On the 40th anniversary of the International Institute for Peace Through Tourism, the industry should ask itself a difficult question: If tourism truly stands for peace, can it remain silent when peace, human rights, and entire communities are being destroyed?
If playback is interrupted, you can restart it.
Tomorrow, September 10, marks the 40th anniversary of the International Institute for Peace Through Tourism (IIPT)— four decades dedicated to advancing a simple but powerful idea: that tourism can and should be a force for peace.
Everyone is invited to join this anniversary celebration during a special global webinar, “Beyond Borders: Travel, the Future and the Pursuit of Peace,”tomorrow at 09:00 New York / 14:00 UK / 15:00 Central Europe.
Click here to register and attend the free webinar.
This anniversary should be more than a celebration of the past. It should be an opportunity for the global travel and tourism industry to confront the world as it exists today—and ask whether the principles of Peace Through Tourism demand more than speeches, declarations, and conference discussions.
This article brings that question directly into the crisis engulfing Israel, Palestine and an increasingly unstable Middle East.
Because right now, the very region that gave birth to three of the world’s great religions — and that for generations has drawn travellers in search of history, faith, culture and human connection — is being torn apart. Israel, Lebanon, Gaza and the Palestinian territories. Jordan. The UAE. Saudi Arabia. The wider Gulf.
Countries and destinations that built, or were building, vibrant tourism economies are confronting war, political confrontation, attacks on infrastructure and shipping, threatened airspace, collapsing visitor confidence and an international image increasingly defined not by hospitality, heritage and discovery, but by conflict.
That should concern every tourism leader in the world. For decades, Israel sold the world an extraordinary tourism story.
Jerusalem. Tel Aviv. The Dead Sea. The Mediterranean. Ancient history, religion, food, nightlife, beaches, archaeology and cultural heritage unlike almost anywhere else on earth.
Millions came. Many loved what they found and returned. But tourism is about something much bigger than hotels, airlines and visitor numbers.
Tourism is about a country’s image.
And images can be destroyed. The question the international tourism industry should now be asking is uncomfortable but unavoidable:
What happens when the actions of governments make travelers no longer want to come?
And there is an even harder question:
If we truly believe in Peace Through Tourism, at what point does silence in the face of war, suffering and violations of human rights become incompatible with the values our industry claims to represent?
We must also remember how this fire started
Any honest discussion of what followed must begin with October 7, 2023, when Hamas-led militants launched a horrific terrorist attack on Israel, killing about 1,200 people and taking some 250 hostages. The deliberate murder and abduction of civilians was indefensible. Israel had both a right and an obligation to protect its citizens from terrorism.
But October 7 also ignited a fire whose consequences spread far beyond that day’s horror. What followed devastated Gaza, deepened fear and hatred, destabilized neighboring countries and contributed to an expanding cycle of military confrontation that has reached far beyond Israel and Palestine.
Today that fire is burning across a much wider region.
The Gulf is facing attacks on commercial shipping, Iran and the United States are exchanging strikes, Jordan has faced Iranian missile attacks connected to the wider conflict, and renewed Houthi attacks have struck Saudi Arabia. On September 9 alone, Iran said it had attacked 10 vessels near the Strait of Hormuz after the United States sank five Iranian oil tankers.
The fire that began with terrorism and war has become something the world is struggling to contain.Recognizing the horror of October 7 does not require remaining silent about everything that came afterward.
Both truths must have a place in any serious conversation about peace.
Gaza cannot be separated from tourism’s conversation
Then there is Gaza. The accusations surrounding Israel’s conduct there are among the gravest imaginable.
The word genocidecarries an exceptionally serious legal meaning and should not be used casually. A United Nations Commission of Inquiry has concluded that Israel committed genocide in Gaza. Israel strongly rejects that conclusion and maintains that its military campaign has been directed against Hamas.
Separately, the genocide case brought by South Africa against Israel remains before the International Court of Justice and has not yet resulted in a final judgment on the merits of whether genocide occurred.
Those distinctions matter. But legal terminology cannot become an excuse for looking away from the scale of human suffering.
Tourism cannot promote “people-to-people understanding” at conferences and then suddenly decide that human beings are somebody else’s business when those questions become politically uncomfortable.
If tourism claims to be a force for peace, those words have to mean something when peace disappears.
Israel’s diplomatic isolation is becoming harder to ignore
The latest confrontation between Israel and Britain should be another warning.
Britain, France and Canada have moved to block imports from Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank, while nine additional governments have backed the initiative. Israel responded by ordering Britain’s East Jerusalem consulate closed, barring British political figures from entering Israel and removing Britain from other cooperation arrangements.
Britain says the measures are intended to oppose settlement expansion and defend prospects for a two-state solution. Israel describes them as morally distorted and interference in its sovereignty.
Whatever one’s politics, this is no longer a routine diplomatic disagreement.
It is another indication of a widening gulf between the policies of Israel’s right-wing government and governments Israel historically counted among its friends. And tourism executives should pay attention.
