Who can file here from 31 August 2026
The announcement of 29 August replaced the former document showing current location with “Proof of Permanent Residence (sefach)” and added a criminal record certificate. The rule applies from 31 August, from midnight Thai time.
The sefach is the detachable address slip that goes with the teudat zehut, an everyday document of a resident rather than a permanent residence status. If the post really does accept it, Israel turns out to have one of the mildest readings of the rule in the world. But this is one line in one announcement: the Thai foreign ministry infographic attached to that same announcement has no word “sefach” in it, just “proof of permanent residence”, and the embassy’s DTV page has not changed since July 2024. We have not come across a single account of a filing through Tel Aviv. So we call the sefach a hypothesis rather than a rule, and for a foreign resident of Israel without a teudat zehut we ask the post first.
One more discrepancy inside that same announcement concerns the old rules. The text of the post says that applications filed and paid for before 31 August will be finished under the previous requirements; the foreign ministry infographic says merely filed. There is one safe criterion: filed and paid.
Filing is online, the money is cash in Herzliya
Tel Aviv is the only one of the eight English-language posts to write in plain words that online payment is not available. The application goes through the e-Visa portal, and the fee is paid in cash at the embassy by prior appointment. Processing takes 7 working days from the payment, the day of payment not counted: formally the shortest stated timeline of the eight, but the count runs from the money, not from the filing.
Two things follow. There is no such thing as remote filing in Tel Aviv, electronic form or not. And to the timeline you have to add the wait for an appointment, whose length the post does not publish. Nor does it name the size of the fee; we do not repeat agency figures.
The criminal record certificate
The post has named the document but not its validity period. Our policy is the same as for every post: a certificate no older than three months, which covers any requirement.
The Israeli certificate is free, comes out in Hebrew and English in a single document, and is available not only to citizens but to foreigners over 12. The state declares no issuing time at all. An apostille does not work for Thailand until 28 February 2027. The e-Visa form allows the certificate of the country of citizenship or of the country of filing — for a foreign resident that is a real choice.
There is a technical difficulty too: under the rules of issue the certificate is handed not to the applicant but to the recipient entitled to receive it. How the file then gets into the e-Visa portal, neither the embassy nor the police has explained. It is the first question we are putting to the post.
How filing works
- The application goes through the e-Visa, the fee in cash at the embassy in Herzliya by appointment.
- The timeline is 7 working days from the date of payment.
- Finances per the form: three months of statements from one or several banks with a balance no lower than 500,000 THB — about ₪45,768 on 3 September — or a sponsorship letter. The post has published no money requirements of its own.
- The post reserves the right to request further documents, call the applicant in for an interview or refuse without giving reasons.
- Dependants: the post has no rules of its own. By the general rule that means a spouse and children under 20, and the certificate the form asks for applies to them too — while in Israel it is not issued to anyone under 12.
What else matters
The embassy’s DTV page has not been rewritten since July 2024: the new rule lives only in the announcement of 29 August and in the form itself. From 15 September 2026 visa-free entry for Israeli citizens drops from 60 to 30 days.
What we track here
Whether the sefach really passes. The size of the fee and the real length of the queue for an appointment. How the certificate reaches the applicant’s hands. And the first live case: until there is one, every figure here is the post’s text, not practice.
A package you have assembled yourself we check before filing — the Preflight Check: $300, a written report within two working days. Full support all the way to the visa is the Solo Route and Family Route.
The state of every consulate is on the live board, and the consulate assigned to your country is on the map.