How does an American president fly to a country at war?

By the time they got to the back of Air Force One to tell us what to do in the event of a missile attack, it was clear that this was not going to be a normal presidential trip.

The iconic blue-and-white Boeing 747 was somewhere over the Atlantic this week carrying President Biden to Israel, which is in the midst of a war with Hamas, and security personnel were giving instructions to traveling journalists on how to avoid it. Well, death.

They handed out pocket-sized note cards with directions on how to respond if the air raid siren went off, indicating the possibility of a Hamas strike while we were on the ground. What would we do if an attack occurred while we were under the wing of Air Force One on the runway waiting for the president to disembark? What do we do if an attack occurs while we are in the convoy heading to Tel Aviv? What to do if there was an attack on the hotel where Mr. Biden was scheduled to meet with Israeli officials.

Not to mention, the very small font of the advice on the card would be very difficult to read the moment we think a missile is flying our way. But it was the first time since I started covering the White House in 1996 that I remember such a briefing for reporters aboard Air Force One, a sign of how uncertain the trip can be.

After all, they were showing the president and his traveling team to a country at war in broad daylight on live television. Air Force One was scheduled to land at Ben Gurion International Airport within range of Hamas rockets coming from Gaza, a place considered so dangerous that many international airlines have stopped flying there.

Just the day before, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz had been evacuated from his private plane at the same airport due to air raid sirens and taken to a shelter. Journalists who travel with him? They were ordered to throw themselves on the runway and lie down until the danger had passed.

The day before that, Secretary of State Antony Blinken was similarly moved to a shelter during a meeting with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The reporters who were with him were taken out of the trucks and into the stairs of a building to get rid of the possible attack.

It has already been an unusual presidential journey in other ways. Even as the motorcade arrived at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland for Air Force One to take off, we learned that the second half of the flight, which was a stop in Jordan for Mr. Biden to meet with Arab leaders, had been abruptly canceled because of an explosion in a Gaza hospital. Air Force One was rolling down the runway and the flight itinerary was suddenly changing.

There is, of course, a reason why presidents do not fly to countries at war. When this has happened in the past, it was usually under more controlled circumstances. Franklin D. Roosevelt was the first president to travel to a foreign destination during wartime when he traveled to Casablanca during the North African Campaign of World War II and was not told about it until after he arrived safely. Reporters thought he was heading home to Hyde Park, New York.

Following this precedent, Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama flew to Afghanistan or Iraq under cover of secrecy. Their arrival was not announced in advance, and their short stay was measured in hours and confined to US military bases. Once, when Mr. Bush was whisked out of Washington for a trip to the war zone, his cover was nearly blown when a panhandler approached his unmarked car at a traffic light. As the president was told to step back, a quick-thinking Secret Service agent in the car behind him shoved a few dollars out the window to get the panhandler’s attention.

When Biden traveled to Ukraine this year, he was the first president to visit a country at war outside the relative security of the US military presence, but that trip was also shrouded in secrecy. Fearing Russian anti-aircraft missiles, Biden was taken on a nine-hour train ride to Kiev accompanied by a handful of aides, guards and two journalists.

By contrast, the White House announced Mr. Biden’s trip to Israel in advance. Although he asked reporters traveling with him to keep details of his schedule secret until his arrival, Mr. Netanyahu’s office in Israel published where and when he would be going before he landed.

The security briefing on the plane was surreal. While I covered the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, I was not among the few reporters who traveled with Bush or Obama there. But even then, I’m told, reporters didn’t get the same kind of briefing we did on our way to Tel Aviv.

We were told that if we heard an air raid siren, called an “azaka” in Israel for warning, we would have about a minute before impact if the missile was heading our way. If this happened while we were on the runway to cover the president’s arrival, we would have to run as fast as we could to the nearby motorcade cars. If the siren goes off while we are in the vehicles, we must remain in them – the opposite of Israeli security protocol, which is to get out of the vehicle and find other cover because the vehicle itself could be a target.

Once we arrive at the hotel in Tel Aviv where the President will meet with Mr. Netanyahu, we must find a designated shelter or safe room in the building, called “Mamad.” We were told that once the alarm went off, it meant the missile had been intercepted or landed somewhere else, but that we should shelter in place for a few minutes to avoid falling debris. If we got separated from the President’s party or Air Force One took off without us, the little card had phone numbers we could call.

Fortunately for Mr. Biden and his traveling team, the nervous anticipation was worse than the reality we would face during our short stay.

As we headed to Tel Aviv, the beachside city looked the same as it always does. There were plenty of heavily armed soldiers along the motorcade route, but there usually were wherever the president traveled. On a warm Mediterranean day, Israelis wearing shorts and T-shirts stood along the road, taking photos with their smartphones just as people usually do during a presidential visit.

For whatever reason, the hearing sirens did not sound while Mr. Biden was on the floor. We were told that it sounded elsewhere in the country, and that it sounded in Tel Aviv after we left. But it is clear that Hamas chose not to provoke the US President during the seven and a half hours he spent in Israel.

The trip ended with another surprise. The president returned to the press box to speak formally with us on his way home — something Mr. Biden had never done before during his presidency. (“You guys are a pain in the neck,” he told us.)

Wearing a light blue jacket and jeans, he admitted the trip was a gamble, at least politically. Presidential trips are usually planned in advance with certain outcomes. This was a flyer in more ways than one.

But Mr. Biden seemed satisfied that he had accomplished what he wanted. “I think it’s worth seizing the opportunity,” he added.