Which Israeli Websites Don't Open from Abroad: We Checked 106 on 23 October 2026

On 23 October 2026 we tested access to 106 Israeli websites from abroad without a VPN. 56 of them opened; the other 50 did not. The closed ones include the Tax Authority, the pension clearing house, Clalit, Leumit, the patient portals of almost every hospital, the municipalities, Mashov (the school portal), Shufersal (the supermarket chain) and the IDF's services. Find your site in the tables below: if it's closed, the usual cause is that it refuses connections from abroad. The closed sites we tested through SuperStableVPN all opened through it: the Tax Authority, the pension clearing house, Clalit, Leumit, hospital portals and Sheba Connect, the municipalities and CityPay, the water and gas companies, HOT, HOT Mobile, Yes, Bezeq International, Israel Post, Highway 6, Pango, the fines collection center, the IDF sites, Mashov, Tabu, the brokers, Shufersal, Rami Levy and Yad2.

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Israel has been in a state of war since its founding, and in war cyberattacks never stop. When fighting escalates, Israeli websites come under constant attack, and the simplest defence, used by government and private companies alike, is to shut out everyone connecting from outside Israel. When things quieten down, some of those restrictions are lifted, but not all of them and not everywhere. We checked in a relatively calm period.

For Israelis abroad this is an everyday problem. Claiming a tax refund, checking pension savings, getting a hospital discharge summary, paying arnona (municipal property tax) on a parent's flat, ordering them groceries, cancelling the old internet contract, checking a child's grades on Mashov: all of it happens on Israeli websites, and some of them simply don't open unless you are in Israel. Below is what we saw, by topic, and why each group of sites gets closed.

How we checked

We opened each site in an ordinary browser on a home internet connection in Canada. Where a service has a personal area, we opened its login page rather than the home page. "Works" means the login page loaded in full; we did not log in. Where a service has several addresses, such as a website and a personal area, and even one of them didn't open, the service is marked as not working. From another country or another provider the picture may differ slightly.

Government and tax

Government sites are mostly open: gov.il also serves Israelis abroad, with consulates, appointments and documents. The exception is the Tax Authority. Its systems hold income, employer and bank account records for almost everyone in the country, which makes it one of the most valuable targets there is. So the Tax Authority stays closed to foreign connections even in calm periods, and people who have left need it more than most. If you left in the middle of a year and stopped earning an Israeli salary, too much income tax may have been withheld, and you can claim it back for the past six tax years. For that you need Form 106 (tofes 106), the annual salary and tax statement from your former employer. On top of that come income statements for the years you worked in Israel, and closing your tax file if you had opened one. The services of the Population and Immigration Authority (documents, status certificates) and the Licensing Authority (renewing a driving licence, for example) run through gov.il and the my.gov.il personal area, appointments are booked through GoVisit, and all of that is open.

Need the Tax Authority? How to get in from abroad, or test it with an Israeli IP — 3 days free.

Courts, debts and property

Debts in Israel don't disappear when you move: an unpaid debt or an old bill can end up as an enforcement case at Hotza'a LaPoal, and people sometimes only find out after their bank account has been frozen. The good news is that this group is mostly open: the courts (Net HaMishpat), the Hotza'a LaPoal personal area and the Israel Land Authority personal area all work from abroad. The exceptions are the fines collection centre run by the same authority, which handles fines and fees passed on for collection, and the site for ordering a Tabu land registry extract, which loads blank from abroad. And a Tabu extract is exactly what an owner selling a flat from another country needs.

Health funds

Diagnoses, prescriptions and test results are among the most sensitive data about a person, and unlike a password, a medical history can't be changed after a leak; Israeli hospitals have already been targets of attacks. The Clalit and Leumit sites don't open from abroad; Maccabi and Meuhedet work. Yet after a move the health fund's site is needed exactly when a new doctor wants your medical history from Israel: the list of medications, test and scan results, discharge summaries. Clalit is the largest health fund in the country, so this affects a great many people.

