Despite the opening of the “Green Islands” in Eilat and the Dead Sea, hotel occupancy in November was only 200,000 people – a decrease of 91% compared to the same period last year.
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The highest occupancy during the last month was recorded in Eilat – 15% occupancy, compared to 76% occupancy in 2019. Contributed to this by the restrictions imposed by the government, opening the skies to flights and the peace agreement with the UAE that allowed many Israelis to vacation in the country. from her. At the same time, it should be noted that the hotels in Eilat and the Dead Sea only operated for 10 days. In the rest of the country the vast majority of hotels are still inactive.
November continues the trend that characterized 2020: If at the beginning of the year there was an expectation of a fourth consecutive year of records in inbound tourism and overnight stays in the country’s accommodation services, then the corona disrupted hotel activity in the country, which has almost completely ceased since March. During March, room occupancy was only 22%, while during the months of April-May, hotel activity was almost nil. Around the eve of Pentecost, which fell on May 28, several hotels returned to activity, and more hotels opened afterwards. Israel’s international borders remained closed and tourist activity in hotels was mainly of guests from Israel.
In June-August, although the borders were still closed, there was a recovery thanks to the contribution of domestic tourism: the number of overnight stays was almost all (98%) of Israeli guests, and room occupancy rose from 21% in June to 52% in August.
In mid-September, before the start of the Tishrei holidays, a second closure was announced in Israel. The hotels remained almost completely closed until mid-November, and the “Green Tourism Islands” law in Eilat and the Dead Sea hotel area. Entry into these areas was allowed only after Corona inspections, and the hotels were granted permission to operate in the normal format under the restrictions of the “purple character”. In the rest of the country, some of the hotels operated only in a room rental format, without additional activities such as restaurants, gyms and pools.
As of March, a number of hotels were transferred to the Home Front Command and Corona patients or people who had to be isolated were housed there, but data on this activity of the hotels are not included in the data.