A government can destroy its country’s tourism brand
- Destination marketing executives spend fortunes constructing national brands.
- They advertise warmth.
- Hospitality.
- Safety.
- Tolerance.
- Culture.
- Freedom.
They invite influencers, journalists and tour operators to discover the “real” country behind the headlines.
But governments create images too. And sometimes government policy can undo in months what tourism authorities spent decades building.
Israel is an especially painful example because it possessed one of the world’s strongest tourism propositions.
Jerusalem is sacred to Jews, Christians and Muslims. Israel offers extraordinary archaeological and cultural attractions, the Dead Sea, Mediterranean resorts, Tel Aviv’s restaurants and nightlife, and landscapes familiar to billions of people through religion and history.
There are countless Israelis working in hotels, restaurants, aviation, guiding, transportation and tourism who did not create their government’s policies.
They are among those who pay the economic price. And that leads to a question Israel’s tourism leaders themselves should be asking:
Why is the government behaving as it is, where is this road leading, and what will ultimately remain of Israel’s international tourism image?
Tourism is extraordinarily vulnerable to reputation. People can admire a country’s people, history and culture while strongly opposing its government. But eventually government actions can become inseparable from the image travelers associate with the destination.
That is the danger Israel now faces.
The damage does not stop at Israel’s borders
This is perhaps the greatest failure in how the tourism industry discusses the Middle East. Travellers do not carry geopolitical maps in their heads. Conflict in one country contaminates perceptions of neighboring destinations. Petra did not start the Gaza war. The Bedouin tourism businesses of Wadi Rum did not decide Israeli policy. Jordanian hotel employees did not expand West Bank settlements.
Yet they can pay part of the bill.
The same applies to businesses across the Gulf.
A family considering a holiday may not distinguish between an attack hundreds of kilometres from Dubai, a missile intercepted over Jordan, fighting involving Saudi Arabia or an incident near the Strait of Hormuz. They see one headline: MIDDLE EAST WAR.And they change their plans.
This is how regional instability spreads through tourism.
A missile does not have to hit a hotel to destroy its bookings. It merely has to hit the television screen.
Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Saudi Arabia should be paying attention
For the UAE and Saudi Arabia, the implications should be obvious. These countries have invested enormous amounts of money in turning tourism into a pillar of economic diversification.
Dubai and Abu Dhabi have become global aviation and tourism centres. Saudi Arabia is investing heavily in transforming itself into a major international leisure destination. Yet no tourism strategy exists in geopolitical isolation.
The wider Gulf is now confronting exactly the sort of uncertainty that tourism destinations fear: attacks on shipping, threats to energy infrastructure, military exchanges and questions about whether instability has changed from an occasional risk into a persistent regional condition.
When travelers begin seeing an entire region through the prism of missiles, drones, military confrontation and instability, geographical distinctions that seem obvious to governments and tourism boards can disappear remarkably quickly in consumers’ minds.
That should concern tourism leaders throughout the Gulf. Because this is no longer merely an Israeli tourism crisis.
It risks becoming a Middle Eastern tourism crisis.
And where does the United States fit into this?
Washington cannot be removed from this conversation either. The United States has been Israel’s indispensable strategic partner. It is also now directly involved in an escalating regional military confrontation.
That makes American policy part of any serious discussion about the direction of this crisis and its consequences.
The difference between Washington and several of its traditional allies is increasingly visible. Britain, France and Canada are moving against trade from Israeli settlements, while the United States has declined to follow them. Secretary of State Marco Rubio has instead warned that such sanctions could destabilize the West Bank.
Tourism leaders therefore have every right to ask:
When powerful governments pursue, enable or support policies that contribute to wider instability, who ultimately pays the economic price?
- Often it isn’t the politicians.
- It is the airline employee.
- The Palestinian tour guide.
- The Israeli hotel worker.
- The Jordanian driver.
- The restaurant owner in Petra.
- The travel agency in Dubai.
- The hotel employee in Saudi Arabia.
- The family whose livelihood depends upon visitors arriving next month.
- Regional instability produces economic casualties far beyond the battlefield.
Tourism cannot claim neutrality forever
- The global tourism establishment loves the language of sustainability.
- We talk about ESG.
- Responsible tourism.
- Community tourism.
- Human rights.
- Diversity.
- Peace through travel.
We put these words on conference stages, annual reports and glossy brochures. But values are very easy when they cost nothing. The real test comes when defending them might cost a destination, a government relationship, a sponsor or a customer.
Should tourism organizations speak about human rights?
Yes.
Should they become political parties?
No.
Should they tell travelers which side of every geopolitical dispute to support?
No.
But there is an enormous difference between partisan politics and defending fundamental principles.
- Tourism organizations can condemn terrorism and the atrocities of October 7.
- They can condemn antisemitism.
- They can defend the rights and security of Israelis.
- They can defend Palestinian civilians.
- They can oppose forced displacement and settler violence.
