Bahrain-Israel ties are growing daily in the wake of the historic Abraham Accords, signed in 2020, a top kingdom official told Israel Hayom over the weekend.
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These budding ties received a boon from two major events recently – last week's Negev Summit, and the 28th International Mediterranean Tourism Market (IMTM), held in Tel Aviv on March 29-30.
Bahrain took an active part in the expo, alongside 56 other countries. The kingdom's booth was graced by its top tourism official, Industry, Commerce and Tourism Minister Zayed bin Rashid al Zayani, who shared Manama's plans in the field – to reach 14 million tourists a year by the end of 2026.
Given that the emirate is home to only 1.7 million people, this is a particularly ambitious vision. To illustrate, Israel – with a population of about 9 million – recorded a pre-pandemic high of 4.5 million tourists in 2019.
Al-Zayani, for his part, is convinced that as long as you put your mind to it, no industry target is too high.
"We are investing in tourism infrastructure. We are currently building the largest exhibition at the conference center in the Middle East and we hope it will be ready this year. We are investing in indoor infrastructure, beaches, and water facilities around Bahrain," he said.
Bahrain's International Exhibition and Convention Center is set to be completed in late 2022 when it will become the region's largest expo hall. Spanning 310,000 sqm., the center is slated to offer 95,000 sqm. of exhibition space across 10 halls, a 4,000-seat tiered auditorium, 95 meeting rooms, Royal & VIP Majlis, a 250-seat restaurant, and a host of executive and auxiliary offices.
Bahrain has much to offer tourists. A combination of over 5,000 years of history and modern skyline, spectacular shopping malls, luxury hotels, buzzing nightlife, and more. Prices in Bahrain are significantly lower compared to other countries in the region and compared to Israel.
"Prices in Bahrain are very competitive. We have hotels of all levels of hotels, with a very high level of service and a professional staff," al-Zayani noted.
"During the coronavirus period, we supported our tourism industry. The government paid for the salaries of all those employed in the industry during the first three months of the pandemic. We also abolished all tourism levies, so they didn't have to pay the government anything, as we subsidized state services like water. The first aid package amounted to about 32% of our GDP. We allocated four additional ones, at lower amounts."
Al-Ziani is optimistic about the future: "Relations with Israel are growing very fast. About a year and a half since the Abraham Accords we have an embassy here and Israel has an embassy in Manama, and the two ambassadors are very active.
"We have signed 38 agreements and MoUs between the two governments. Bahrain has opened the doors for the flow of business and investments with Israel, and we are already seeing sharp growth in the volume of trade.
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"Bahrain exports aluminum and steel to Israel, and imports mainly high-tech components from Israel, and now we have also begun to see tourism developments."
Sonia Gorodeisky was a guest in Bahrain as part of the press delegation to Formula 1, held annually in Bahrain.
