Israel warns citizens against traveling to Sharm el-Sheikh

CAIRO – 29 March 2017: Israel issued a travel warning to its citizens Tuesday to leave Sinai’s Sharm el-Sheikh over “high-risk security concerns”, reported the

Associated Press

.

Prime Minister's Benjamin Netanyahu's counterterrorism office said there is a “very high concrete threat” of attacks and recommended Israelis leave the area immediately. The office also suggested those planning to visiting change their plans.

In April 2016, the Israeli counterterrorism office warned Israelis against traveling to Egypt’s Sinai during Passover, also due to “possible terrorist attacks,”

Youm7

cited Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth as saying.

A total of 148,336 Israeli tourists visited Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula from January through November 2015, compared with 140,425 tourists in the same period in 2014, according to data provided by Egypt’s Ministry of Tourism in January 2016.

Egypt’s tourism sector, which represents 11 percent of the country’s GDP, has suffered from ongoing shocks ever since the 2011 uprising that toppled then-President Hosni Mubarak from power. In 2013, tourism in Sharm el-Sheikh did not pass 44 percent due to terrorist attacks in North Sinai after Mubarak’s successor, President Mohamed Morsi, was also removed from power,

ONA

reported.


Although Egypt has trade agreements with Israel dating to 1980, allows Israeli tourists to visit and both countries maintain mutual embassies, Egyptian society generally refuses to acknowledge normalization with Israel.

Egypt has officially recognized Israel since the Camp David Accords, a peace agreement brokered by U.S. President Jimmy Carter and signed by the late President Anwar Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin in 1989.