Israel flights to Dubai could stop over security disagreements

Flights between and Israel and Dubai could be halted within the week as a result of disputes over security arrangements.

Senior Israeli officials told Israel's Walla News that flights to Dubai could stop on 8 February after the Shin Bet intelligence service, which handles security for Israel's airports, raised concerns about the security of the journeys.

Shin Bet cited an upcoming decision by Dubai to change the city airport's security arrangements on that day, according to the report. They claimed, however, that the dispute was not "political" and was purely a technical issue

"In recent months, disputes have been discovered at the security level between the competent bodies in Dubai and the Israeli aviation security system, in a way that does not allow the realisation of the responsibility for the security of Israeli aviation," said Shin Bet.

The security service also said that, should the flights to Dubai be halted, it will look into the possibility of rerouting the flights to Abu Dhabi. 

The dispute marks a wobble in the relationship between the two sides, which signed a normalisation agreement in 2020.