Advantages: History, beauty, climate
Disadvantages: Fear, political situation, prices

...I spent two weeks in Israel over Christmas and New Year 2004/05. I lost count of the times people thanked me for going there at a time when so many are afraid. There really isn't any need to be afraid. The last suicide bomb attack in Israeli territory was in September, and nearly all cases of violence break out in isolated areas which are easy to avoid as a traveller. A trip to Israel can take in Egypt and Jordan as day trips, although with an Israeli stamp in your passport you will be barred entry from most other Arabic countries. Apparently you can ask immigration officials to not stamp your passport, but I arrived bleary eyed and hungover at 5am and the stamp was dry before I registered that anything had happened. You will more than likely be flying El Al from the UK to Israel. Get to the airport early, be prepared... Read review

Ciao members have rated this review on average very helpful

Advantages: many sights to visit, great scenery
Disadvantages: aparthied society without the international condemnation, Israelis are very rude, prices becoming similar to UK ones

...Going to israel is not like going on a package holiday to Malaga. For a start there is the intensive security grilling you get from the automaton like El-Al stewards where you are warned not to associate with 'local people'. This takes a while. When you finally approach Ben Gurion airport many of the passengers will start singing Ha-Tikvah believing they are returning to their roots. If you want to forget about any ongoing Israeli-palestinian conflict - go to Tel aviv which is like a cross between New York and Barcelona with some unfortunately rotting German Bauhaus architecture thrown in. the nightlife and the attitudes are western, it is a good place to hang out. As you go and visit the rest of the country on the efficient good value Egged buses, you see how efficiently the Israelis have tamed this land and how neatly their towns... Read review

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Advantages: May be interesting
Disadvantages: Responses may be more that I can handle

...zone, for a population of 1.7 billion and covering an area of 13,056,235 sq. km. For "Israel/Occupied Territories/Autonomous Territories," the ICRC has 13 offices in Jenin, Tulkarm, Nablus, Kalkilya, Ramallah, Jericho, Bethlehem, Hebron, Gaza, Khan Yunis, Majdel Shams, Jerusalem, and Tel Aviv. The budget for this area is 22,407,815 Swiss francs, and the personnel consists of 130 expatriates and 90 locally-hired staff. The personnel numbers and budget have continued to increase dramatically since the Annual Report 2001. When I checked the ICRC worldwide web page on February 19-21, 2003, they listed a presence of 327 (254 staff, including 73 expatriates). In the recently published Annual Report 2002, the ICRC proudly states that it has doubled its personnel to cope with the severe problems caused by "the current Palestinian insurgency... Read review

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Advantages: Diverse and fascinating
Disadvantages: Can be dangerous and very hot in the Summer

...Before my incredible sojourn around Vancouver and Western Canada (see previous opinion), I cut my travelling teeth with a gap year in Israel in 1997. I really knew very little about the country before I left, but in many ways this was a good thing, as I went with no preconceptions or prejudices. I arrived in Tel-Aviv with my backpack, a handful of American Dollars, passport, credit card, toothbrush and very little else. After settling in a cheap hotel I embarked on a mission to discover the local nightlife and returned to my accommodation long after daybreak. However, after three days of partying in Tel-Aviv I decided to venture east to Jerusalem. The Arab centre of Jerusalem is a crazy mix of ethnic lifestyles, religious sanctity and modern commercialism. The sights and sounds are fantastic, but the attitude of the street bazaar... Read review

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Advantages: Very original way of portraying the situation of the Palestinians
Disadvantages: Not clear to those unfamiliar with this issue

...There are very few feature films about Palestine or Palestinians that have ever gone out on general release (if you discount TV documentaries). Although there is a slowly growing scene, Michel Khouri is about the only Palestinian director with any sort of profile. With this film, Elia Suleiman might well do the same although an opportunity to raise the profile of this film was missed when the Academy deciding the Oscars nominations declined to put this film in the best foreign film category due to the fact that Palestine is (not yet) a country. This film takes place in Nazareth (inside Israel), Jerusalem and the Kalandia checkpoint between Jerusalem and Ramallah with a very mixed cast of Palestinians and Israelis. The film starts with a man dressed as Santa Clause frantically running uphill in Nazareth with a bag full of presents... Read review

