As of August 31, there will be only four countries left on Israel’s list of red countries – places to which the public is banned from flying without special permission: Bulgaria, Brazil, Mexico and Turkey.
The Health Ministry released the status of the countries to which Israelis could fly, ranking them red (banned), orange (requiring between seven and 14 days of isolation) or yellow.
With yellow countries, people who are vaccinated or recovered only have to isolate on return to Israel until a negative COVID-19 test result is obtained or 24 hours has passed, whichever is earlier. Unvaccinated people still must be isolated for up to 14 days.
The list of yellow countries includes Bahrain, Hong Kong, Hungary, Taiwan, New Zealand, China, Singapore, Slovakia, Poland and the Czech Republic. Poland used to be an orange country.
Any country that is not yellow or red is considered orange.
This means that Austria, for example, is now on the list of countries requiring isolation.
As noted, the new country rankings go into effect next Tuesday.
The way that the Health Ministry ranks countries is expected to change after the High Holidays. In addition, the ministry is reportedly considering allowing those who have received a third shot of the Pfizer vaccine to be exempt from isolation on return to Israel regardless of where they were traveling.