Is paying a sum of money to an airport employee to expedite the procedures for an arriving traveler from abroad considered bribery?

Whether this money was given to the employee at the airport by his request or without his request, it is neither permissible to give it nor to accept it. This is because gifts to employees are a form of treachery. If giving it results in obtaining something one is not entitled to, or prioritizing someone over another who is more deserving, then this money becomes a forbidden bribe. A bribe is what is given to the bribed person after he requests it, while a gift is given to him proactively. It is forbidden for the employee to take either of them, based on the hadith: "Gifts to employees are ghulūl (treachery/ill-gotten gain)."