Crisis in The Middle East: What Does it Mean for Travel?

It's been almost a year since the war between Israel and Hamas began, and it's been spreading wider.

For outsiders looking in, it can appear like the whole region is in meltdown, and that travel would have ground to a halt. In reality, tourism performance varies wildly across the region, with places like Dubai still doing well, but war-affected areas doing far worse. 

Here’s what the crisis in the Middle East has meant for travel so far.

Only around 500,000 tourists visited Israel between January and June, compared to about two million up to the same point last year. Around 10% of hotels in Israel are facing imminent financial collapse due to a steep decline in occupancy rates, according to a report published in July by the Israel Hotel Association (IHA).

Prior to the October 7 attack, Israel had high hopes for its tourism sector. In 2022, the country had 2.7 million tourists with $4 billion in spending. Israel was on track for a record-breaking year of tourism in 2023.

The U.S. Department of State puts its "Travel Advisory" for Egypt at ‘Level 3’ – meaning travelers “should reconsider travel" and it cites the risk of terrorism. The highest level is 4, which means "do not travel."

But tourism officials in the country have previously pointed to continued demand. “Egypt had seen demand despite the geopolitical issues, which shows that safety is important but also how the travel professionals and the tourists are quite educated about the role of Egypt during this issue that is happening,” Ghada Shalaby, Egyptian vice minister for tourism affairs said at Dubai's Arabian Travel Market in May.

“There is demand coming into Egypt even to all its destinations, so the numbers speak for themselves.”

Egypt brought in nearly 7.1 million tourists in the first half of 2024, on par wit