Open access peer-reviewed chapter

Management of Tourism Crisis in the Middle East

Written By

Omar Jawabreh

Submitted: 15 September 2019 Reviewed: 16 October 2019 Published: 06 March 2020

DOI: 10.5772/intechopen.90174

From the Edited Volume

Public Sector Crisis Management

Edited by Alexander Rozanov, Alexander Barannikov, Olga Belyaeva and Mikhail Smirnov

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Abstract

This study looks for to recognize the realism of management of tourism crisis in Jordan (Amman Hotels’ Bombing case study). In order to show the role of the management and its effects in facing the tourism crisis in Jordan, the researcher will try to handle a group of points: finding a special concept for tourism crisis, crisis generative environment, management of tourism crisis, and studying Jordan management of the Hotel bombing in Amman. To clarify and achieve the objectives of the research, the researcher adopted the descriptive analytical approach to what is stated in the most important books and references Arab and foreign periodicals, statistics, and official reports relating to the ethics of the research. It is recommended, in this study, to provide training opportunities for all people who have a role in the management of tourism crisis especially in the communication sector, the massive presence of police in the tourism site, hotels, and all the tourism places under the condition of not being seen, and to provide the qualified policemen with modern defensive weapons.

Keywords

  • tourism crisis
  • hotel
  • Black Wednesday
  • tourism crisis management
  • Jordan

1. Introduction

The Arab region is crowded with political challenges, most notably the Arab Spring, and the Arab-Israeli conflict is a permanent and ongoing event that is constantly taken on the agenda of Arab and Jordanian tourism. The lack of financial allocations for marketing is not a new event in Jordan’s tourism strategies. We add that there is a clear shortage of qualified human resources to work in the local tourism sector.

The Jordanian citizen does not accept tourism as it affects the value system and morals in the country; we find that the growth of mufflers and bars is faster than the growth of mosques or cultural and social centers, as well as being the main source of high prices and increased greed of traders, especially owners of restaurants and hotels, tourism makers in Jordan do not distinguish between foreign tourists and the Jordanian citizen (tourist).

According to recent statistics, the growth rate of the sector in Jordan will exceed 7% during 2010–2019, while the global growth rate of tourism will reach 4%; the number of hotels that will enter the Middle East market will reach 253 in the next Four years, in addition to 120,000 guest rooms.

The World Tourism Organization expects that the contribution of the sector to the GDP in Jordan will reach 23% by the end of 2020, and provide (435) thousand jobs and is expected to increase the number of tunnel rooms during the same period, i.e., 10 rooms, and the participation rate of the tourism sector in the product Local to 17%.

