Tourism and Israel–Arab Normalization Processes: The Case of Israel,Morocco,and the UAE

Abstract

The Iran factor and the USA’s role as a mediator are cited as notable factors contributing to the Israel–Arab rapprochement that led to the signing of the Abraham Accords in September 2020. These explanations mainly help understand the factors contributing toward the normalization and suggest that economic incentives and tourism are significant factors in sustaining the normalization in the cases of Israel–Morocco and Israel–UAE. By using the theory of tourism diplomacy, the article shows that since the Abraham Accords, tourism has been used by the governments of Israel, Morocco, and the UAE to maintain positive relations; an emotional tourism campaign through pilgrimages and saint veneration is used to promote tourism flow, especially in the case of Morocco; and tourism played a significant role in stabilizing Israel’s relations with the UAE and Morocco. This carries important policy implications for the future normalization process that tourism can play a major political tool used by Israel and Arab countries to maintain positive relations.

Keywords

Abraham Accords Israel–Arab relations normalization pilgrimage tourism diplomacy

Introduction

This article aims to highlight the role of tourism in promoting Israel’s relations with the UAE and Morocco since the signing of the Abraham Accords in September 2020. No empirical research exists on the connection between tourism flow and the promotion of Israel–Arab normalization. This article seeks to contribute to both the Israel–Arab relations literature and the peace tourism literature to understand the impact of traveling on promoting Israel’s relations with the Arab world. Several reasons necessitated focusing on Israel, Morocco, and the UAE. First, existing scholarship on Israel–Arab normalization and the Abraham Accords mainly note the common security interest (Guzansky, 2015; Rubin, 2009) and the US role as a facilitator, alongside the belief that maintaining ties with Israel can help improve Arab relations with the USA (Guzansky & Marshall, 2020; Warshel, 2021).

Scholars claim that the Israel–Arab rapprochement was based on common security interests against Iran (Guzansky, 2015; Rosman-Stollman, 2004; Rubin, 2009; Rugh, 1996; Zaga, 2021). These studies mainly underlined the official establishment of relations, while discussing the economic and cultural factors that contribute to normalization extension is rare. In line with the security explanation, Jonathan Fulton and Roie Yellinek (2021) suggested that the Middle East regional security complex is “ultimately a more important factor in explaining normalization” (p. 499). Additionally, Eyal Zisser (2023) claimed that the Emirati motive for getting close to Israel lies in the recognition that Israel has become a Middle Eastern regional security and economic power. Therefore, as Zisser (2023) suggested, normalizing relations with Israel “was in the interest of any Arab state seeking stability and security” (p. 467). Other studies have suggested that Israel’s relations with the UAE are based on economic incentives; for example, Haifa AlMaashi (2021) argued that the main incentives for Israel and the UAE lie in protecting their economic interests, suggesting that the economic pillar “seems to be the most prominent one” (p. 569).

Literature on Israel and Morocco relations has mainly focused on the secret and unofficial historical relations (Abadi, 2000; Maddy-Weitzman, 1996; Segev & Schumacher, 2008), the positive historic relationship between Morocco and its Jewish community (Ben-Layashi & Maddy-Weitzman, 2010), and the Oslo Accords in the mid-1990s that led to the establishment of the consular relations (Laskier, 2004). Mohamed Chtatou’s (2023) research on Israel’s ties with Morocco focuses on the historical relations and security cooperation. In addition, the explanation given for the 2020 normalization was the United States pushing Morocco toward it in return for Washington’s recognition of Moroccan sovereignty over Western Sahara (Arieff, 2021; Gearan et al., 2020; Warshel, 2021). This article underlines that these explanations mainly help us understand the establishment of the relations and suggests that tourism played a major role in the next stage of Israel, Morocco, and the UAE’s efforts to promote the normalization process since 2020.

