travel on expired Israeli passport

Remember when the United States State Department decided to allow American citizens to travel on expired passports, with some conditions, due to the backlog in the embassies aroudn the world because of Covid closures?

Well, Israel just announced a very similar program.

The following announcement has been going around this evening. I confirmed it on the Misrad Hapnim website, though it is only a notice on the page and I am not able to link directly to the notice

It says, if you need to renew your passport, there are no appointments available until the end of May. To that end, it has been decided that until the end of May 2022 Israelis who hold a foreign passport will be allowed to travel and leave Israel using the foreign passport even without a valid Israeli passport.

This is surely going to be extended past May, as if there are currently no appointments until the end of May, in a few weeks the lack of appointments will extend into June or July. They might as well just say now that this will be in effect until the end of 2022 or pick a date by which they expect to get the Ministry activity back up to par.

And while this is a solution for Israelis who hold a foreign passport, many Israelis do not. I guess one thing at a time.

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