Israel has enjoyed a boom in tourism over the past 12 months and leaders of the industry are confident they can repeat the success and do even better in the year ahead.
They told a press conference here today that a record 865,000 tourists visited Israel in the period January-July, 1985, a 19 percent increase over the same period last year. In the last 12 months, 1.5 million tourists came, representing $1.5 billion in revenues.
Rafi Farber, Director General of the Ministry of Tourism, said Israel could increase its tourist business without investing in a larger infrastructure. He pointed out that there are now some 30,000 hotel rooms in the country which can accommodate more than two million tourists a year. This means Israel can absorb an additional 600,000 visitors without building more hotels.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