This article corresponds with the economic explanation regarding Israel–Arab normalization under the Abraham Accords. It underlines the importance of tourism diplomacy within economic incentives that can reduce the Israeli–Arab conflict and promote normalization through people-to-people interactions, religious tolerance, and cultural exchanges. Further, it highlights the Moroccan and Emirati attempts to brand themselves as an attractive tourist destination for Israeli travelers. As analyzed later, the Moroccan case shows that an emotional tourism campaign through pilgrimages and saint veneration effectively promotes tourism from Israel. The article also demonstrates the links between tourism and politics in Israel–Arab relations and shows that tourism flow can be used both as an economic incentive and a political mechanism to promote ties between the signatories to stabilize relations after the Abraham Accords.

To explore the role of tourism in promoting Israel’s relations with Morocco and the UAE since the Abraham Accords, the article adopts tourism diplomacy (Becken & Carmignani, 2016; Moufakkir, 2010; Salman, 2023) as a theoretical framework. It uses a methodology of analyzing foreign policy case studies while focusing on one-sided tourism flow from Israel to the UAE and Morocco due to the limited numbers of Emiratis and Moroccans traveling to Israel. Overall, Israel is perceived as an expensive tourist destination, and Gulf Arab travelers prefer more affordable Mediterranean alternatives such as Greece or Türkiye (Central Bureau of Statistic, 2022; Israeli Ministry of Tourism, n.d., Setton, 2023). Accordingly, Ronen Krumholtz, a sales and marketing director at Diesenhaus Unitours, an Israeli travel agency, claimed that the package tours offered by Israeli agencies were considered expensive relative to other destinations (interview with the author, September 3, 2023). In addition, most Middle Eastern tour agents do not know Israel as a tourist attraction (Godinho, 2023), and it is possible that Israel’s image problem in the Arab world due to the conflict with the Palestinians has affected the low tourism flow from the Emirates and Morocco to Israel (Times of Israel, 2023a). However, at least in the case of the UAE, during the current Israel–Hamas war since October 2023, Etihad Airways from Abu Dhabi and FlyDubai (Emirates) from Dubai have continued flying to Israel while other foreign airlines halted flights to Israel (Sternlicht & Sapir, 2024). Hence, despite the Israel–Hamas war, the UAE and Morocco continue to promote people-to-people interactions.

The article first examines the Israeli tourism flow to the UAE and Morocco through the data gathered from the Abraham Accords Peace Institute databases, Israeli Ministry of Tourism, Bank of Israel, and the Israeli Central Bureau of Statistics. This data reveals the trends in the Israeli tourism flow to the UAE and Morocco. It then traces the contribution of tourism flow to the relations by analyzing the economic trends alongside statements of decision-makers that indicate the importance of tourism. For instance, the UAE’s “Year of Tolerance,” the Abrahamic House, and the Moroccan tolerance and religious coexistence are analyzed to demonstrate the groundwork of the Emirati and Moroccan governments in strengthening local conditions to create a more welcoming environment for Israeli tourists. The specific mechanisms through which tourism contributes to normalization relate to people-to-people interactions, economic interdependence, and cultural exchanges. Finally, documents published by Israeli officials and multiple public sources of information alongside interviews and statements published in the media are also used.

Tourism Diplomacy and Normalization

Studies in tourism diplomacy argue that tourism improves relations between states, including those with a political dispute (Butler & Mao, 1996), and tourism is increasingly perceived as a force for peace (Farmaki, 2017). Over the years, a growing body of literature has focused on the contribution of tourism diplomacy to peace. For instance, Omar Moufakkir (2010) suggested that tourism can be a political tool, while Susanne Becken and Fabrizio Carmignani (2016) claimed that increasing tourism can promote stability and increase the chance of peace. Similarly, it has been argued that tourism helps promote bilateral relations between Israel and Tanzania (Salman, 2023).

