While it’s anyone’s guess how long this lasts, American Airlines has just suspended its only route to the Middle East, as flagged by View from the Wing.
In this post:
American cancels Philadelphia to Doha flights
American operates daily flights between Philadelphia (PHL) and Doha (DOH) using Boeing 787-9s. This route is primarily operated in order to provide connections to Qatar Airways’ network, given that the two airlines both belong to oneworld, and even have a strategic partnership.
Now American has temporarily suspended this route. The service was suspended as of Wednesday, June 18, 2025, and for now, the suspension is through Sunday, June 22, 2025.
Here’s how American describes this decision:
American Airlines has made adjustments to its Doha, Qatar (DOH) operation, temporarily suspending flights between DOH and Philadelphia (PHL) until Sunday, June 22. We will continue to monitor the situation with safety and security top of mind and make any additional adjustments as needed.
Meanwhile the United States Embassy in Qatar has advised travelers to exercise increased vigilance:
Out of an abundance of caution and in light of ongoing regional hostilities, the U.S. Embassy has advised its personnel to exercise increased vigilance and has temporarily restricted access to Al Udeid Air Base. We recommend that U.S. citizens in Qatar take similar precautions.
Of course in recent times we’ve seen Delta and United repeatedly suspended flights to Tel Aviv (TLV) in light of the ongoing conflict, but this is the first time that American has suspended its Middle East service over safety concerns. United, meanwhile, has also just suspended its Dubai (DXB) flights, meaning all Middle East service by US carriers has been put on pause.
I’m curious what prompted this suspension
I don’t really know what to say here that isn’t political, given how polarizing everything going on is. It’s certainly a concerning time, in terms of the escalation of tensions in the Middle East.
One wonders what specifically is prompting American to suspend Doha flights. Obviously there’s a lot of unrest in the region, but that doesn’t necessarily explain why service is being cut to countries that are quite safe (as of now), where local carriers are still operating as usual.
Is it a safety concern with crews being on the ground in Qatar, and the risk of something happening to them? Is the concern that someone may try to carry out an attack on the aircraft departing Doha? Is it an issue with the route American takes, which typically passes not too far from Egypt?
Qatar is of course an incredibly safe country during good times, given its alliances. Geopolitics is just endlessly confusing and fascinating, when you look at the various alliances, which are now really being put to the test.
Bottom line
American is suspending its Philadelphia to Doha route for several days, a decision that came with “safety and security top of mind.” This decision coincides with the US Embassy in Qatar telling Americans to exercise increased precautions. It’s not known what exactly is prompting this diversion, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see the route suspended for more than several days.
What do you make of American suspending Doha flights?
Looks like we know why they cancelled...
American has now extended the travel alerts through July 6th and also extended the cancellations. As best I can tell it’s cancelled for another week, through June 29th.
Well now we know why.
I was on this exact route early Wednesday morning. Seems as though that was the last trip before they cancelled. Very obvious explanation here: Iran is threatening to attack the US military base in Qatar, which is relatively not far from the commercial airport. The US military is preparing to get all American assets out of this country, besides essential personnel at the base itself.
"Qatar is of course an incredibly safe country during good times, given its alliances." - Qatar is known to not only help hide terrorists but they actively fund terrorist organizations. They also throw money around at diplomats to buy influence around the world. They were helping hide KSM when he was wanted for trying to blow up American airliners and helped him escape the authorities allowing him to go on to put 9/11 into action....
"Qatar is of course an incredibly safe country during good times, given its alliances." - Qatar is known to not only help hide terrorists but they actively fund terrorist organizations. They also throw money around at diplomats to buy influence around the world. They were helping hide KSM when he was wanted for trying to blow up American airliners and helped him escape the authorities allowing him to go on to put 9/11 into action. They have been housing hamas including during the preparations of the Oct 7th assault. They also have relations with the taliban. muslim brotherhood and al queda affiliates. It helps to look beyond the fancy planes and airport lounges and really understand where your money is going when you visit there. Most likely the concern is US airliners in the middle east make ideal targets to be blown out of the sky by terrorists. if Trump launches us into yet another war in the middle east expect aa severe escalation in all sorts of terrorist attacks against US interests around the world. Iran isn't gaza. It has the means to fight back and has a global reach when it comes to terrorists.
