by Lacey Pfalz
Last updated: 8:50 AM ET, Wed March 4, 2026
Hundreds of thousands of travelers left stranded by the worsening conflict in the Middle East are finally starting to head home—though at an uneven rate, according to current reports.
As the U.S. State Department urged travelers to leave 14 countries earlier this week following the country’s attack on Iran, which responded with a deluge of retaliatory attacks on neighboring countries and American targets, those same attacks hit airports across the region, closing part of the region’s airspace and leading some airports to cancel all commercial flights, stranding hundreds of thousands.
FlightAware’s cancellation data is still showing that airports in Dubai and Abu Dhabi have hundreds of cancellations.
According to The New York Times, by Wednesday, March 4, countries like the United Kingdom, France, Germany and Spain were organizing evacuation flights for their citizens. The U.K. had reportedly 300,000 citizens in the region during the initial Saturday attack, while there were some 400,000 French citizens currently in the region.
The Associated Press reported the first of these charter flights have already been completed, with citizens landing in their home countries on Wednesday morning local time. The countries are prioritizing flying sick and vulnerable citizens back home first.
Other European countries are following suit with flights of their own, including Norway, Ireland and Italy.
The U.S. State Department shared it was helping almost 3,000 who’ve contacted the department for emergency assistance, while another 9,000 had already left the region. Yet the Department never shared numbers for how many Americans are currently in the Middle East.
On Tuesday, President Trump posted to social media that the government would offer free charter flights for trapped Americans who registered with the State Department, or help them book a commercial flight of their own.
The post was sent a day after the Department urged Americans to leave the Middle East on their own—even as the airspace over the Middle East shrunk and travelers, regardless of where they’re from, were stuck.
Data from Cirium suggests at least 18,000 flights have been canceled in the region since Saturday.
Randy Manner, a retired U.S. major general and former deputy commanding general of the Third U.S. Army in Kuwait had been stuck in the United Arab Emirates since Friday.
He told The New York Times, “It is the epitome of absurdity. ‘Leave the country’ but yet the airspace is closed. This is nothing less than a total failure of the U.S. government to provide the expected assistance to American civilians who are caught in harm’s way,” he said.
Some destinations in the Middle East are also trying to help stranded travelers find their way back home. The Israel Ministry of Tourism is currently offering emergency assistance, including chartering land crossings into Egypt to help travelers get somewhere where flights are available.
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