TRAVEL
Israeli Tourism
Bounces Back
NECHEMIA MEYERS
Special to The Jewish News
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.
here won't be many
tourists at the inns of
Bethlehem this
Christmas; the intifada has
seen to that. But elsewhere in
the Holy Land, tourists are
once more in evidence, and ac-
commodations for them, at
least in certain popular spots,
is apt to be in short supply.
After a slow but steady
recovery since the Gulf War,
the tourism industry is now
pleased to be welcoming back
visitors from its traditional
markets in Western Europe
and North America and is
looking forward to the pro-
spect of new markets, par-
ticularly in the Far East.
Up to this point, the ubi-
quitous Japanese tourist, a
common sight in Disneyland,
the Louvre and the Tower of
London, has been almost com-
pletely absent from Masada
and the Western Wall (except
for members of the fervently
pro-Zionist Mikoya sect). In-
deed, no more than a few
thousand of the 10 million
Japanese who go abroad each
year have shown up in Israel.
There are soon likely to be a
lot more of them, however,
thanks to the Toyota Motor
Corporation's recent decision
to promote tourism to this
country and the Tokyo
government approval of an El
Al charter service to Japan,
starting in the summer of
1992.
El Al and other airlines are
also active elsewhere, either
boosting the number of their
flights to Israel (as in the case
with Lufthansa and Olym-
pic), or dispatching larger
planes to Ben-Gurion Airport
(like TWA).
Tourists who fly in are like-
ly to head for Jerusalem, Tel
Aviv or Eilat, but increasing
efforts are being made to at-
tract them to the Dead Sea
and the Galilee: the former
being billed as a natural
health farm (particularly for
people with arthritis and skin
diseases), and the latter as a
mecca for people seeking an
active vacation.
As I can testify from what
I have seen, there is, indeed,
plenty to keep one active in
the Galilee. It offers lots of
horseback riding and swimm-
ing, as well as an opportuni-
ty to go floating down the Jor-
dan in an inner tube during
the summer, or skiing down
the slopes of Mount Hermon
during the winter. Available
all year round is ice skating,
thanks to the rink opened
recently at the luxurious
Canada Sports Center in
Metulla, a town hitherto best
known as the target of ter-
rorist attacks from Lebanon.
Fortunately, it now attracts
bus-borne tourists rather
than airborne rockets.
Should the latter return,
however, the former would un-
doubtedly disappear, as was
evident earlier this year
when Iraqi Scuds killed the
local tourist industry.
Now, says Avi Etgar,
director-general of the Tour
Operators Association,
tourism is bouncing back,
with the number of visitors in
1991 likely to be 10 percent
higher than in 1989, the last
reasonably normal year. So
rather than laying people off,
as members of his group were
doing not so long ago, they are
busy looking for new
personnel.
Should the Middle East re-
main quiet, he adds, they will
be hiring even more in
1992. D
NEWS
Arab Arms
From Germany
Bonn (JTA) — Several
Arab countries have been
the recipients of arms from
the stocks of the defunct
former East German army,
diplomatic sources here
disclosed.
Egypt was the only Arab
country named, but several
others have also benefited
from the shipments made
since German unification in
October 1990.
Shipments to Israel were
widely publicized last month
when containers of military
equipment were found
aboard an Israeli freighter
in Hamburg mislabeled
agricultural equipment.
Criticism arose because
the military authorities
were making the shipments
without informing the polit-
ical echelons.
It was disclosed at the
same time that former West
Germany received Soviet-
made weapons Israel cap-
tured from Arab armies in
the 1967 Six-Day War.
Germany has also shipped
East German weapons to the
United States, France,
Britain, Spain and Turkey
since the East German army
was absorbed into the
Bundeswehr, Germany's
army.