Was probably a combination of things. I see it left EWR almost 5 hours late on the 9th; arrived in TLV almost 5 hours late on the 10th, and left TLV 4.5 hrs late on the 10th back for EWR. The late arrival from EWR, combined with the new security procedures for int'l arrivals into the US, and the situation with the UA plane (a runway was closed, planes were being diverted left and right), all contributed... but I would bet the UA incident had the least - if any - to do with the delay.

Regarding your cynical guess Critic, most FAs could care less about protecting the company from potential blame. We take what information is available to us, and do the best we can with it. Anyone with a brain can see the plane left EWR late, several hours before the UA incident, so there would be no reason for the FA to purposely mislead someone about the reason for the delay. There probably was merit to what he was saying, given the runway closure and diversions (but again - the UA incident still played a minimal role, more than likely, given that the inbound was 5 hours late from EWR).