# El Al jobs: how to really apply, and who to ask > What El Al hires for, how its Hebrew careers site works, what the company publishes about its referral scheme, and the practical way to reach a person inside. Facts checked on 2 September 2026 - Industry: Airline - HQ: Ben Gurion Airport - Employees: 5,001–10,000 (2026, company LinkedIn page) - Careers page: https://www.elal.com/heb/career/work-elal - Referral programme: Yes - LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/el-al-israel-airlines - Website: https://www.elal.com --- ## What El Al does El Al is Israel's flag carrier, founded in 1948. In its own description it operates scheduled, charter and ad-hoc passenger and cargo flights to more than 50 destinations across Europe, the Americas, Africa, Australia and the Far East, from its home base at Ben Gurion Airport (checked 2 September 2026). Alongside flying, its reports describe adjacent businesses: duty-free, catering, security services and aircraft maintenance. What gets hired here splits roughly in two: operational roles — cabin crew, pilots, ground and airport customer service, maintenance and engineering, the security division — and corporate roles. The careers site is Hebrew-only. ## How hiring at El Al works Applications go through [the careers area of its site](https://www.elal.com/heb/career/work-elal), which includes a jobs page and a candidate FAQ. Roles are posted on LinkedIn too (checked 2 September 2026). **Refer a friend: yes, and El Al publishes the terms.** The company hosts, on its own domain, the rules of a "חבר מביא חבר" scheme for the cabin crew role, defining a bonus for an employee whose referred candidate passes the interviews, completes the course and stays for a qualifying period. Note what that is and isn't: it is aimed at **employees**, not at you. You cannot apply through it — but somebody inside can, and they have a reason to. **Process stages: partly published.** El Al hosts a candidate-facing document about its selection day, and there is a candidate FAQ. A full stage-by-stage breakdown is not published. **Cabin crew requirements:** published mainly inside the postings and recruitment documents themselves. We are not going to reproduce a requirements list we could not read directly from the company's own document — read the posting. ## Why applying through the form is not enough Cabin crew and service roles at El Al are among the most sought-after jobs in Israel, and applicants per intake outnumber places by orders of magnitude. The form is not a gate — it is a queue. And when a company publishes terms that pay an employee for bringing a candidate, it is telling you plainly which channel it prefers. That is exactly the argument in [the post on referrals](/en/blog/how-to-ask-for-a-referral/): a referral does not skip stages and does not guarantee a reply, it changes the channel. [A 2015 paper in the Quarterly Journal of Economics](https://academic.oup.com/qje/article-abstract/130/2/805/2331590) found referred applicants are hired at a higher rate even when their skills look similar. ## The right way to apply to El Al 1. **Find the exact role** on the jobs page. "I want to work at El Al" is not an application. 2. **Tailor the resume to it.** For cabin crew and service — customer-facing work, languages, shift work; for corporate and engineering — the tools and standards the posting names. 3. **Find one person inside.** El Al employs thousands, so somebody in your network has probably worked there. A LinkedIn search on the company plus the role title is the place to start. 4. **One short message:** who you are, which job, two pieces of evidence that you fit, and one request to pass your resume inside. It is fair to mention the referral scheme exists — it lowers the cost of the ask. 5. **One reminder** after five to seven days, then the next person. Tagishoti does these steps for you: it finds matching roles, tailors a resume to each, uses your connected LinkedIn account to identify who at the company could put you forward, and drafts the message. Nothing is sent without your approval, and nobody promises it will be answered. ## FAQ: jobs at El Al ### Does El Al have a refer-a-friend program? Yes, at least for the cabin crew role. El Al publishes the terms of one on its own domain, paying a bonus to an employee whose referred candidate is hired, completes the course and stays for a qualifying period. The scheme is aimed at employees, not candidates — the referral has to come from an employee. ### Where is El Al based? Its operations centre and head offices are in the El Al complex at Ben Gurion Airport. The company's LinkedIn page lists Tel Aviv, and it also has overseas offices. The work location for a given role is stated in its posting. ### Does El Al hire people with no prior experience? Some ground and airport service roles are built as a first job, and cabin crew go through a training course run at the company's expense. The exact requirements for each intake are published in the posting, and nowhere else. ### How long does the hiring process take? Not published as a stage list. El Al does publish a candidate document about its selection day and a candidate FAQ, but without timelines (checked 2 September 2026).