DOT: Kuwait Airways must sell tickets to Israeli travelers

Bart Jansen | USA TODAY

WASHINGTON – Kuwait Airways broke the law when it refused to sell plane tickets to Israelis, the Transportation Department said Wednesday.

The airline must obey U.S. anti-discrimination laws if it wants to operate from U.S. airports, the department said.

The department investigated after the airline refused to sell Eldad Gatt, an Israeli citizen, a ticket from New York’s John F. Kennedy airport to London’s Heathrow in 2013.

More recently, Gatt found airfares much cheaper if he could fly through Arab countries that boycott Israel. An August 2015 search for flights from JFK to Mumbai cost $433 on Kuwait Airways, $625 on Gulf Air and $779 on Air India, he told the department in a filing.

U.S. law states airlines "may not subject a person, place, port or type of traffic in foreign air transportation to unreasonable discrimination."

But Kuwait Airways said it declined to sell Gatt a ticket to avoid running afoul of Kuwaiti law which prohibits its citizens from entering "into an agreement, personally or indirectly, with entities or persons residing in Israel, or with Israeli citizenship.”

In a January 2014 filing dealing with Gatt's complaints, the airline claims that it doesn't violate U.S. law and doesn't discriminate based on race, ethnicity, nationality or religion because it is simply following Kuwait law's prohibition.

"Kuwait Airways respectfully submits that it has not violated the above statute," said the filing from Evelyn Sahr and Kathryn Moore, lawyers in Washington, D.C., representing the airline. "All Kuwait Airways passengers are treated equally within the requirements of applicable laws."

The department concluded that Kuwait Airways discriminated. In a letter to the airline, the department said Kuwait Airlines must comply with U.S. laws forbidding discrimination in exchange for access to U.S. facilities.

“It is our duty to ensure that the transportation system is free of discrimination. Period,” Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx said in announcing the letter.

The airline has 15 days to respond to the department’s aviation enforcement office about how it will comply with U.S. law.