Swelling wage invoice, destructive money move, constrain Airports Authority
Behind the drama in current days at Israel’s foremost gateway, Ben Gurion Airport – the claimed manpower scarcity, strike threats, and cancelled conferences – lies a way more difficult story. Up to now few years, wage prices have taken a rising slice of the income of the Israel Airports Authority, reaching 75% within the first quarter of this yr.
The Israel Airports Authority’s monetary statements reveal a structural failure that deepens from yr to yr, and explains why each request to for larger manpower turns into a tangled monetary drawback, and never simply an operational one.
Is there actually a scarcity of staff?
Final Wednesday, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Minister of Transport Miri Regev, and Ministry of Transport director common Moshe Ben Zaken, visited Ben Gurion Airport. In the middle of the go to, as reported by the Israel Airports Authority, “A presentation was made to the prime minister of the operations of Ben Gurion Airport and the work of 1000’s of staff who work day by day to make sure that the airport capabilities constantly in the summertime season.” However behind the daring statements, sources inform “Globes” that at that occasion the airport staff committee chairperson Pinchas Idan approached the minister of transport and introduced up his calls for regarding the staff. She referred him to the director common of the ministry, who organized a gathering with Idan and the Airports Authority administration for the next day. However Idan didn’t present as much as the assembly, and the remainder is historical past – a day of chaos for vacationers.
When you ask Idan, there was by no means a strike. “No Italian strike and no deliberate sanctions,” he wrote to the prime minister and the minister of transport. “For weeks, we warned many times in each potential discussion board: the bags dealing with system is critically wanting manpower.”
Based on the employees committee, the airport’s workforce is wanting 400-500 folks throughout all divisions: 18 firefighters, 11 operators, 200-300 checking and safety employees, 80 transport staff and 100 sorters. As well as, the committee claims, greater than 100 staff are on navy reserve responsibility, and dozens are absent due to long-term sickness. The committee petitioned the Labor Court docket to shorten shifts formally from 13 to 9 hours.
Examination of the figures reveals a extra advanced image. 2.6 million passengers are anticipated to cross by way of Ben Gurion Airport this August. Altogether, there are 978 baggage sorting and dealing with staff (everlasting and non permanent). In August 2019, extra passengers handed by way of the airport, some 2.8 million, and there have been 976 sorting and dealing with staff. The earlier yr, the variety of passengers in August was 2.7 million, and the variety of sorting and dealing with staff was 975. The employees committee says that through the years gear has been added that makes extra manpower obligatory.
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This summer season, at Idan’s request, some 250 non permanent staff had been added, at a price of NIS 15,000-20,000 every. Based on a supply aware of the small print, one of many disputes is over giving everlasting standing to these staff when the summer season is over.
Detrimental money move
At any charge, with a view to perceive the dialogue slightly higher, and the worth that the Israel Airports Authority pays, we took a deeper dive into the monetary statements and the numbers.
Initially, “Globes” has discovered that between October 7 2023 and the top of June this yr, the Authority had a destructive money move of almost NIS 2 billion.
In 2025, the Authority’s income, which is made up of charges from passengers, airways, and business operations, was NIS 3.7 billion. On the expenditure facet, NIS 1.9 billion went on wages and related funds. Wage prices rose by NIS 218 million, due to recruitment of non permanent staff, implementation of latest labor agreements, and revision of the minimal wage. In brief, wage prices represented 51.3% of the Authority’s income.
Wage prices had been 16% increased than in 2024, after they totaled NIS 1.6 billion. Income that yr was NIS 2.8 billion, such that wage prices represented 57% of it.
In 2019 too, earlier than the outbreak of the Covid pandemic, wage prices had been NIS 1.6 billion, however in that yr income totaled NIS 4.1 billion. In different phrases, wage prices as a proportion of income rose from 39% in 2019 to 51% in 2025. Final yr, due to the decline in income, the Israel Airports Authority issued a NIS 500 million bond.
Within the first quarter of 2026, wage prices rose 2% compared with the corresponding quarter of 2025, to NIS 477 million. Income, in the meantime, fell by 20% due to Operation Roaring Lion towards Iran, to NIS 629 million, in order that within the first quarter wage prices represented 75% of income.
Based on estimates, the common gross wage of Israel Airports Authority staff is NIS 25,000 month-to-month. That is solely a median, and staff in jobs comparable to baggage dealing with and safety usually earn a lot much less.
Reform required
Thus far, the occasions of final Thursday haven’t led to any new agreements, apart from that the Israel Airports Authority would announce that it continues to hunt new staff. “After talks between the chairperson of the Israel Airports Authority, its CEO, and the employees committee chairperson, the workers absolutely returned to work. On the similar time, it was agreed {that a} substantial effort could be made to extend the dimensions of the workforce,” the Authority’s assertion mentioned.
Firstly of this week, the Israel Airports Authority reported that its administration and the employees committee had concluded a joint assembly “out of duty to the touring public and a dedication to restoring common exercise at Ben Gurion Airport.” It was additionally determined that managers would briefly be part of work shifts. The Israel Airports Authority additionally mentioned that it was taking over extra staff in readiness for the Jewish vacation season.
With the Airports Authority hemorrhaging money, nevertheless, the query arises how it’s potential to resolve the state of affairs in such a method that it’ll not be repeated sooner or later.
Apart from the development of extra airports, the evaluation within the aviation trade is that complete reform could also be required, whereby the Israel Airports Authority will function as a authorities firm and never as a statutory company as at current. That might require it to fulfill a lot increased requirements of transparency, and even to distribute an annual dividend to the state.
Similarly to what has occurred at Israel’s seaports, all of the terminals could be privatized, and their operators would have contracts with the federal government firm. In that state of affairs, most airport staff would change into staff of personal operators.
One other strike on the way in which?
In the meantime, all eyes are on this Thursday, the final Thursday in August, when some 100,000 passengers are anticipated to cross by way of Ben Gurion Airport. The airport’s administration is bracing for the opportunity of extra disruptions, and it too is aware of that this incident can’t be allowed to tug on. Apart from the tens of 1000’s of Israelis who will likely be inconvenienced, there are additionally dozens of international airways which have resumed flying right here in current months after Operation Roaring Lion. If Ben Gurion Airport continues to be shut down as soon as every week, it’s uncertain whether or not we will proceed to see them in Israel.
The Israel Airports Authority said in response: “There isn’t any connection between the company construction and the effectivity of the Authority and/or the organizational construction. Adjustments are certainly required within the Authority’s working mannequin, and a transfer is presently being superior led by the Authority’s council and in cooperation with the employees committees to look at and alter the Authority’s working mannequin to adapt it to the present interval.”
Revealed by Globes, Israel enterprise information – en.globes.co.il – on August 24, 2026.
© Copyright of Globes Writer Itonut (1983) Ltd., 2026.
