Jerusalem’s Old City vendors say tourism slump is squeezing family shops across all four quarters
Jerusalem’s Old City is normally one of the most visited corners of the Middle East. Pilgrims and tourists move through its labyrinthine streets, past the Western Wall, the Church of the Holy Sepulcher and the golden Dome of the Rock, filling the souvenir shops and family-run galleries of the Jewish, Muslim, Christian and Armenian quarters. Now, shopkeepers say, that steady current has nearly dried up.
In interviews with The Jerusalem Post this week, vendors across all four quarters described a three-year tourism slump that has left their businesses under severe strain. They pointed to the same culprits: fewer flights to Israel, high airfares, and fears abroad that the country is unsafe. The result, several said, is a marketplace that feels empty even during what should be peak seasons.
“The day-to-day tourism is horrible,” said Eitan, owner of Mira, a family shop in the Jewish Quarter. “Not too many people. There’s not the traffic that there should be.”
His family has lived in the Old City since 1968, and Eitan has run the business since 1984, through “all the intifadas” and “all the wars.” The current drought, he said, is rooted in simple math. “There are a reduced number of flights, and the flights that are operating are too expensive for many people, and people are afraid to come,” he said. “I know a lot of people who cancel their trips. Sometimes the airline canceled their trip; sometimes they could not come because of the prices. Once you have limited seats available, not everybody can come.”
Eitan said meaningful recovery will remain out of reach until airlines return in force. “As long as the airlines are not coming back to Israel, I don’t see any solution,” he said.
Similar concerns echoed through the Old City. Dia, a longtime vendor in the Muslim Quarter whose family runs the well-known “Alabama – The Heart of Dixie” shop, said the decline has made business “very, very slow.”
“It’s very safe, the Old City,” he said, but the image of Israel abroad since the war began on Oct. 7, 2023 has kept visitors away. “Three years now, nobody comes.”
Near the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in the Christian Quarter, Hassan, a souvenir vendor, painted the same picture. Business has been “very weak,” he said. “There are no tourists now.” He recalled eight to ten months before the war when the shop was doing well, “but now, it’s zero.”
In the Armenian Quarter, Garo Sandrouni, who runs a ceramics gallery with his wife, Sonia, said even the end of the latest major exchange of strikes between Israel and Iran earlier this year did not generate a noticeable uptick. With the Jewish New Year coming in September, he said, vendors are hoping for better days.
“Now, everybody is expecting in September that it will be much more,” Sandrouni said. “Let’s see. But now, there is not much difference from what it was like three months ago or four months ago.”
Like other shopkeepers, Sandrouni sees expensive flights as the main obstacle. “They’re much more expensive than before, and some people are also afraid to come,” he said. The fear, he added, comes in three layers: “first from the war, secondly from flights if they cancel, and thirdly from the expensive tickets.” He recalled customers who were stranded in Israel after foreign carriers canceled service; some made their way to Jordan to fly home.
Sandrouni said these last three years have been the worst in his four decades on the street. “I have been here for like 40, 45 years on this street,” he said. “It is the worst thing that we have witnessed. I mean, from the October war until today.”
Outside the Old City, tourism analysts see a broader structural crisis. Many foreign carriers suspended or limited service after the war began, and the slower-than-expected return of routes has kept capacity tight. In June, Dr. Eran Ketter, an Israeli tourism expert, told The Post that the industry was being held back by geopolitical instability, the strength of the shekel, limited air capacity and higher travel costs. The United States, historically Israel’s largest source market, has been particularly affected.
“Putting all of this together, we’re coming into a situation that only people who really want to travel to Israel, and can afford it, are traveling at the moment,” Ketter said.
Ketter said greater political stability would be the “number one enabler,” allowing tourism to shift from a nearly three-year “survival state” into “growth mode.” Stability, he argued, would also persuade airlines to resume service, creating competition and pushing fares down.
Tourism Ministry Director-General Michael Izhakov made the same point in July. “When there are no flights, there is no tourism,” he said. “Once the flights reopen, we will see a very rapid recovery in inbound tourism to Israel.”
Izhakov said the ministry was in talks with airlines and the Transportation Ministry, and had meanwhile tried to stimulate demand through marketing and domestic tourism. It has also targeted Jewish audiences abroad and shifted more attention to Israeli tourists. At a recent meeting of the Israel Tourism Recovery Forum, Izhakov and tourism leaders met US Ambassador Mike Huckabee to discuss expanding direct US-Israel flights. Huckabee said he would “continue encouraging Americans to visit Israel, experience it firsthand, and discover the reality for themselves.”
For the vendors of the Old City, the stakes are immediate. These are not just souvenir shops; many are family institutions that anchor the neighborhood. The recovery of inbound tourism, and of the flights that make it possible, cannot come soon enough, they say.
Still, some are choosing to look ahead. “I’m a positive person,” Eitan said. “I believe things will be good again. When, we don’t know, but hopefully soon. We are here, and whatever God wants to give us, he gives us.”