Some researchers have linked terrorism to tourism, including: Feridun [1], who examined the effects of terrorist attacks on the tourism sector on incoming tourism in Turkey during the period 1986–2006, and showed that the terrorist attacks negatively impacted on the economic side. Some researchers went on to link political, economic, and terrorism events to tourism development. Saha and Yap (2013) conducted a study on the impact of political instability and terrorism on tourism development in 139 countries for the period 1999–1999. The study showed the impact of political instability on tourism development. In addition, terrorism and political instability have also seriously affected the tourism industry. The study also examined the relationship between political instability, terrorism, and tourism in the SAARC regions, representing the countries of Pakistan, India, Sri Lanka, and Bangladesh during the period 2012–1995 [2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7]. In addition to many other data, such as the average tourist expenditure according to the average duration of stay in different tourist areas and other data, this rule should also include everything related to the tourism offer, various accommodation, employment, tourism transport sector, tourism companies, public tourist shops, entertainment places, special events, and festivals. This is in addition to the need to provide data and information on the impact of the tourism sector on the national economy, such as gross and net tourism income and the impact of this income on the balance of payments and capital invested in the tourism sector, tourism employment, tourism sector, and the growth rate of tourism and tourism sector compared to other sectors. Finally, this database should include data on domestic tourism and tourist offices at home and abroad, and data on the environment and its impact on the tourism sector. The role of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs at home and abroad is to clarify the real picture of foreign embassies inside Egypt and to foreign nationals abroad, in order to reduce the effects of this crisis, in addition to many other measures that complement these steps. After the crisis, there are a number of measures such as providing medical and psychological care for the injured tourists and citizens and the role of the Ministry of Information, Tourism, Foreign Affairs and Interior in containing the crisis and international tourism seminars and conferences, clarification and protection of tourism and nontourism. In Egypt, the world can feel the extent of security and safety enjoyed by Egypt. One of the crises is the Gulf War and the Crisis of the Egyptian Tourism Sector: the Egyptian tourism sector has suffered significant losses since the escalation of the Gulf War in August 1990 and even after the end of the war in February 1991. The Gulf War led to the decline of the Egyptian tourist season, by about 6%, by about 60%. Tourism movement (number of tourists) to about 27% in 1989 decreased to 9.3% in 1990 and then reached 80.14% in 1991. It is clear to us that without the Gulf War and assuming a steady rate of growth of the number of tourists, in 1989, the number of tourists had reached more. The loss was not only limited to the number of tourists coming to Egypt, but also to the number of tourist nights spent in 1990, during the same period in 1990. The Gulf crisis has also led to the deterioration of several key sectors related to tourism activity such as hotels, tourism companies, public shops, ordinary traders, as well as the corporation. The direct loss of the tourism sector was estimated at about 3 billion pounds, but the losses were also about another 3 billion pounds, which means both direct and indirect losses [8, 9, 10].

In spite of many variable advantages that Jordan has, it still did not get the appropriate tourism position because of the many crises that face the tourism sector, the sensitivity of this sector, the intensity of its effect with crisis, and in specific, the terrorist attacks which aim to shake the trust in the Jordanian tourism [5, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23].

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2. Research background

While it is premature to give an accurate assessment of the anticipated consequences of the deteriorating security situation that the country is complaining in this delicate situation, on the tourism sector as a whole, the indications so far indicate the widespread concern among some tourists who are planning to spend their holiday in Tunisia, while others cancel their reservations and change their orientation toward other safer countries. The tourism sector contributes about 7% of the GDP economic sector, which contributes about 7% of the GDP, which is equivalent to 400,000 jobs directly. Because tourism activity is closely linked to other economic activities, such as trade, handicraft, and transport, the shrinking influx of inbound tourism negatively affects the income of these activities and indirectly threatens the employment of its workers.

El Hassan Achi is an economist in development, institutional economics, trade, and labor. His research focuses on the Middle East and North Africa.

While restoring security is an indispensable condition for improving the performance of Tunisia’s tourism sector, it is not enough. If the crisis of the Gaza Strip has been exacerbated since the revolution due to the deterioration of the security situation and the increasing uncertainty about the trends of tourism policy after the victory of the Ennahda Party in the legislative elections and its leadership of the government, its roots were already due to structural factors related to the nature of the tourism product adopted by Tunisia as a field of specialization. The investment policy is the new trend for investment policy in the tourism sector during the period before the overthrow of the regime of President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali.

Tunisia’s tourism sector has suffered from its excessive focus on medium-sized indoor beach resorts, which mainly receive low-income groups from the European Union. This trend suffers from low levels of profitability and is strongly influenced by economic conditions. It is clear from the data of the World Tourism Organization that the average revenue from tourist arrivals to Tunisia does not exceed $ 385, which is the weakest at the level of tourist destinations around the Mediterranean. The average tourist revenue is $ 725 in Morocco, $ 770 in Turkey, $ 890 in Egypt, and $ 1000 in Greece.

One might say that Egypt has an income of 5 million and 400,000 tourists, which is a good number, but what is important in tourism is the income generated by tourism and not the number of tourists. The detailed view of the number of Arab tourists last year is as follows: 283,000 tourists from Libya, 77,000 from Iraq, 68,000 from Palestine, 63,000 and 500 Yemeni tourists, and 54,000 Syrian tourists; and from African countries, the detailed view is as follows: 44,000 tourists from Nigeria, 8000 from Ethiopia, and 3000 from Somalia.