With Leumit or Clalit? What to do from abroad, or test your login with an Israeli IP — 3 days free.

Hospitals

Hospitals have their own patient portals: discharge summaries after hospital stays and surgery, test and imaging results, prescriptions. This is the most detailed medical data there is about a person, and it is locked down even more tightly than at the health funds: of the 15 hospitals whose portal we found, only two opened from abroad. The government hospitals — Wolfson, the Galilee Medical Center, Hillel Yaffe, Shamir (Assaf Harofeh), Poriya, Ziv, Bnai Zion, Barzilai and others — share one platform, Apollo, and its login page doesn't open from abroad. The Sheba portal, Rambam4U and the whole Assuta site are closed too, and Clalit's hospitals issue documents through the Clalit personal area, which is also closed. Continuing treatment after a move is hard without these documents: a new doctor may ask for a discharge summary or the report of an MRI done in Israel, and if you didn't keep copies, you have to find them from abroad.

Banks and credit cards

This picture is deceptive. Every bank and credit card company on our list opens from abroad, and checking a balance or a statement usually works. The trouble starts when you try to do something: transfer money, add a payee, change your phone number or address. Fraud detection systems exist to catch exactly that, actions from an unfamiliar place, so a transaction from abroad can be held and the account locked until you call the branch.

It is worth telling your bank in advance that you live abroad, but don't count on it. In practice the "customer abroad" note often never reaches the system, and fraud detection keeps doing its job: anything that doesn't come from Israel is a reason for a closer look. An Israeli IP removes one of the signs of a login from abroad, but not all of them; fraud detection also looks at the device and at behaviour.

Investments

The Meitav and Excellence trading platforms open from abroad, while the IBI personal area and Psagot Trade don't: the login page stays blank. Where the login does open, the same caveat applies as with banks: viewing your portfolio usually works, while a withdrawal or a change of bank details can run into a security check.

Pension, insurance and payslips

Pension and insurance companies hold a lifetime of savings, together with your ID number, address and bank details: exactly what fraud needs. The pension clearing house (HaMislaka HaPensionit) says it best: through it you can request information on your savings across funds and insurers, including long-forgotten ones, and it is closed to foreign connections. Migdal's personal area opens from abroad but its website stays blank, so under our rule it is marked as not working. Michpal+, on the other hand, opens: the portal where employees of the many companies that run payroll on Michpal get their payslips (tlushei sachar).

And after a move you need them all the time. Years of work in Israel often leave savings in several pension funds from different employers, in a keren hishtalmut (study fund) and as severance pay (pitzuim), and you have to work out what is where and what you can do with it. A typical story: someone remembers a keren hishtalmut from an employer ten years ago and tries to find out which company holds it and whether the money can be withdrawn yet. Payslips are needed to prove past income and employment, to a bank, a new employer or the immigration process in the new country.

Need HaMislaka? Checking your pension savings from abroad, or test it with an Israeli IP — 3 days free.

Municipalities, water and gas

A municipality holds the addresses, ID numbers and payment details of everyone in the city, and almost all of those residents are in Israel. From city hall's point of view, access from abroad is extra risk for almost no benefit, and the easiest thing is to close it altogether. All five large municipalities on our list and CityPay, which many cities use for arnona and other municipal bills, don't open from abroad. That causes problems for anyone who still has a flat or parents in Israel: paying arnona, moving it into a tenant's name, getting a no-debt certificate, appealing a fine. The Israel Electric Company, meanwhile, is open.

Water and gas companies are the same: the service is delivered in Israel, but paying and sorting out the bills sometimes has to be done from abroad. The personal areas of the Tel Aviv (Mei Avivim) and Haifa (Mei Carmel) water corporations and the whole site of Jerusalem's Hagihon don't open from abroad, while Beersheba's water corporation is open. The Supergas and Amisragas sites are closed entirely. For a landlord this makes it hard to check whether water and gas have been paid and to move the account into a new tenant's name.

