Belarusian President Lukashenko's Son Flies To Tel Aviv, Israel 'Unaware Of His Presence'

Viktor Lukashenko, the son of Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, landed in Israel on Monday. Though Alexander Lukashenko and his son and national security adviser Viktor Lukashenko have been sanctioned by the West for aiding Russia's war on Ukraine, Israel has not formally sanctioned them.

Viktor Lukashenko departed Minsk on Monday in a plane owned by the Belarusian government that landed briefly in Tbilisi in Georgia at 3:15 P.M. local time. The Bombardier Challenger 850 took off less than an hour later and flew to Israel, landing at 6:13 P.M. local time in Tel Aviv, Belarusian opposition news outlet Motolko reported.

Belarusian blogger and dissident Anton Motolko runs Motolko, and the revelations appeared on his Telegram channel. He is also the head of the Belarusian Hajun Project, a military monitoring agency engaged in collecting evidence and following military activities inside Belarusian territory since the start of the Ukraine war. His Telegram channel boasts more than 100,000 followers.

Israeli news media Haaretz said Lukashenko departed Israel the next day. An investigation undertaken by Haaretz proved that a business jet, registered as EW-301PJ, did land in Tel Aviv on Monday, and took off from Israel at noon local time the following day.

The report added that the plane's flight log matches the public meeting schedules of Lukashenko and Belarusian Prime Minister Roman Golovchenko over the past year. However, Haaretz said it was not sure whether Viktor was indeed onboard the plane when it landed in Tel Aviv, though another prominent media organization The Jerusalem Post confirms it.

Viktor's plane reportedly took a circuitous route from Minsk to Tel Aviv, through Russia and Georgia, because of the EU ban, which prohibits Belarusian planes from using its territory.

Viktor and Alexander Lukashenko, dubbed Europe's last dictator, had been blacklisted by the EU months after a disputed election in 2020. There were allegations accusing Lukashenko of fixing the election in his favor to serve a sixth term in office. The EU had also alleged that Viktor was responsible for a campaign of intimidation and oppression mounted against the country's citizens after the election.

Meanwhile, Israeli diplomatic sources told The Jerusalem Post that they had been unaware of Lukashenko's presence but would look into it. Israel's Prime Minister Yair Lapid had earlier mentioned that Israel will not be a route to bypass sanctions imposed on Russia by the U.S. and other Western countries, there has been no mention of sanctioning Belarusian individuals.