by Lacey Pfalz
Last updated: 8:40 AM ET, Mon March 16, 2026
Travel risk and crisis response service provider Global Rescue deployed security experts throughout the Middle East to assist stranded travelers in heading back home as the war with the U.S. and Israel against Iran continues into its third week.
Global Rescue teams are coordinating with public and private security resources, including aviation partners, to help individuals and facilitate safe ground, air, and sea evacuations. The State Department is also assisting stranded individuals with chartered flights.
Officials continue to emphasize that stranded travelers without a safe way out should remain in place.
“Our security teams are working in a highly dynamic operational environment to relocate travelers from high-risk areas when safe corridors become available,” said Fernando Lopez Medina, security operations supervisor at Global Rescue and a former U.S. Army Special Forces Green Beret. “These operations require close coordination with regional partners, secure transportation resources and constant reassessment of the threat environment to ensure movements are conducted safely.”
Global Rescue, which operates on an annual membership scheme, provides 24/7 monitoring, intelligence gathering, and operations, including emergency evacuations that aren’t covered by traditional travel insurance, such as medical evacuations, high-altitude assistance, and, more importantly, given current events, evacuations from war zones or other areas impacted by conflict.
Global Rescue continues to advise its members to postpone all non-essential travel to the Middle East. The State Department is warning travelers not to visit 14 countries in the region and strongly encouraging those visiting them to leave. With airports at risk of attack, opportunities to leave are few and far between in many of these countries.
“Travel to or through the Middle East right now carries elevated and unpredictable risk,” said Kent Webber, senior manager of Intelligence Services at Global Rescue and former Senior Intelligence Operations Officer in the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Intelligence at the United States Pentagon. “Our intelligence teams are continuously gathering and analyzing information from multiple sources across the region to provide members with real-time threat assessments and operational guidance as conditions change.”
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