They throw around money like AIPAC? Yet its only Israel that has killed more children in 3 days, with American munitions, than Russia did 3 years. The western rules based order is has fallen.
That's really interesting - you'd think they'd be able to tweak their flight paths to comfortably avoid the war zone. And yes, it's a war. More specifically it's state sponsored Holocaust 2.0 carried out by the illegitimate state of Israel. That's NOT political
I was supposed to be on that flight today. First AA said it was operational and told me they are canceling several days. Plane was supposed to be pretty full. Took over an hour for AA to find an alternate route from my starting point at BKK. Am now transiting through Haneda.
Was yours a paid or award ticket? My guess paid? Trying to rebook for family on a ward ticket and flat out refused to make changes called 2x and uses chat also. Said the routing rules wouldn’t allow a change, and since I’m biz, the options were even more limited. To get from XXX-DOH-US.
It was paid with an upgrade to business. I'm Executive Platinum if that matters. I was glad they got me business on JAL through Haneda but it took a lot of effort.
I expect AA will offer alternatives flights? I have 2 booked, next one DOH-PHL on Aug 1st. I guess I'll just have to wait. One consolation, currently its on AA metal, as an alternative I might be "forced" onto a QR metal...
Bonkers!
They will put you in Qatar. I had premium economy on AA, flight was delayed by 12 hrs. They rebooked on QR economy and refunded the difference.
Bahrain has a majority Shiite population so it offers citizenship to Pakistanis to increase its Sunni population. Qatari citizens only make up of 20% of the population
so it is certainly no Qataris work on US largest military base in the region. There is no reason for Iran to target the Gulf states, except SA purely on the basis of Sunni vs
Shiite Muslims. Netanyahu has been claiming Iran is months from developing...
Bahrain has a majority Shiite population so it offers citizenship to Pakistanis to increase its Sunni population. Qatari citizens only make up of 20% of the population
so it is certainly no Qataris work on US largest military base in the region. There is no reason for Iran to target the Gulf states, except SA purely on the basis of Sunni vs
Shiite Muslims. Netanyahu has been claiming Iran is months from developing nuclear weapons for three decades. The difference is today's Republican politicians who go bonkers. Since WWII, US foreign policy focuses mainly on "regime change" unfriendly governments in Asia, Africa and South/Central America. It ensures that conflicts/ wars and poverty exist in those targeted countries. It cannot solely succeed without the obedience of corrupt national governments. It does not have forever friends or eternal enemies-- mainly no principles and values. For decades, I never understood why the US and Israeli governments allowed Khomeini ascend to power, considering US long experience in "regime change" in the third world. It actually overthrew a democratically elected Iranian government before installing the Sha. I actually read about the Sha's regime until he died. When he was in power, he entertained monarchies, the powerful and wealthy worldwide. After he lost power, no countries wanted to house him and all countries even treated him like plague. Yeah not to mention the US shot down an Iranian civilian plan and blamed Libya for the Pan Am flight crash in Lockerbie when Iranian government shot it down because the investigation would trace back to the previous Iranian plane crash. Now I understand " The Iranian-Contra Affair" is the reason behind the threesome relation among US, Israel and Iran until it became "Fatal Attraction". The Gazan war provides an opportunity once in a lifetime for Israel to expand its territory and power in neighboring Muslim countries. Netanyahu could not careless rescuing live hostages or recovering dead hostages' bodies. For nearly two years, it fails to rescue hostages in occupied territory. Does it resemble Bush's WMD in Iraq? The delusion of wiping out Muslim fanatic groups is beyond comprehension. Those who advocate this lunacy will die while we and future generations will live with deadly consequences. I am saddened to hear that Isfahan and Tabriz are targets of Israel missiles because they are birthplaces of two most famous Persian rugs. No other rugs in the world rival Persian rugs. The world is in much more peaceful, harmonious and economically vibrant place to live in if less than ten percent of the population believes in political and religious leaders. The Iranian mullahs are religious cult leaders and Trump is a political cult leader: We are in good hands in the rabbit holes while other Muslims in targeted countries are suffering in hell. The religious wars will will march on from biblical time until eternity when Christianity claims supremacy over Islam and Judaism. The US is now retreating in Africa while ISIS , Al Queda and the likes are surging.
