Most visa questions have an answer like “visa-free”, “visa on arrival” or “apply at the consulate”. But for some country pairs the honest answer is different: travel is not permitted at all. This usually has nothing to do with paperwork — it comes from the relationship between the two states. Getting this right matters, because telling someone to “apply for a visa” for a trip that cannot legally happen is worse than unhelpful.
Three ways a trip can be blocked
- No diplomatic relations: the two countries don’t recognise each other, so there is no visa to issue and no admission. Israel and Iran, Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Algeria, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan fall in this group (in both directions).
- Passport not valid for the destination: the travel document itself excludes a country. Pakistani passports are printed “valid for all countries of the world except Israel”, and Bangladesh reinstated its own “except Israel” clause in 2025. Malaysian passports are likewise not valid for travel to Israel.
- Entry banned / permit-only: the destination refuses holders of a particular passport. Israeli passport holders are refused entry to Kuwait, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, refused tourist entry to Malaysia (a special government clearance is needed for limited non-tourist travel), and need rarely-granted prior approval (a “calling visa”) for Indonesia.
The Pakistan ↔ Israel example
Pakistan does not recognise Israel, and the Pakistani passport carries a printed endorsement excluding Israel. There is no ordinary tourist, work or study visa route. The only documented exceptions are travelling on a second passport from a country that recognises Israel, or rare case-by-case clearance. Our Pakistan-to-Israel page now shows this clearly as a travel restriction rather than a visa to apply for — and the reverse, Israel to Pakistan, does the same.
The exceptions: the Abraham Accords
Relationships change, and we date every one we record. The 2020 Abraham Accords normalised relations between Israel and the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco. Israeli passport holders can now travel to the UAE visa-free, to Bahrain on an eVisa or visa on arrival, and to Morocco on an eVisa — so these pairs are not blocked. Because this area is volatile, we re-verify it and note effective dates.
How we handle this on the site
Each affected page now resolves the country-to-country relationship before showing any visa fields. When travel is not permitted, the page shows a sourced “travel not permitted” explanation instead of a fee, checklist or “apply” button, and we never publish structured data implying a visa is available. Every restriction carries a source and the date we last verified it. This is part of our wider accuracy programme — verified facts, dated, in both directions.