Israeli airport traffic broke an all-time record on Tuesday, as passenger number 11,071,001 passed through Ben Gurion Airport passport control.
Israel Airports Authority director, Kobi Mor said they expected more than 11.5 million people to have passed through Ben Gurion’s gates by the end of the year, in compliance with estimations that 2010 would break records in the Israeli tourism industry.
“The airport authority considers the safety and security of passengers as its highest priority,” Mor said, adding that they have been focusing resources on promoting large-scale security projects.
Mor stated that the airport authority would continue promoting projects and customer services.
Earlier this year, Tourism Minister Stas Misezhnikov at the OECD tourism conference in Jerusalem that Israel will have more than 3.2 million tourists, 500,000 more than the country got in 2009.
Israel is seeing an increase in tourism from the United States and Russia, as well as from emerging markets including Brazil, India and South Korea. They include pilgrims as well as people interested in Israel’s culture, he said.
The country is planning to build another 9,000 hotel rooms by 2015, said Misezhnikov.
{Haaretz/Matzav.com Newscenter}