There are fears that some Western countries are rushing to issue travel warnings to the South Sinai region (northeast of the country), with the term Sinai still associated with terrorist operations.

The number of tourists arriving in Egypt decreased by 13% during the period from January to August, compared with the same period last year.

The total number of tourists coming to Egypt during the last 8 months was about 6.3 million, compared to 7.2 million in 2013, according to data from the Egyptian Ministry of Tourism.

Egypt’s tourism income declined last year to $ 5.9 billion, compared to $ 10 billion in 2012, down to 41%.

Egypt is counting on the tourism sector to provide about 20% of foreign currency annually, while the volume of investments in the sector is estimated at 68 billion pounds (9.5 billion dollars), according to the Ministry of Tourism data.

The peace treaty in 1994 contributed to the increase in the number of group tourists coming to Jordan from the American and European regions and nationalities more than the Arab countries in contradiction with the first hypothesis. The US and European regions and nationalities are more developed than Asia and the Pacific and the Arab countries representing countries that are incompatible and do not meet the second hypothesis. This indicates the impact of the positive security event related to peace in the region such as the Jordanian-Israeli peace treaty, which reflects the negative impact on the number of tourists coming to Jordan, which contributes to increase the number of tourists from distant regions and developed countries more than tourists from neighboring regions and developing countries.

Since 1967, Palestinian tourism has suffered a setback. Israel has seized Palestinian tourism capabilities and changed the Jordanian and Egyptian laws and regulations by military orders that serve only their interests.

The city of Jerusalem was isolated and Palestinian tourism companies were besieged by a series of decisions that prevent them from being able to withstand Israeli companies that have granted all facilities.

Israeli tourism companies have imposed conditions on tourist groups from around the world to visit the Holy Land, including staying in Israeli hotels, causing heavy losses to the tourism services sector in Palestine.

Here we should mention the destruction of many historical and archeological sites in Palestine, where excavations are carried out under the Al-Aqsa Mosque, sweeping away ancient historical tombs and many archeological sites. The Hebrew era was not able to abolish the Arab presence from Palestine, and did not extend for more than 8 years; in addition, this era came late in comparison with the history of Palestine’s long history.

The tourism industry in Palestine can flourish with a just political solution leading to an independent sovereign Palestinian state, and the accompanying lifting of restrictions on travel, movement, tourism infrastructure development, and security and serenity.

The tourism sector was characterized by the influx of large numbers of investors close to the system in order to benefit from concessions, including the acquisition of land at low prices and access to bank loans in exchange for low interest rates and other facilities. At the same time, the sector professionals suffered from arbitrary decisions by the regulators, especially in the area of classification of tourist accommodation units and access to licenses. During the last 10 years, preceding the “Arab Spring,” the number of tourists who chose Tunisia as a destination jumped from 5 to 7 million, while the number of people going to Morocco rose from less than 5 to more than 9 million during the same period. The number of people traveling to Turkey and Egypt has increased by 250%.

To increase the tourism sector in Tunisia for the foreseeable future requires a reasonable level of stability and security, but the development of the sector and ensure its continuity in supporting economic growth and secure the jobs necessary to absorb the huge numbers of unemployment, especially among the educated youth, need to review in depth the tourism trends of the country.

Thus, the EU and its NATO ally, the United States, must modernize the intelligence equipment of the Tunisian security apparatus in order to detect early attacks that resonate with Western populations.

The Tunisian Ministry of Interior and Defense’s budget increased by 31% in 2019 to combat domestic terrorism. Tunisia’s economy and youth are known to have given the money, so the EU and the US should provide equipment, training, and security assistance to Tunisia instead of relying on the government to allocate funds to fight terrorism. Thus, the government will be able to reduce its defense expenditures to deal with youth unemployment and increase the wages of its citizens and economic development projects in marginalized and impoverished areas in order to quell the anger of the people and shape a better economic future.

Tunisia’s tourism receipts have dropped significantly by 35%, and the number of tourists has declined by 31%, according to official statistics of the Tunisian Professional Tourism Complex.