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Advantages: Historical drama of the first order
Disadvantages: At 3 hr, 28 min, perhaps a tad too long

...of Israel, another lesson focuses on the desperate condition of European Jews after World War II. Survivors really had no place to go—at least, no place where they were welcome. Palestine provided the promise of a home where they could determine their own future and where they would not be regarded with suspicion as outsiders. Still another lesson deals with the complexities of British policy over the years it held the Mandate. In 1917, when the Empire seized Palestine from the Turks, one of the expressed goals of the Crown was to provide support for the Zionist ambition to create a Jewish homeland in what had been ancient Israel. By the late 1930s, the realities of the politics of oil--not to mention the influx of Arabs as well as Jews into the Palestinian territories--led the British to close Palestine to Jewish settlement at the very... Read review

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Advantages: Wow, I never knew that
Disadvantages: But is it safe?

...After last week’s questionable assassination of admitted murderer Sheik Yassin, it’s nice to remember some of the positive contributions Israel is making to the world – some of them quite remarkable for a country that was established only 55 years ago. Israel has a total population of around six million with Israeli Arabs making up over 25% of that amount. The total area of Israel excluding the occupied territories is just under 21,000 square kilometers. By comparison, Syria is over 180,000 square kilometers and Egypt is over a million square kilometers. Israel has the highest number of university degrees per capita in the world. In 1969, Golda Meir became the world’s second elected female leader. Apart from the US and Canada, Israel has more companies listed on the NASDAQ than any other country. After the bombing of the American... Read review

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Advantages: a great chance
Disadvantages: with many riscs

...So as I made my tour through the Ciao Cafe, I found this completely empty section. And as everyone knows, men love to be the first ones, if possible, everywhere.... I think, there would be two things I would try to change, the first is, as almost everyone surely will understand Hitler, and the other one, and that's a bit more offending, is Palestine. My opinion about the Palestinian problem is, Jewish people came there, protected mostly by the USA, and got all the best part of the land there, and none has cared about the rights of the Arabian people there. So these people live in neediness (f.e. an Palestinian man uses about 8 litres of water a day, an Israeli about 130, and the water for the Israeli people comes form the springs in the "west Jordan area", too.) As long as the inequity goes on like it used to be during the last 50... Read review

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Advantages: Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmm
Disadvantages: Death, Destruction, Carnage, Humanitarian Disaster

...'t have been from us as well, well it was, (British/U.S. Govt) we sold it too him in the 80's, if you do a little research you will discover this is true. The reason we know that he has had WMD's is because we still got the invoices. Saddam shouldn’t be in power, but there are other countries that have much worse dictators, which are much poorer, and that pose a bigger threat to us than Iraq does or has. *Why Iraq? Why not Israel, i mean Israel have got U.N. resolutions against them regarding their illegal occupation of Palestinian territories and murder of innocent civilians in Palestine, but yet were not invading them. What about North Korea, named by G.W. as part of the infamous 'Axis of Evil', they have U.N. resolutions against them. why don't we go and invade them? They pose more of a threat to us than Iraq, they have said... Read review

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Advantages: Travel is always an enhancing experience, one way or another
Disadvantages: Too little time and money to engage in still more travel

...appreciation of this diversity is greater than your own. The rest of the time, we KNOW it is. Second: United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland ~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~-~- I hold Israel in a very special place for many reasons--personal, cultural, political, intellectual. I've been only once, as a graduate student enrolled in Hebrew University's Overseas Program. It seems that every time I’ve started planning a return, some new crisis erupts. I'd be willing to go in spite of these continuing troubles, but Himself puts on the brakes--and these days I prefer to travel with him. Israel has deserts that resemble those of my youth (in New Mexico), a vibrant and welcoming people (despite more than 50 years of a legal state of war with many of her neighbors), and a historical and cultural importance that transcends the ages... Read review

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