El Al Israel Airlines Ltd., trading as El Al is the flag carrier of the State of Israel. Since its inaugural flight from Geneva to Tel Aviv in September 1948, the airline has grown to serve almost 50 destinations, operating scheduled domestic and international services and cargo flights within Israel, and to Europe, the Middle East, the Americas, Africa, and the Far East, from its main base in Ben Gurion Airport. El Al is the only commercial airline to equip its planes with missile defense systems to protect its planes against surface-to-air missiles, and is considered one of the world's most secure airlines, thanks to its stringent security procedures. Although it has been the target of many attempted hijackings and terror attacks, there has only been one El Al flight hijacking in history, which ended without any loss of life. As Israel's national airline, El Al has played an important role in humanitarian rescue efforts, airlifting Jews from other countries to Israel, setting the world record for the most passengers on a commercial aircraft by Operation Solomon when 14,500 Jewish refugees were transported from Ethiopia in 1991. Wikipedia