Delta Resuming Flights To Tel Aviv, Israel, As Of April 2025

In October 2023, we saw most international airlines discontinue flights to Israel over safety concerns, following the Hamas terror attacks, and subsequent conflict. While many major airlines tried to resume service to Israel as soon as possible, that just wasn’t practical, given the constantly evolving security situation.

With there now being a ceasefire, it looks like we’re going to finally see US airlines resume service to Israel, as Delta has just announced its plans to resume flights.

Delta will resume New York to Tel Aviv route soon

As of April 1, 2025, Delta plans to resume daily flights between New York (JFK) and Tel Aviv (TLV). Delta last operated service to Israel in July 2024. The route will operate with the following schedule:

DL234 New York to Tel Aviv departing 3:40PM arriving 9:35AM (+1 day)
DL235 Tel Aviv to New York departing 11:35AM arriving 5:00PM

The 5,677-mile flight is blocked at 10hr55min eastbound and 12hr25min westbound. Delta will use an Airbus A330-900neo for the service, featuring 281 seats, including 29 business class seats, 28 premium economy seats, 56 extra legroom economy seats, and 168 economy seats.

Delta claims that the decision to resume Israel flights “follows a comprehensive security review, conducted in close coordination with government and private-sector partners,” and “the airline continues to prioritize the safety of its customers and crews and has implemented additional precautions for operations to and from Tel Aviv.”

I have to imagine that United won’t be very far behind Delta in resuming service to Israel, or might even resume flights around the same time. Historically, United has been by far the biggest US carrier in Israel. I can’t imagine United will hugely shift capacity to Israel immediately, since presumably most planes have been allocated to other routes for the summer season.

Delta & EL AL have an intriguing partnership

With Delta resuming flights to Israel, I can’t help but point out an interesting development we’ve seen in the past couple of years. In June 2023, Delta and EL AL announced a new strategic partnership. Of course the timing of that wasn’t great, since it was supposed to launch in late 2023, around the same time that Delta pulled out of Israel the first time.

As we see more airlines returning to Israel, I’m very curious to see what this partnership looks like in practice, and how Delta evolves its Israel route network in light of this.

Historically, Delta has been heavily focused on joint venture partners and airlines that it invests in, so I wonder if we could see more ties between the two airlines. The partnership between Delta and EL AL has come in handy in recent months, given that EL AL has been the only airline consistently flying between the two countries.

It’s possible that we don’t actually see a whole lot more, and that Delta has simply decided that this is the best way to compete with United in Israel.

Bottom line

Delta will resume daily flights between New York and Tel Aviv as of April 2025. Delta is the first US airline to announce plans to return to Israel following the announcement of the ceasefire, though I have to imagine that United will resume Israel flights soon as well. Given how high airfare has been between the two countries, this should provide some relief.

What do you make of Delta resuming flights to Israel?