Numerous research has been conducted on tourism in the context of conflict and peace studies (Durko & Petrick, 2016; Farmaki & Stergiou, 2021; Higgins-Desbiolles, 2003; Kim et al., 2007). For instance, it has been argued that “politics is a crucial determinant of international tourism” (Chu et al., 2021, p. 5281). Indeed, the literature exploring the link between politics and tourism finds that relations between states influence tourism flow (Balli et al., 2019; Hall, 1994; Su et al., 2022). Some studies show that cross-country relations can affect tourism flow, among other things, through government initiatives (Farmaki, 2017; Kim et al., 2016; Tse, 2013). Overall, the tourism peace literature can be divided into two categories: one proposes that tourism can be seen as a peacemaker (D’Amore, 1988; Higgins-Desbiolles et al., 2022; Yousaf, 2021), while the second considers it as a peacekeeper (Jafari, 1989; Khalilzadeh, 2018; Litvin, 1998). Tourism can be considered a peacekeeper in Israel’s relations with the UAE and Morocco and increases economic cooperation; however, in the Israel–Arab context, the term “normalization” is more applicable rather than “peace.”

Gadi Hitman and Chen Kertcher (2018) argue that normalization can build trust through shared economic, security, and political interests, eventually leading to peace agreements. They further argue that the reconciliation process focuses on the long-term changes that need to be done in education and cultural issues to build necessary trust, which can pave the way for normalization between Israel and Arab countries. The current research corresponds with Hitman and Kertcher’s differentiation between “normalization” and “reconciliation.” In line with that, Elie Podeh (2022) proposed three normalization models in Israel–Arab relations: informal normalization, formal functional normalization, and legitimate/full normalization. Podeh (2022) suggested the term “legitimate/full normalization” to describe Israel’s relations with the UAE and Morocco since 2020. He argued that legitimate/full normalization refers to direct governmental cooperation alongside people-to-people cooperation. In addition, this type of normalization emphasizes that cooperation with Israel takes place openly and publicly.

Israel–UAE Tourism

Historically, although the UAE took part in the Arab anti-Israel coalition, there have been moves toward partial normalization with Israel. For example, the UAE joined the other Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) states to support the 1991 Madrid Conference to settle the Arab–Israeli conflict. In addition, the UAE decided to eliminate the tertiary boycott against Israel to facilitate the peace process. The signing of the 1993 Oslo Accords gradually caused the Gulf states to terminate their policy of boycotting companies that had economic relations with Israel (Guzansky, 2015; Rugh, 1996), and the Israel–UAE security and economic cooperation began to gain momentum, especially in the tourism sector.

Tourism is one of the UAE’s largest non-oil revenue sources, and Israeli tourism has become a common phenomenon since 2020. According to the Abraham Accords Peace Institute (AAPI) 2022 Annual Report, while in 2019, no Israelis had traveled to the UAE; in 2020, the number of Israeli visits to the UAE was nearly 25,000. In 2021, 113,000 Israeli tourists visited the UAE; in 2022, their number reached almost 270,000. Overall, Israeli tourism flow contributed an estimated $325 million to the UAE economy in 2022. The Abraham Accords parties saw tourism potential to expand normalization through economic activities and people-to-people exchanges. The Emirati initiatives, such as the opening of the Abrahamic House as a center of three religious spaces comprising a mosque, a church, and a synagogue; the increase of the number of kosher restaurants; and the licensing of three synagogues to act as houses of worship for Israelis tourists, contributed to create a more welcoming environment for Israeli tourists, resulting in tens of thousands of Israelis visiting the UAE. According to the AAPI June 2023 newsletter, over 95,000 Israeli tourists have flown to the UAE in May 2023. The mutual visa-free travel agreement further intensified the process (Ben David, 2022).

According to Israeli officials, 200,000 tourists from Israel visited the UAE during the COVID-19 pandemic, suggesting the potential for higher numbers once the pandemic was over (Makovsky, 2021). Since August 2020, Israelis had the option of flying directly from Israel to the UAE, and in the last 10 months of 2022, more than 150,000 Israeli tourists have traveled to the UAE (International Finance, 2023). According to Hotelier (2023), Israel is Dubai’s fastest-growing tourism source market. For instance, in 2023, of the top 20 countries, Israeli tourists are increasing the most, with 85,000 visiting in January and February alone. That is, Dubai Tourism data quoted in Hotelier show a 212% increase year-on-year, the biggest rise for any country. It puts Israel as Dubai’s eighth-largest tourism source market, ahead of Kuwait, Egypt, and France. In the case of Abu Dhabi, Israel became the 11th-largest source market, with 9,000 tourists in the first two months of 2023 (Hotelier, 2023). Finally, between January and April 2023, Israel was among the top 10 tourism source countries, and since June 2022, over 180,000 tourists have flown with Emirates Airlines between Tel Aviv and Dubai (Jerusalem Post, 2023).