The disaster also hit Egypt, which lost its rank on the list of tourist destinations in the world, as a result of the turbulent security events and air accidents, in addition to the prosecution of the group of Jerusalem’s pro-ISIS in Sinai, which is responsible for the targeting of a Russian civilian aircraft, in addition to the recent terrorist attack that targeted the church of Saint Joseph.

A series of events led to a 46% decline in the number of visitors to Egypt in the first quarter of 2016.

The deterioration of tourism prompted officials to draw up an alternative plan to revitalize the sector, and find an alternative to the Russian tourist market, which represents nearly 90% of the total tourist arrivals to the Red Sea and Sinai resorts, so the Egyptian authorities resorted to stimulate domestic tourism and attract other nationalities from East Asia, Arab countries, and North Africa. But her plan failed.

Implications of the crisis: the incident of this crisis has resulted in the loss of human losses number of tourists such as death and workers in the Egyptian tourism sector as well as the result of the existence of financial losses, such as damage to some of the enterprises and some of the assets of some enterprises This crisis also had a significant impact, such as the panic and panic of many tourists. Citizens. The database and information must be available to manage a crisis in the tourism sector: there must be an integrated database for tourism data and information in order to successfully manage a tourism crisis. This rule should include everything related to tourism demand such as the number of tourists, tourist nights, tourism revenues, tourist destinations, and tourist destinations. Survival of the nationality of tourists.

The events and changes witnessed and witnessed in the Arab world have had a significant impact on the economic reality, and the crisis has included many sectors, most important of which are tourism. The tourism sector is considered strategic in many countries, including Tunisia, Egypt, and Syria, which remains one of the most prominent arenas of the “Arab Spring.” The fact that these countries are nonoil, and poor in natural resources, relied heavily on their tourism returns, which declined significantly compared to the situation that existed before the recent political transformations.

Tunisia’s tourism sector has been hit by the revolution of January 14, 2011 and has affected thousands of families whose livelihoods depend on occupations and businesses directly related to tourism and tourists, whether in the hotel sector or other tourism services, even those working in the traditional industries. All tourist indicators have fallen, as a result of various events directly affecting foreigners in Tunisia, such as the attack on the US embassy on September 14, 2012, the suicide bombing at the beach of a hostel in the tourist city of Sousse, and the attempt to blow up the synagogue on the tourist island of Djerba. But the tourism index rebounded last year, approaching what it was before the outbreak of the revolution in Tunisia.

Talking about tourism in Syria today may be misplaced, with the crisis in the country touching the simplest aspects of life. But it is one of the three Arab Spring countries that relied heavily on tourism, with the tourism sector accounting for 12% of their gross national income. Since the start of the popular protests on March 15, 2011, which turned into an armed conflict, the Syrian economy has declined and tourism is inactive. Tourism receipts have fallen by more than 94%, with losses exceeding $ 2.2 billion as of August 2013. Today, only a few tourists from Iran and Iraq are visiting the country, where only a handful of tourists from Iran and Iraq are visiting. The damage to tourism in Syria, which will be felt for a long time, when the country overcomes its plight, is not only in terms of tourism infrastructure, but also its long-term destruction and historical monuments throughout the country, especially in the northern region where archeological sites such as Aleppo are concentrated.

Libya and Yemen did not have an active tourism sector that can be stopped after the events witnessed. However, it should be noted that other Arab countries such as the United Arab Emirates and Morocco, and some Mediterranean countries such as Turkey, Croatia, and Greece, have benefited economically from the poor conditions of the Arab Spring countries [24].

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3. Research methodology

To clarify and achieve the objectives of the research, the researcher adopted the descriptive analytical approach to what is stated in the most important books and references Arab and foreign periodicals, statistics, and official reports relating to the ethics of the research.