Makes perfect sense. I've been wondering about these two flights -- along with AA & UA's flights to Delhi. All four of these flights (2x DEL, DXB, and DOH) fly very close to Iranian airspace and it wouldn't take much for Iran to "accidentally" hit one of those planes.
For those who think this couldn't happen (by accident or otherwise), I'd refer to you to MH-17 (2014) which was shot down over Ukraine or Iran Air 655 (688) which was enroute to Dubai
Rather AA and UA cut their flights to the middle east altogether; who wants to fly lackluster airlines when you can fly with the ME3 to those regions. Every time I look for flights that route through that region on AA, I see availability by then gaslight on it being the PHL to DOH by AA. I rather just see no availability rather than availability on a carrier I do not want to fly.
Nonsense. Emirates and Qatar hype up their flagship products, but when you don't get them you're stuck in J cabins arguably far worse than those found on an AA 777/787.
I much prefer Q Suites, however, the last long-haul AA I did DOH PHL was amazing, the seat was one of the most comfortable I have ever had, service was impeccable, I was suitably impressed at how much AA have lifted their game on these new aircraft
robbo, HRGuy …. Seriously?
Qatar ranked No: 1
Emirates ranked No: 4
American ranked No: 83 …. whatever are you thinking?
On QR 737 rn from Doha to SFO. Made a lil detour to avoid Israel, added about an hour of flight time
This is not a new detour; they've been flying across Saudi Arabia and then up the Suez Canal for quite sometime (ie: over a year). This isn't just QR. AA and UA's flights to DOH and DXB (respectively) have been taking similar routes
Some might be interested in the U.S. Airline Rankings. Tim Dunn will be pleased no doubt.
https://thepointsguy.com/airline/best-us-airlines-2025/?utm_source=tpge-best-airlines-ds-june-2025&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=13936913&utm_usr=96cca048f70216df9d4b811774b39d338f430f67d68fff2d13af35601badcea9&utm_template=18212356
Are you seriously going to spam every thread topic with this "rankings" nonsense?
One man’s “Spam” is another man’s another man’s knowledge gain. Rankings are not all Synn …. nor Immortal just like you old bean …. :-)
I have to wonder why it's only the Philly flights.... flights to Doha are still leaving out of JFK; are the routes that different? If the cancellations are really about airspace, hopefully they can reroute.
AA only has flights to Qatar from PHL. Any other flights you're seeing with an AA code would be AA codeshare on Qatar Airways flights.
AA are being pussies. Qatar is on friendly terms with Iran and is non confrontational with Israel. They also have US and Russian military installations, so they basically schmooze everyone. Nobody is going to target a passenger jet heading there for fear of a major political incident with a neutral.
Israel and Iran are targeting one another, so you'd want to avoid the space above those two and the path between. But you could...
AA are being pussies. Qatar is on friendly terms with Iran and is non confrontational with Israel. They also have US and Russian military installations, so they basically schmooze everyone. Nobody is going to target a passenger jet heading there for fear of a major political incident with a neutral.
Israel and Iran are targeting one another, so you'd want to avoid the space above those two and the path between. But you could vector your way around to safely serve PHL-DOH.
Completely uneducated comment. Shows your lack of geography, and airspace awareness. Much more to it than "friendly".
Don't ever question my knowledge of geography, you neophyte!
Iran surely has not forgotten that we shot down one of their passenger planes in 1988. When they threaten our interests in the region, surely that's one of the things on their minds.
Iran still believes that the ummah is still fighting the First Crusade.
ELAL and others can be seen on FlightRadar24 as flying to TLV.
I suspect their hull insurance carrier demanded the suspension out of an abundance of caution.
AF KL also canceled Dubai flights
No, it didn't. AF662 is enroute CDG to DXB as we speak. Only one flight was cancelled yesterday, the route itself is not affected.
I would be worried flying so close to Iran these days as Qatar is located geographically. There are lots of missiles in the air lately. Could be a situation like Malaysia Airlines flight 17. I pray that sort of tragedy doesn’t happen again!
Well even missiles sometimes missed their intended targets so i think they are taking a caution approach.
United canceled EWR/DXB starting 3 days ago.