Israel–Morocco Tourism

Israelis have traveled to Morocco indirectly before the Abraham Accords. For instance, from 2000 to 2004, tourism from Israel to Morocco was limited and indirect through third countries (such as Spain) due to the severance of official relations against the backdrop of the Israeli–Palestinian conflict escalation and the outbreak of the Second Intifada (Al-Aqsa Intifada) in September 2000. However, as of January 2004, Israeli groups could travel directly from Israel on organized tours to Morocco (Hayoun, 2003). Overall, since 2013, 18,000 Israeli tourists have visited Morocco, and the numbers have increased to nearly 40,000 visitors in 2019 (World Tourism Organization, 2023).

Increasing tourism from Israel is an official Moroccan foreign policy goal. This corresponds with the works of Issachar Ben-Ami (1998), Oren Kosansky (2002), and Andreh Levy (1997) on how Rabat frames an emotional tourism attraction using pilgrimages and saint veneration to attract Moroccan Jews to their homeland. Based on Sadik Rddad’s (2021) claim that Morocco has stressed cultural and economic benefits to justify its normalization with Israel, the current study argues that cultural ties and economic motives are linked to tourism flow. Thus, the Moroccan-Jewish heritage as a cultural foundation is used by the Moroccan government to increase tourism from Israel. This is a key Moroccan incentive to promote economic development (Rddad, 2021). Indeed, according to Chtatou (2023, p. 231), “Morocco remains home to hundreds of shrines of Jewish saints, where Jews celebrate every year the Hiloula […] and pilgrimage to their shrines.”

Hanane Sekkat (2019) argued that Morocco made efforts to reconnect with its Jewish diaspora, making the country an emotional attraction for them. He claims that Morocco directly uses traditional Moroccan-Jewish heritage and religious and symbolic legacy to attract Israeli tourists; one major example that connects the Moroccan Jewish diaspora back to their country of origin is the organization of hilloulot (“pilgrimages” or celebrations) to the burial sites of the tsaddikim (“revered saints”). Another example is the Moroccan radio and television channels that devote various programs to mention the coexistence between Moroccan Muslims and the Jews. These programs invite Jewish figures to highlight Jewish culture as an indispensable component of Moroccan culture. In that context, over a hundred saints in Morocco were venerated by Muslims and Jews, indicating a strong interaction between the two communities (Rddad, 2021).

There is notable evidence showing the connection between Moroccan-Jewish heritage and tourism promotion. For instance, since 2020, the Moroccan government has initiated national projects for restoring hundreds of Jewish sites and establishing the first university campus synagogue alongside institutionalizing the Jewish community’s contribution to Moroccan culture aiming to encourage tourism from Israel. The new Beit Yehuda Jewish Museum in Tangier is one of the projects, the second to be inaugurated in 2022 with the direct financial support of King Mohammed VI (Millner et al., 2022). Nadia Fettah Alaoui, the Moroccan Minister of Tourism, announced that a survey was being conducted to study the Israeli market, including training and preparing more tour guides for Israelis. These initiatives resulted in some 200,000 Israeli tourists visiting Morocco in 2022 (Times of Israel, 2023b).

