Originally Posted by mecabq

My flight had a block time of four hours from BEY-DOH the other day; I thought maybe this was an error with time zones/DST but didn't give it much more consideration. I realized later that these flights (maybe all QR flights) don't fly over Syria. Middle East Airlines, on the other hand, apparently doesn't have this restriction as their times, using the same type of aircraft, are the more normal 2:45-2:55.

I wonder if it's a perceived safety issue, or for political reasons?

On an unrelated note, BEY apparently doesn't accept on-line check-in. I printed my boarding pass from the QR web site, but at immigration they made me go back to the counter and get a boarding card for whatever reason. This isn't QR's fault, I guess, but it would be nice if they gave a message when I was checking-in on-line or, better yet, didn't allow OLCI at all on this route. YMMV perhaps.

Lines at BEY can be long (or, more accurately, slow-moving) and I barely made the flight, since I arrived at the airport close to departure; they were packing up the check-in counter when I arrived back there, and of course just shrugged their shoulders when I asked why I was made to suffer the horrible inconvenience and indignity of being turned back after standing in the line for passport control.