I think this suspension has to do with the US having a military base in Qatar with a significant presence and strategic importance. Should the US directly get involved in attacking Iran (which seems far too likely given recent comments and devlopments), Iran has publicly stated they will retaliate against the US, likely through military targets in the region but potentially beyond that. With the US' largest military base (at least to my knowledge) in...
I think this suspension has to do with the US having a military base in Qatar with a significant presence and strategic importance. Should the US directly get involved in attacking Iran (which seems far too likely given recent comments and devlopments), Iran has publicly stated they will retaliate against the US, likely through military targets in the region but potentially beyond that. With the US' largest military base (at least to my knowledge) in the region being in Qatar, I assume it will be a likely target. Should Iran want to go beyond military targets, I guess going after an airline named "American" on their only flight to the Middle East could be of concern.
But Iran won't chance hitting Qatar, who is one of their only 'friends' in the entire Gulf region. And that US base has plenty of Qataris serving and working there. No way they'd do it. More likely to hit something in a place like Bahrain, Saudi or the UAE.
If one believes that there is a possibility that the US will attack Iran, and there is therefore a possibility that Iran will attack US assets in the region, it's not a crazy move by the flag carrier of the US.
Netanyahu roped Trump into cancelling JCPOA in his first term, now he's trying to rope Trump into directly attacking Iran. It's reminiscent of W Bush getting roped in (after much effort by Netanyahu, imagine that) to attacking Iraq based on groundless claims of Iraq rebuilding its WMD stockpiles. Given Netanyahu's historical success in this, it seems like a prudent move by the airlines. Better safe than sorry in case Trump escalates everything even further.
Dusty, I am unconvinced that Netanyahu was an actor in the Iraq WMD debacle. It was mostly down to certain British Prime Minister who was hoping for his Margaret Thatcher Falkland Islands war success moment …. he failed miserably.
@AeroB13a
Did you forget Netanyahu's testimony to Congress in 2002? Sure Blair drank and tried to sell the same koolaid Netanyahu was pushing, but without Congressional approval Bush was not going into Iraq, and without Bush and the US, Blair was not going into Iraq. No one person is solely to blame, but Netanyahu absolutely had outsized influence on Congress's decision to invade, despite being a private citizen at the time. It's especially telling...
@AeroB13a
Did you forget Netanyahu's testimony to Congress in 2002? Sure Blair drank and tried to sell the same koolaid Netanyahu was pushing, but without Congressional approval Bush was not going into Iraq, and without Bush and the US, Blair was not going into Iraq. No one person is solely to blame, but Netanyahu absolutely had outsized influence on Congress's decision to invade, despite being a private citizen at the time. It's especially telling that Ariel Sharon, the actual leader of Israel at the time, told Bush explicitly that Israel wouldn't have any part in the decision one way or the other, but apparently Netanyahu's testimony held more sway than the actual elected leader of Israel.
Dusty, every day is a school day and today I have learned something new. Thank you for sharing that knowledge.
Sarcasm?
Not from me Calidude, I am genuinely grateful for the information graciously provided by Dusty.
United has also suspended the their DXB route for a similar time frame. The first cancelled outbound began yesterday. I was on that and it created a pretty complicated re-routing to get to Dubai
United has also canceled DXB.
United has cancelled its flights to DXB for the next few days
Talk about panicking or being sensible, that is the question?
Does AA know something about the region which has not been announced as yet? …. one can only speculate.
Top-50 airline execs really don't panic when they have to make sensitive multi-million dollar operational and commercial decisions. They just tend to do what needs to be done.
Well now HRGuy, as AA is not in the top 50 World Rankings and even slipped down from last year, perhaps there was/is some panic there amongst the “Execs”?
Any idea how this route was performing? Any chance AA saw an opportunity to axe an unprofitable route without jeopardizing their partnership with QR?
It's my understanding the Qatari government was also offering some substantial incentives for flying to DOH
Dan, one is hearing whispers on the right side of the pond, that the Gulf passenger traffic is moving away from the area rather than to it. That could well be a sensible move.
No clue what the average fare was, but t100 shows load factors in the upper 80s/ lower 90s on average. So pretty full.
I've flown on that route many times since it started. I've had an upgrade offer only a few times - and definitely worth it! I've seen the flights mostly full as well.