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4. Tourism crisis management

Based on the statistics of UNWTO during the past decades, it is clear that the growth of tourism is increasing year after year, the report of the World Tourism Organization (United Nation World Tourism Organization) 2016 that there is an increase in the number of international tourist arrivals in 2015 by. It is expected to reach 1.8 billion tourists by 2030, according to statistics and long-term studies 16, but the problem is when we are in reverse, that is, a decline or a slowdown in this growth due to increased rates of security incidents, so that this varies While the tourist can understand the possibility of a natural disaster in a particular tourist destination, such as an earthquake or volcano, or tsunami, or heavy rain, or storms and hurricanes as non-human, and the probability of occurrence is predictable It is possible to avoid tourism at the time of the occurrence, and after the disappearance of the natural disaster and its effects, tourists can go to the tourist destination, which is a great deal of assurance and certainty, but the problem if there are security imbalances of man-made, political instability, terrorism and criminal crimes, and treatment Bad for the tourist The lack of security oversight makes the tourist cancel the idea of going to this place where security imbalances occur.

A well-known example of the impact of terrorist acts on tourism is the impact of the attacks on the World Trade Towers in New York on September 11, 2001, where the global demand for tourism in the United States decreased by 7.4% in 2001 and 2002, and caused the unemployment of more than 10 million tourism employees. Globally, the hotel occupancy rate has fallen by more than 50% despite a 40% price reduction, which has led to a decline in tourism investment due to the decline in interest rates.

The Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region has long been a major attraction for tourists, with tourism being an important source of income and growth. In 2011, the tourism sector contributed an estimated $ 107.3 billion, or 4.5% of GDP. According to the World Bank’s 2013 report, but as a result of the social movements in the region and the economic instability in Europe, tourism has suffered a lot, and social movements have the ability to affect negatively. Availability of accommodation, and the potential target, and the disruption of travel plans, as reports show that the number of tourists coming to the region fell by 9% to 72 million in 2011, a decrease of 6.6 million in 2010 [25].

For example, in Tunisia, where the tourism sector plays a vital role in the economy and other fields, where the proportion of GDP is 18.6%, where the sector suffered the most negative effects of social movements in 2011, international tourists fell to 5.1 million, an estimated 34.2%. This figure was even lower than the number of arrivals in 2000. Tourism receipts in Tunisia declined by −27.3%, an estimated $ 2.4 billion.

Most destinations in the Middle East have experienced, directly or indirectly, social and political developments in the region Syria −14%, Egypt −32%, Lebanon −24%, Palestine −15%, and Jordan −13%.

Security problems, political violence, wars, coups, terrorism, unrest, and security threats have a major impact on tourism.

4.1 This revision requires two issues

The first is taking into account the demographic shifts in Europe, new trends in demand for cultural, environmental, and desert tourism, adventure tourism, and discovery. The World Tourism Organization estimates that nearly 40% of tourism activity today is culturally related. These new forms of tourism are more profitable and less vulnerable to seasonal changes.

The second is opening new markets in order to diversify the sources of tourism revenues and overcome the situation of excessive dependence on European tourists, who now make up more than 80% of the tourism arrivals to Tunisia. Emerging markets in Asia and Latin America will be an important source in the coming years due to the improvement in the living standards of their populations and the development of air communications between different parts of the world.

Unfortunately, terrorist attacks targeting tourists are not new. Similar attacks took place in 2015 and 2018 as a result of the continued determination of terrorists to hit the strategic positions of the Tunisian economy, and these types of targeted attacks are unlikely to stop anytime soon. The city of Kairouan, shared on one of their Telegram channels, militants continued to focus on recruiting more people and vowed to target foreign tourists in Tunisia, exacerbating the country’s current security and economic crisis.

Prior to the Arab Spring, Tunisia’s tourism sector contributed 21% of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP), and despite its decline to 15.9% after the overthrow of Ben Ali, it rose again to about 18% from 2012 to 2014. Then, the positive trend of Tourism’s contribution fell again to 14.3% in 2015 after the terrorist attacks on the city of Sousse and the Bardo Museum. In the same year, Tunisia’s per capita income fell from $ 4160 to the pre-2007 level of $ 3500, down to 19% [26].