One major Moroccan initiative was to recognize the Jewish role in its history, and since 2010, King Mohammed VI has launched projects to restore synagogues, Jewish cemeteries, and heritage sites. During these initiatives, 167 Jewish sites in 14 regions have been refurbished (Chtatou, 2021), resulting in an estimated 50,000 Israelis traveling to Morocco. Another reason behind Morocco’s efforts to preserve its Jewish community heritage is to promote tourism from Israel. As aforementioned, although Morocco had protected Jewish sites before the Abraham Accords, this process has been accelerated. The Moroccan government worked to attract more Israelis to travel to Morocco using pilgrimages and saint veneration. For instance, in October 2022, Morocco inaugurated a synagogue on the campus of Mohammed VI Polytechnic University. The synagogue, located in Benguerir, near Marrakesh, was inaugurated by the local Jewish community representatives (Chtatou, 2023).

Another example is the Moroccan National Tourism Office has set a goal to increase the number of Israeli tourists to 200,000 in 2023 (Ben Nun, 2022). According to the AAPI June 2023 newsletter, nearly 21,000 Israelis flew to Morocco in May 2023. In an interview, Moroccan Foreign Minister Nasser Bourita stated: “[…] Morocco has an important history with the Jewish community […] just this past year 70,000 Israelis came to visit here” (Times of Israel, 2020). This indicates that tourism has played a major role in the normalization between Israel and Morocco since 2020. Moroccan tourism diplomacy through an emotional campaign, pilgrimages, and saint veneration boosted Israel tourism and strengthened the bilateral relations since 2020.

Tourism as a Factor in Maintaining Normalization

This section will try to show the tourism role in promoting the normalization process. In the context of the UAE–Israel relations, Larissa Samoilovich, director of new markets development at the Israel Ministry of Tourism, notes that: “In signing the Accords, both nations…were counting on tourism as a critical factor in building economic ties” have demonstrated the tourism role in strengthening the normalization (Godinho, 2023). All the parties to the Abraham Accords were counting on tourism as a key pillar in building economic cooperation (Ben David, 2022), eventually deepening their relations. In 2022, Israel and the UAE (Bank of Israel, 2023) signed an agreement to boost tourism between the two countries. Israeli tourism minister Yoel Razvozov called it “historic,” arguing that it would help “establish meaningful relations that will result in great economic benefits for our markets and tourism industries.” The minister’s statement that it was, “a historical moment and an important step in our relations with the UAE” (i24news, 2022) shows that tourism is important in strengthening ties between the two countries.

To increase the tourism flow, the UAE and Israel have agreed to expand the number of direct flights by approving seven additional weekly flights for the 2023 summer season. Israeli Minister of Transportation, Miri Regev, stated: “These additional flights will strengthen the ties between the two countries […] In light of this, I decided to approve the addition of seven weekly flights.” The UAE’s ambassador to Israel, Mohamed Al Khaja said: “To further strengthen people-to-people ties between Israel and the UAE, we now have increased the number of daily flights to better connect our people and economies” (Israel Travel News, 2023). These official statements highlight the connection between the Israel–UAE normalization and tourism flow. Remarks of the Israeli Consul General in Dubai, Liron Zaslansky, that the Israel–UAE relations have “creating strategic opportunities in almost every aspect of the non-oil economy from tourism and aviation to finance and technology” can be seen as evidence of the link between economic diplomacy, tourism, and Israel–UAE rapprochement. Zaslansky claimed that “the flights between Israel and the UAE are always full” and that in the future, tourism would remain “fast-growing and one of the best-performing industries” (Gulf Business, 2023). The former Israeli Minister of Tourism, Orit Farkash-Hacohen, stated that the direct flights and the tourism flow are “an essential step toward building peace between our nations” (Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 2020). Finally, in an official visit to Bahrain in June 2023 to promote tourism between Israel, UAE, and Bahrain, tourism minister Chaim Katz said: “We will work to realize the potential of tourism between the countries and to strengthen the connection between the nations” (Bahrain News Agency, 2023).

