From a hotel in Kyoto to a sandwich joint in Edinburgh, the world is becoming hostile toward Israelis who are learning that a vacation won’t shield them from the Gaza war.

During the nine months of war the Israeli tourist experience abroad has been marked by fears of antisemitism and efforts to avoid pro-Palestinian demonstrations.

According to reports by Israeli media and posts online, some of those worries have recently turned real for a number of Israeli tourists.Anecdotal incidents at touristic locations around the world are making it clear that even though there is no official policy of excluding Israelis, that is sometimes the situation on the ground.

An especially bumpy week began on June 17 at the Material Hotel in Kyoto, Japan, when an Israeli named Alex was informed that his reservation had been canceled due to the allegations of Israeli war crimes in Gaza. The Material told Alex that it was “not able to accept reservations from persons we believe might have ties to the Israeli army,” as reported by Israeli website Ynet.

The story made the rounds on social media, produced a stern protest letter from Israel’s ambassador in Tokyo, and led to a rebuke by the Kyoto municipality that the hotel had breached Japanese business law and must ensure that such a transgression won’t happen again.

  • corsicanguppy
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    5 months ago

    was “not able to accept reservations from persons we believe might have ties to the Israeli army,”

    Doesn’t Israel have mandatory service of 1-2 years for young adults? This means every citizen has ‘ties’ to their army. I wonder whether the news is avoiding that fact since it changes a few narratives, if so.

    • IndustryStandard@lemmy.worldOP
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      5 months ago

      It makes things very complicated.

      Recently Israel bombed a medic and claimed he was a combatant. They had a picture of someone that looked like the man sitting in a military uniform in 2019. However that person was not an active combatant at all.

      Their only intelligence to designate him as Hamas was a deep learning match on the picture and the man’s face.

      Assuming it was realy the medic in the picture, If any person that was ever affiliated with Hamas is a valid target the same would count for the IDF.

      Meaning all Israeli civilians that ever served in the IDF suddenly count as military targets.

    • Iceblade@lemmy.world
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      5 months ago

      Yes. Pretty much every Israeli citizen will have “ties to the Israeli army”.

    • YTG123@sopuli.xyz
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      5 months ago

      mandatory service

      It’s in the name, what are you going to do?

      But generally, people who don’t want to can avoid going to combat roles.

      1–2 years

      They are increasing it to 3 years for men. Read up on the situation to get a taste of sweet Israeli domestic politics