It is in the interest of Western countries, particularly the European Union and the United States, to contribute to the fight against terrorism and extremism in Tunisia and to curb the spread of the terrorism export epidemic through the channel of illegal immigration.

Western policymakers have long voiced security concerns over their inability to detect all illegal immigrants from Tunisia and other Maghreb countries, especially since the West’s alert for potential terrorist attacks which remains high and costly.

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5. Results and research findings

Tourism is a sensitive industry for international and regional crises such as wars, acts of violence, and terrorism, as well as crime, corruption, deadly diseases, and other elements of national security. For example, war is tragic for tourism. Military activity can destroy infrastructure and cripple tourism investment. The civil war in Iraq, Lebanon, and Syria has severely damaged the tourism industry and paralyzed the domestic and foreign investments in these countries [4].

Political instability has implications on the local economy and employment at a time when the country needs foreign currency and on the benefits of economic development resulting from tourism, and it affects the tourism stability in tourism development by a likely decrease in domestic and foreign investment in tourism infrastructure and by increasing costs. Securing these investments decreases the international tourism movement, for example, the Middle East region due to wars and multiple conflicts such as the Arab-Israeli conflict such as: the Arab-Israeli conflict, the first and second Gulf war, the Israeli aggression in GNU. Lebanon 2006.

The security problems also talked about fluctuation in tourism revenues and tourism investment for several points, most notably:

  1. The occurrence of terrorist and security events will be reflected negatively on those involved in tourism investment, such as businessmen and venture capitalists, because they fear the negative effects of security events and their various repercussions on their money and tourism projects to serious risks, which lead them to leave this activity and go to other activities that are more secure and profitable. This negatively affects the tourism investment.

  2. The proliferation and increase of security problems and risks mean increasing the cost of securitization of tourism equipment and tourists. Rather than directing tourism revenues to invest in new facilities and equipment at international standards to attract more tourists, this money is directed to the security of tourism.

  3. Continuous warning for traveling to the middle east from countries such as the United States, Canada, Australia, and Britain with security problems so that they are not exposed to risks such as being killed, injured, and kidnapped, which negatively affect tourism revenues and lead to a decline in tourism investment.

  4. As a result of the various leaps in the professional side of the threats to tourism, such as terrorism, in the last three decades, professionalism in directing attacks on elements of tourism investment, such as hotels, tourist facilities, and transport, has been monitored, in order to achieve the greatest publicity and information on the one hand, and on the other hand, cause serious damage to tourism investments.

5.1 Routine crisis and sudden crisis

In forming a committee to study the crisis, this way is used when no information is found about the real power who makes this crisis and who has an interest in making it, or in lessening the value and importance of the crisis. Or in giving vent to the crisis which is called the venting of the volcano, and finding different alternative paths in front of the pushing force that generated the crisis and its flow to change it to other different alternative paths which can contain its strength and reduce its danger, or in isolating the strength of the crisis through observing and defining the generated power and isolating it from the path of the crisis to prevent its spreading and expanding and consequently making it easier to deal with, solve, or even eradicate it [27].

The untraditional ways of dealing with crises are more important because it became more proper to the sole of the time and more harmonious with the nature of its changing, but because it important and wide spread, we can talk about it in a separated study [28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48, 49, 50, 51, 52].

5.2 Reasons for these kinds of tourism crises

The reasons can be limited to the confusing relationships between the touristic companies outside and inside, either in financial settlement or in the disturbance of carrying out the touristic programs; pressure made by the tour operators on their agents in the host county to get less prices; steering the movement by the tour organizers to a certain places without taking into consideration the social and environmental cost; and not educating the tourists of all the acceptable and not acceptable behaviors in the host country so that the tourist will not behave in an unacceptable way.