The Moroccan Ministry of Tourism has considered the Moroccan Jewish émigrés potential tourists, and historical, religious, and cultural Judeo-Moroccan heritage has been recognized as their major attraction. One major example is the 1993 appointment of the Moroccan Jewish businessman Serge Berdugo as the Moroccan Minister of Tourism. This shows the importance of the Jewish diaspora in Morocco’s tourist economic policy. Berdugo’s appointment indicated Moroccan official recognition that religious and cultural Judeo-Moroccan heritage could benefit Morocco’s growing tourist industry (Kosansky, 2002). Another example is the Moroccan tourist bureau’s inclusion of a local guide as a translator between Israeli tourists and the local population (Levy, 1997). The link between tourism and Israeli–Moroccan normalization has also shown in the Moroccan Foreign Minister Nasser Bourita’s words during an interview with Yedioth Ahronoth: “From our perspective […] We’re talking about [re-formalizing] the relations between the countries to the relations we had […] Morocco has an important history with the Jewish community, a history that is special in the Arab world […] just this past year 70,000 Israelis came to visit here” (Times of Israel, 2020).

Morocco’s initiative to promote tourism from Israel was successful as shown above, tourism has contributed to their normalization after the renewal of official relations. One day after the official announcement of the resumption of relations, Nadia Fettah Alaoui, the Moroccan Minister of Tourism, announced that regular air routes would be established within three months. The minister also announced that a survey was being conducted to study the Israeli market to increase the tourism flow from Israel. These efforts also included training and preparing additional local tour guides for Israeli tourists (Zainabi, 2021). To sum up, the Moroccan–Israeli normalization since 2020 was nurtured largely through tourism, and many Israelis took the opportunity to travel to the place of their birth without having to obtain a visa. Moroccan policies targeting Israelis alongside the establishment of a direct flight route have contributed to boosting tourism from Israel.

Conclusion

This study used the tourism diplomacy theory to explore the tourism role in promoting the UAE, Morocco, and Israel normalization, showing the interaction between the Middle East, diplomacy, and tourism studies. As aforementioned, previous studies that have discussed UAE–Israel relations have dealt with their common security motives, and works on Morocco–Israel ties suggested a neorealist view, arguing that it was the US recognition of Morocco’s sovereignty over the western Sahara that allowed Morocco to join the Abraham Accords. This research suggests another view, focusing on analyzing the contribution of tourism in a way that has led to the expansion of their relations since 2020.

Three main conclusions have emerged from tourism diplomacy analysis: Middle Eastern governments use tourism as a political tool to promote relations. By doing so, the findings point to the value of tourism for maintaining and strengthening normalizations among nations. The work extends previous research on politics and tourism (Hall, 1994) and tourism as a peacekeeper (Salman, 2023). Second, Morocco used an emotional tourism campaign through pilgrimages and saint veneration, while the UAE used religious tolerance to promote traveling and tourism flow from Israel. Third, this analysis demonstrates the importance of tourism flow resulting in people-to-people contacts and economic growth in the context of the complex Israel–Arab relations. Overall, local initiatives of Morocco and the Emirati governments have contributed to creating a welcoming environment for Israeli travelers through religious tolerance, thus supporting the normalization process.

Regarding the peace tourism debate, the findings specifically highlighted the tourism role as a peacekeeper, showing that tourism played a major role in stabilizing Israel–UAE and Israel–Morocco relations through traveling and economic growth since the signing of the Abraham Accords. The results validate the concept that tourism promotes peaceful relations, and in that sense, this study corresponds with the literature viewing tourism as a peacekeeper and an economic growth engine. Economic motives through tourism diplomacy have positively affected the continued normalization between the UAE, Morocco, and Israel since 2020. In the context of Israel’s Arab countries relations, this is an important theoretical finding that relations can develop through economic considerations and tourism flow. According to the AAPI 2023 annual report, despite the geopolitical tensions in the Middle East, the overall diplomatic and trade relations, including tourism, have continued, although people-to-people initiatives have slowed. Furthermore, future research needs to explore tourism as a tool Middle Eastern countries use for political purposes. By doing so, states can understand how tourism flow can be used for political purposes related to promoting Israel’s bilateral relations with Middle Eastern Arab countries.

Footnotes

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The author received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

ORCID iD

Yaron Salman

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