Tourism up 25% in first 5 months of 2006

By JPOST.COM STAFF
Nearly 884,000 tourists entered Israel in the first five months of 2006, a 25 percent increase over the same period last year. According to Tourism Minister Isaac Herzog, increased marketing efforts will bring 2.6 million tourists to Israel by the end of the year. The minister referred to the latest forecast and plans to relaunch English and Russian-language tourism websites. The majority of tourists, 739,400, arrived by air in the first five months of the year, up 20% from 2005. 187,800 foreign tourists arrived in Israel in the month of May alone, 9% more than in May 2005.