5.3 Amman hotels explosions

5.3.1 Black Wednesday

On 9/11/2005, three terrorist explosions happened using explosive built, and they were aimed to three hotels in the middle of the Jordanian capital Amman; the first one happened at half past nine local time of Amman at the entrance of Radisson sass hotel; the second one in Hyatt Amman, and after few minutes, new one aimed Days Inn Hotel; the first estimated casualty number were about 57 and over 115 wounded. The main reason for this high number of casualty is the explosion in Radisson Sass Hotel, because it happened during a wedding; Al-Qaida adopted the responsibility for these explosions.

5.4 The readiness security and safety strategy

Political instability affects the Middle East on the number of foreign and Arab tourists coming to Jordan, and the proportion of its contribution to GDP during the period (2014–1990), the study showed that the number of foreign tourists and the proportion of their contribution to GDP decreased political events while the number of Arab tourists witnessed a positive rise and increase it in GDP. Any terrorist incident is a dagger in the heart of the country in general and tourism in particular, and the government is expected to completely recover by the end of 2014 and target between 13 and 14 million tourists.

The relative stability of the security situation coincides with the beginning of the study at universities that were accompanied by deliberate violence, and therefore, the negative effects on tourism from these terrorist operations cannot be underestimated despite the statements of officials.

The return of tourism to 2010 rates, In the light of security stability, within the framework of focused tourism marketing programs through global and regional tourism markets, which target new markets to attract tourism to Egypt by opening new tourist markets including India, China, Central Asia and other markets, in addition to taking the necessary measures to revitalize Egyptian tourism to its natural form. Again, the most important of which is to achieve security and safety and not to cut off the electricity that has become a means of “extinguishing” tourists. It is necessary to confront terrorist operations and develop a security plan to impose a security cordon around tourist areas to prevent the leakage of criminal and outlaw elements. In order to prevent any attacks on tourist areas besides securing the roads leading to all tourist places, especially that Egyptian tourism is targeted and must work to achieve security and safety to attract tourists again, because tourists are afraid to come to Egypt because of security events, even if they are not serious, because we need To erase the fear of the tourist’s memory, which has crammed for fear of repetition of violence and terrorism that will not recognize borders or nationalities, and has not accompanied the humanitarian, religious and moral attitudes that prevent attacks on peaceful civilians, who have no political or sectarian orientations, and to print in his memory A new and bright mental image to fix their memory to accept what calls for confidence and reassurance, especially as social media publishes a lot of videos that show the unrest and security problems in Egypt in a panic to tourists, and that tourism companies could not face this by marketing Egypt as a tourist unlike other countries that have succeeded In marketing itself, despite its poor tourism and archeological components, we must realize that the repetition of terrorist operations has negative effects on the flow of incoming tourism, coupled with the decline in the volume of domestic and foreign investments in the tourism sector, which affects the tourism industry in the future. B, and then develop a comprehensive strategy for tourism development plan is required to face all the possibilities and the negatives facing the tourism industry, until you find a way to recover and attract more Arab and foreign investments, rather than escaping out of the area.

5.5 The readiness strategy in communication sector

The successful response in any emergency situation depends on the fastness of communication, and to make this ability to communicate successfully, there must be a detailed base of everybody that has a relation in the crisis management necessary to communicate.

The most important way of communication is the telephone, then comes the roll of emails and the site of tourism activation institution. But if all communications through telephones in emergency situation failed, the other alternative equipment’s could be used, like wireless telephones and global telephones which must be available and the people in the responding group must be trained to use them.

It goes without saying that the entire tourism sector must talk in one voice, and the immediate responding group decides the desired massage to be sent, and it is delivered by the minister of tourism and antiques (spokesperson) in a press conference and interviews made by the mass media. For the group in charge of delivering, it follows the daily stuff related to the media and provides with the newest about the crisis through making a news journal about the crisis and renews their information on the electronic site.

At the same time, communication must be made with the tourism partners for Jordan in the outside world, the local tourism sector, the embassies, and the foreigner diplomatic delegation in Amman, and to make this communication effective, there must be an explicit and up-to-date information base that stores on computers about the following authorities to be provided with any new or any information related to the crisis.