Paying arnona? How to pay municipal bills from abroad, or test your city's site with an Israeli IP — 3 days free.

Telecom and TV

Almost all customers of internet, phone and TV providers are in Israel, so many companies reason simply: why give foreign hackers a way in? The personal areas hold ID numbers, addresses and payment details. HOT, HOT Mobile, Yes and Bezeq International are closed; Bezeq and the mobile operators are open. People who have left need these sites to cancel a contract, return equipment and check that they are not still being charged for internet at the old flat. And many keep their Israeli mobile number active on purpose: it is where the codes from banks, health funds and government services arrive.

Transport

Bills for Israel's toll roads keep coming after you leave. A Route 6 (Kvish 6) or Fast Lane bill can arrive weeks later — for a rental car, the rental company passes it on — and an unpaid bill gathers penalties over time and can be sent for collection. Fast Lane, Route 6 and the Pango (parking app) personal area are closed from abroad. Police fines are paid and appealed through gov.il, which is open, as are Rav-Kav Online (the public transport card site) and the Carmel Tunnels personal area.

Army

Army systems are closed to foreign connections for an obvious reason: they hold the personal data of soldiers and reservists. But they are still needed after a move: a service certificate or a discharge certificate (teudat shichrur) can be needed for benefits, grants and proof of service, and a reservist abroad has to keep track of call-ups and certificates. The soldiers' personal area my.idf.il and the Prat portal with its certificates are closed from abroad. The reservists' site is open.

Education

Universities are mostly open: they have foreign students and researchers, and the student personal areas of the Technion, Tel Aviv University, the Hebrew University and Ben-Gurion University work from abroad. But Bar-Ilan's personal area and the Ministry of Education portal with bagrut (matriculation) documents, which you need when applying to a college or university abroad, are closed. And the school systems Mashov and Webtop don't open from abroad. For families who have left for a year or two and will return, that means grades, timetables and teachers' messages while the child is still enrolled in an Israeli school.

Shopping for family

Many people who have left help their parents from abroad: they order groceries, medicines, gifts. Victory, Super-Pharm and BuyMe open from abroad; Shufersal, Rami Levy and Yad2 (the classifieds site) don't. Shufersal says outright that the site is open to selected countries only.

Other

Israel Post is closed, and it is where you track parcels and registered letters that keep arriving at your old Israeli address.

If a site doesn't work

A site that doesn't work from abroad usually keeps loading, shows an error page or stays blank. If the cause is a restriction on access from abroad, refreshing or trying another browser won't help.

A site that works may still not let you log in. The usual reason abroad is the one-time code, which goes to the phone number the service has on file, often an Israeli number that was disconnected after the move or sits in a drawer; see SMS codes from Israel abroad. An Israeli IP doesn't change where the code goes.

Sites change. The next escalation can close what is open today, so treat these tables as a snapshot of the date at the top of the page.

What to do without a VPN, service by service: Tax Authority, pension clearing house, payslips and Form 106, CityPay and municipal bills, Leumit and Clalit.

Opening the closed sites

The closed sites we tested through SuperStableVPN all opened through it: the Tax Authority, the pension clearing house, Clalit, Leumit, hospital portals and Sheba Connect, the municipalities and CityPay, the water and gas companies, HOT, HOT Mobile, Yes, Bezeq International, Israel Post, Highway 6, Pango, the fines collection center, the IDF sites, Mashov, Tabu, the brokers, Shufersal, Rami Levy and Yad2. SuperStableVPN gives you a static IP from a range of Israeli residential addresses, the same every time you connect. Sites flag it less often than a regular VPN's datacenter address, though no site promises to accept it. You connect with the free OpenVPN client on Windows, macOS, iOS, Android or Linux, or on a router (setup). Test the sites you need with an Israeli IP — 3 days free, no credit card required.