferred to other companies. Consequently, a well-publicized conflict developed with the Israel Airports Authority, which insisted that preferential conditions at Ben Gurion Airport are not maintained for those who had halted operations. Ryanair CEO Michael O'Leary even spoke out publicly on the issue, saying that the company was losing patience.

Halting operations in Israel "affected the structure of supply"

Ryanair has since removed Israel from the list of destinations on its website while expanding its flight network. In the Middle East, for example, Ryanair flies to Jordan. It has also expanded its operations to and from key cities across Europe to Jordan, as part of establishing the Hashemite Kingdom as a major destination for low-cost flights to the Middle East. This winter Ryanair has expanded Amman to include 18 direct routes to 12 countries in the EU, and 84 weekly flights in total - a number similar to that operated by the company in Israel.

Assaf Greenberg, VP of Marketing at the website lastminute.co.il, says, "Ryanair's exit from the Israeli market did not create a shortage, but changed the structure of supply. Instead of one low-cost player, we see a dispersion of operations between Wizz Air, Sun Dor, Blue Bird and TUS Airways, which increase frequencies and launch destinations where a vacuum has been created. For the consumer, this translates mainly into competition that allows finding cheap and available alternatives and so it’s worth comparing fares before buying tickets."

Published by Globes, Israel business news - en.globes.co.il - on February 18, 2026.

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