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6. Conclusion

Communication skills are the key to successfully manage any tourism crisis, through successive tests show that the first 24 hours of the event is decisive, the first message when the crisis happen must be quick, media constantly looking for more details about the incident, it is necessary to resist any desire to speculate and hence the importance of speed in delivering the required message and provide further information on an ongoing basis so as not to have a picture based on speculation. Successful communication policy of crisis management is based on the following concepts.

Tourism is a sensitive industry for international and regional crises such as wars, acts of violence and terrorism, as well as crime, corruption, deadly diseases, and other elements of national security. For example, war is tragic for tourism. Military activity can destroy infrastructure and cripple tourism investment. The civil war in Iraq, Lebanon, and Syria has severely damaged the tourism industry and paralyzed the domestic and foreign investments in these countries.

Political instability has implications on the local economy and employment at a time when the country needs foreign currency, and on the benefits of economic development resulting from tourism, and it affects tourism stability in tourism development by a likely decrease in domestic and foreign investments in tourism infrastructure, and by increasing costs. Securing these investments and decreasing the international tourism movement, for example, the Middle East region due to wars and multiple conflicts such as the Arab-Israeli conflict such as: the Arab-Israeli conflict, the first and second Gulf war, the Israeli aggression in GNU. Lebanon 2006.

The security problems also talked about fluctuation in tourism revenues and tourism investment for several points, most notably:

  1. The occurrence of terrorist and security events will be reflected negatively on those involved in tourism investment, such as businessmen and venture capitalists, because they fear the negative effects of security events and their various repercussions on their money and tourism projects to serious risks, which leads them to leave this activity and go to other activities that are more secure and profitable. This negatively affects tourism investment.

  2. The proliferation and increase of security problems and risks means increasing the cost of securitization of tourism equipment and tourists. Rather than directing tourism revenues to invest in new facilities and equipment at international standards to attract more tourists, this money is directed to the security of tourism.

  3. Continuous warning for traveling to the middle east from countries such as the United States, Canada, Australia, and Britain with security problems so that they are not exposed to risks such as being killed, injured, and kidnapped, which negatively affect tourism revenues and lead to a decline in tourism investment.

  4. As a result of the various leaps in the professional side of the threats to tourism, such as terrorism, it has been monitored in the last three decades professionalism in directing attacks on elements of tourism investment such as hotels, tourist facilities and transport in order to achieve the greatest publicity and information on the one hand, on the other hand, these attacks lead 22, causing serious damage to tourism investments.

This effect extends to all activities related to tourism investment only. In the event of security uncertainty, investors will stop repaying loans obtained from banks, as well as interest, in addition to stopping the use of tourist establishments or making new openings, which leads to slower investment rates.

Despite the many disasters experienced by Egyptian tourism in recent years, such as the Luxor massacre in 1997, the crash of an Egyptian plane in the Gulf of Aqaba with 133 French tourists in January 2004, the bombing of the Taba hotel in October 2004, and the Sharm El Sheikh bombings in July, the negative impact of these events did not reach the level of tourism last year.

The number of tourists has dropped to 5430 million, while tourism income fell to 2.6 billion dollars that did not happen in 21 years, where the tourism income in 1995–1996 more than 3 billion dollars, but last year saw a phenomenon He spoke before, when the value of Egypt’s tourism payments outside Egypt, which amounted to $ 4 billion and 100 million, exceeded the income of tourism in Egypt.

Interestingly, the number of nights spent by tourists from all sides decreased, which negatively impacted on tourism income, as the increase in income is linked to the number of nights spent by tourists, an average that witnessed a remarkable decline to 6.2 nights last year compared to more than 12 nights a year ago. Despite the increase in the number of Arab tourists by 13%, the number of Arab tourist nights decreased by 21%.

6.1 Recommendations and proposals

Providing Staff training has a part in crisis management of tourism, specifically in communication skills. The intense security presence in tourist areas, hotels, and all tourist establishments, provided that it is invisible and to provide the qualified security men with modern defense weapons.

References

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Written By

Omar Jawabreh

Submitted: 15 September 2019 Reviewed: 16 October 2019 Published: 06 March 2020