Wizz Air’s $1bn Middle East comeback: Low-cost airline plans Tel Aviv base by April 2026
November 28, 2025
European low-cost airline Wizz Air has confirmed plans to open a new base in Tel Aviv from April next year.
The plans were confirmed by the airline’s CEO, József Váradi, as he paid a visit to Israel this week and spoke to local journalists about the carrier’s plans for the country.
Wizz Air to open a Tel Aviv base in 2026
The question about whether Wizz Air would commit to opening a base at Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion International Airport (TLV) has been circling for some time.
But with the conflict in Gaza delaying progress, along with Wizz Air’s withdrawal from the Middle East with the closure of its Abu Dhabi base back in September, the plans appeared to be on hold.
However, with Váradi’s arrival in Israel on the morning of 27 November, plans for the carrier to open a base in Tel Aviv appeared to be very much back on the agenda. In meetings with the Israeli Minister of Transportation, Miri Regev, Váradi confirmed that Wizz Air still plans to open a base at Ben Gurion Airport as early as April 2026.
As reported by Israeli media outlet Ynet, the new base will come with several A320 family aircraft, dozens of routes, hundreds of new jobs, and an investment of around a billion dollars.
Airline service has been intermittent to Tel Aviv
Since the Hamas attack on 7 October 2023, international flights to Israel have been sporadic at best, with airlines starting and stopping their services unpredictably as the extent of the hostilities fluctuated.
This led to a general lack of consistent competition on international routes into and out of the country, with local airlines EL AL, Israir and Arkia all being accused of colluding to raise prices for passengers as a result.
However, with the US-led ceasefire now in place, and airlines resuming flights to Tel Aviv, Wizz Air has decided that now is the right time to commit to a new base at the airport and is making plans for commencing operations from early next year.
Click here for more air transport news
Wizz Air confirms commitment to the Israel market
Speaking to reporters after holding talks with the Minister, Varadi said that the airline was looking to base up to ten aircraft at the airport and add 50 new routes.
Additionally, the carrier would add 4,000 new jobs in Israel. While about 500 employees will be hired directly by Wizz, the rest will be hired by partners as a result of Wizz Air’s presence.
While Wizz Air currently operates into Tel Aviv from several of its bases across Europe (including Budapest, Larnaca, London Luton, Warsaw, and Bratislava, among others), the airline does not currently base any aircraft there or have a major presence at the airport in terms of staffing.
EL AL and others are not happy
The decision to open a base at Tel Aviv is likely to draw a wave of criticism from the local Israeli airlines. As reported by Aerospace Global News back in August, homegrown national carrier EL AL has been pushing back against Wizz Air’s plans for a Tel Aviv base since earlier this year, saying that a larger presence by the low-cost carrier could be potentially damaging to the country’s aviation sector.
“The plan entails a risk of substantial harm to Israeli airlines in particular and to the State of Israel in general,” stated a letter sent from EL AL’s CEO Dina Ben Tal Ganancia to the Israeli aviation authorities.
“It could lead to negative consequences for national resilience and the safety of the Israeli public on flights from and to Israel,” the letter added.
However, despite the sentiments of the national airline, it has been widely reported that the Israeli government has been courting Wizz Air to open a Tel Aviv base for some time.
Indeed, the Director General of Israel’s Transport Ministry, Moshe Ben Zaken, along with the Director of the Israel Airports Authority, Sharon Kedmi, paid a visit to Wizz Air’s headquarters in Budapest (Hungary), reportedly to finalise plans for the base to go ahead in 2026.
Additionally, governmental departments are said to favour the move as a means of driving economic growth and supporting the country’s fragile aviation ecosystem.
Regev stated at this week’s press conference that the Ministry had been holding talks with the local carriers, along with union representatives and workers’ committees, to protect local jobs and companies.
However, she added that the current situation, where local airlines could fix high fares, was contrary to competition laws in the country and was untenable in the long run.
Meanwhile, Arkia CEO Oz Berlowitz told a reporter from Ynet that, “We oppose Wizz Air’s base, not out of opposition to competition – it already constitutes competition and competition exists.”
“Wizz Air wants to move to an Israeli base for several reasons, including the slots at the airport and the conditions that Israeli companies have. We only ask for one thing-that the conditions that are given to Wizz Air be also given to Israeli companies, because if not, then the Israeli companies will start to disappear”.
Wizz Air returns to the Middle East
Despite Wizz Air having failed to make its base in Abu Dhabi work over a period of two years, after several months of talking about it and ramping up services to Israel, it finally seems that the carrier is ready to commit aircraft and personnel to the Israeli market with the opening of a full base.
This is despite the carrier stating when announcing the closure of the Abu Dhabi base that it intended to concentrate on developing its core European network.
The move will undoubtedly be assisted in terms of spare aircraft by the closure of bases in Abu Dhabi, along with Vienna, which was announced in August. The company has also recently announced the scaling back of its base at London Gatwick due to high costs, which may see more aircraft becoming available across the network.
With a high propensity to travel and relatively high levels of disposable income among the Israeli population, along with a lasting ceasefire, Wizz Air believes that it can make a Tel Aviv base work.
And along with the experience it already has of flying to Israel, paired with the wave of support it is currently riding from key agencies in the country’s government, it could just be right.
Featured image: Wizz Air
