The Israeli Embassy in Vienna has lost contact with an Israeli mother and daughter who have been missing in the Austrian capital since Friday, the Foreign Ministry announced Tuesday afternoon, as hundreds of volunteers joined the search alongside Austrian and Israeli authorities.
Mali Yahalomi, 50, and her daughter Liel, 23, remained in regular contact with family throughout the early part of their trip before communication stopped entirely. According to Mali’s sister, Elinor, the two had planned the trip carefully in advance, beginning in Prague before purchasing train tickets to Vienna and checking into an apartment hotel in the city. They sent family photos on Wednesday, Mali exchanged private messages with Elinor on Thursday, and both remained active in the family group chat on Friday, again sharing photos. Nothing in their communications suggested anything unusual or concerning before contact was lost.
By Sunday evening, after repeated attempts to reach them went unanswered and a WhatsApp message to Mali sat unread with only a single check mark, the family opened an official missing persons case with the Israeli Foreign Ministry’s emergency center. Elinor said she initially tried contacting the apartment hotel directly but could only reach security staff unable to assist. Since Monday morning, an Israeli consul has been coordinating directly with the hotel’s management and the local Chabad House in Vienna, while keeping the family continuously updated on the search.
Israeli Embassy in Vienna published an infographic asking for assistance in locating two Israelis last seen in Austria in August 2026. (credit: ISRAELI EMBASSY IN VIENNA)
As of Tuesday, authorities have no leads on the pair’s whereabouts. A relative told Channel 12 the search has turned up nothing despite the scale of the effort. “The ground has swallowed them up. Everyone is out searching for them, and there’s simply nothing. There are no leads whatsoever. We’re at a loss.” An unnamed Israeli official gave Ynet a similarly grim assessment while stopping short of presuming the worst. “Everyone is out searching for them in an effort to locate them. Various parties are involved. They can’t be found anywhere. It doesn’t look good, but we hope they will be found safe and sound.”
The family is holding onto the hope that Mali and Liel will simply turn up at Vienna Airport for their scheduled flight home to Israel.
The Israeli Embassy has asked the public for help locating the two women, and is urging Mali and Liel themselves, should they see the appeal, to contact their family, the embassy’s emergency hotline at +43 676 367 2304, or local police immediately.
Not the First Such Case This Year
The disappearance follows a separate, less alarming incident in Vienna this past May involving another Israeli traveler. Meir Forman, 80, who went missing after mistakenly boarding a flight to Vienna instead of his intended destination of Munich, according to an N12 News report. Forman wandered out of Vienna’s airport and was found roughly three days later following a weekend-long search by Austrian and Israeli authorities. Austrian welfare officials told N12 that Forman appeared to be suffering from severe confusion and memory loss at the time, and had arrived in the city without a phone or any financial means, complicating the search for him.
Nothing in the current case points to a similar explanation. Mali and Liel’s trip was planned well in advance, their communications with family showed no signs of distress or confusion, and both remained active and responsive right up until Friday. The Israeli consul’s coordination with both the hotel where they were staying and the local Chabad community suggests investigators are treating this as a distinct and more serious situation than Forman’s case, rather than assuming a similar resolution.
This is a developing story. Anyone with information about Mali or Liel Yahalomi’s whereabouts is asked to contact the Israeli Embassy in Vienna’s emergency hotline at +43 676 367 2304 or local Austrian police.