- They can demand humanitarian access.
- They can defend international humanitarian law.
And they can question governments — Israeli, American, Iranian, Arab, European or anyone else — when their decisions put civilian lives and regional stability in jeopardy. These principles should not depend on which flag is flying over the government responsible.
And none of those positions requires hatred of a country or its people.
- Criticizing the policies of an Israeli government is not the same as attacking Israelis or Jews.
- Criticizing the American government is not anti-American.
- Condemning Hamas is not an attack on Palestinians.
- Condemning the actions of the Iranian government is not an attack on Iranians.
That distinction is essential if tourism genuinely wants to be an instrument of peace rather than another voice in a political shouting match.
Israel’s tourism industry should ask its own government questions
Perhaps some of the most important voices should come from inside Israel. Israel’s tourism industry has every reason to ask its government:
Where is this taking us?
What will Israel’s international tourism image look like five years from now?
How many travellers who once dreamed of visiting Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and the Dead Sea will decide they cannot reconcile that holiday with what they have watched happening in Gaza and the West Bank?
- How many conventions will go elsewhere?
- How many airlines will hesitate?
- How many tour operators will quietly remove Israel from programmes because the commercial and reputational complications have become too great?
- And how long will it take to win those travellers back?
Tourism leaders should also be willing to ask why policies are being pursued when they appear to be contributing to Israel’s international isolation.
The settlement sanctions announced this week are largely symbolic economically because settlement goods represent only a small fraction of Israel’s exports.
But symbols matter.
Britain, France and Canada taking coordinated action against settlement trade is itself a story about Israel’s changing international image. Reuters describes the measures as highlighting Israel’s growing isolation among countries it once counted as close allies.
That image eventually reaches consumers. Security crises can end surprisingly quickly.
Reputational crises can last generations.
Tourism sells more than destinations
This is the part our industry sometimes forgets.
- We don’t really sell hotel rooms.
- We sell the feeling of being welcome.
- We don’t simply sell airline seats.
- We sell confidence that passengers will arrive safely and return home safely.
- And we don’t merely sell countries.
We sell an idea of those countries.
That is why what is happening across Israel, Palestine and the wider Middle East belongs in the tourism conversation.
- The suffering and destruction in Gaza matter.
- The future and dignity of Palestinians matter.
- The security of Israelis matters.
- The victims of October 7 matter.
- The hostages and their families matter.
- The violence and settlement expansion in the West Bank matter.
- Jordan’s stability matters.
- The future of Gulf tourism matters.
- And the decisions being made in Washington matter.
They are interconnected.
Forty years later, what does Peace Through Tourism mean?
That brings us back to tomorrow’s anniversary. For 40 years, the International Institute for Peace Through Tourism has advanced the proposition that tourism can help create a more peaceful world.
It is an inspiring idea. But anniversaries should not merely celebrate history. They should force us to examine whether the principles established 40 years ago still guide our actions today.
The theme of tomorrow’s webinar — “Beyond Borders: Travel, the Future and the Pursuit of Peace”— could hardly be more appropriate. Because perhaps the question today is no longer simply what tourism can do for peace.
It is: What must tourism do for peace?
If tourism is genuinely an industry of peace, peace cannot simply be something we discuss when the world is peaceful. Its principles matter most precisely when the world is not.
Silence is also a position
The tourism industry should therefore stop asking whether these subjects are “too political” for tourism.
- War is already political.
- Closed airspace is political.
- Sanctions are political.
- Borders are political.
- Visas are political.
- Travel warnings are political.
And when political decisions empty hotels, ground aircraft, destroy communities and frighten millions of travellers away from an entire region, pretending tourism exists outside politics becomes impossible.
Israel’s government has every right to defend its policies. Britain, France, Canada and others have every right to challenge those policies through lawful diplomatic and economic measures.
Citizens have every right to argue passionately about both.
But the tourism industry also has a right — and increasingly a responsibility — to ask what kind of Middle East is being created.
Because there was, and still can be, a Middle East millions of travelers want to discover.
- Israel.
- Palestine.
- Jordan.
- Lebanon
- The UAE
- Saudi Arabia.
- Qatar
- Bahrhain
- Oman
- Iran
A region of astonishing history, hospitality, religion, landscapes, cuisine and human stories. For tourism, the tragedy is not simply that fewer people may visit tomorrow. It is that political leaders may be destroying something much harder to rebuild:
the world’s desire to come.
Tomorrow, as the International Institute for Peace Through Tourism celebrates its 40th anniversary, perhaps this is the question our industry should put at the center of that celebration:
If tourism will not speak for peace when peace is being destroyed, when exactly will it?Because Peace Through Tourism cannot merely be a slogan used when it is convenient. It cannot be confined to conference stages, declarations and anniversary celebrations.
Forty years after IIPT first advanced this vision, the world may need that principle more urgently than ever.
Peace is not simply something tourism should support. Peace is the prerequisite tourism depends on.
Leave a Comment