Not being privy to the type of system El Al intends to install, or its redundancy/safety systems I just want to play devils advocate for a second..........
Having seen a chinook accidentally ripple fire its whole load of flares at about 50ft after take off (& burn down a barn) and having seen an sea king fire 6 flares on the ground (one of which bounced off the helo pad, past the fuel tanker and impact the refueller in the back - thankfully he was wearing his you cant burn me clothes) and having had many flares personally miss-fire due to reflected flashes of light from window glass & gunfire rather than a incoming missile, I can surely see the FAA wanting to see more proof of the systems safety.
These systems operate well at medium altitudes but at low level there are problems.....and of course there is the human error aspect.
How many flares is an El Al 777 going to have and what package is it going to use to fire them...... not one at time thats for sure; probably 10 at a time to cover the required threat/arc.
Imagine for a second and accidental misfiring on the ground in the alley at LAX............ carnage!!!!
As I said, I'm playing devils on this argument...... it could be that the spams need to have an aircraft shot down first to justify the threat.
By-the-by, doesnt Airforce 1 have chaff/flares/jammers already?
I can see the day now that after deicing we'll move to the ORP for arming then on to the holding point at the runway...............
Personally I think we'd be better off with laser jammers anyway!