Israel reopens airspace after 7-hour suspension due to Iranian attack

JERUSALEM

Israel reopened on Sunday its airspace to the movement of civilian aircraft after a suspension that lasted for several hours due to the Iranian overnight attack on Israeli territory.

“The airspace was opened to civil aviation traffic following its suspension for seven hours,” said the Israeli Public Broadcasting Corporation.

It also reported that “Ben Gurion International Airport in Tel Aviv resumed departing and arriving air traffic.”

Meanwhile, the Flight Radar 24 website which tracks civil aviation traffic globally showed a number of aircraft crossing over Israeli airspace at around 0515GMT.

However, the majority of airlines still use the air corridors over northern Egyptian Sinai and over Turkish airspace as their route as tensions continue between Tehran and Tel Aviv.

Iran began an airborne attack Saturday against Israel in retaliation for an April 1 airstrike on its diplomatic facility in the Syrian capital. The strike killed at least seven members of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, including two top generals.

Tehran has accused Israel of carrying out the attack and vowed to respond. Tel Aviv has not officially claimed responsibility for the attack but it has for months carried out several strikes against Iranian targets across Syria.

Iran and Hezbollah, its main ally in Lebanon, have said the attack will not go unpunished.

* Writing by Ikram Kouachi