Tourists Saying Great Things About Israel

Some tourists in Israel were asked for their impressions of Israel.

Bonus: Their impressions were overwhelmingly positive, and once again highlight how the haters and BDS-holes are full of lies.

Extra bonus: This is from Ha’aretz (believe it or not)!

When Pablo Cañete and Irene Esteban arrived from Spain to the Airbnb apartment they had rented in Jaffa, “We thought we’d come to Morocco, not Israel,” said Cañete, 26, a business administration student living in Germany. “It wasn’t the idea we had in mind. We thought there were only Jews in the city.”

“We thought there were no Arabs in Israel,” added Esteban, 25, who works as an academic in the field of food safety.

Carina Reiter, 28, of Germany was similarly surprised to discover that Jews, Muslims and Christians live side by side in Jerusalem’s Old City. “It’s amazing,” she said. “They don’t have to; they respect each other.”

“Many people in Europe think Israel is no good because there are problems between Jews and Muslims – and then you come here and think it isn’t true,” said Cañete.

But Christoph Schiewer, 34, who has been here several times before, had a different impression. “Even in Tel Aviv, which is very open and not racist, it’s very rare to find mixed groups of Jews and Arabs together,” the German said.

Cañete was also surprised by Israel because he thought Israelis “were just religious, serious, not funny, with no parties, busy only with politics, synagogues and being wary of Muslims. But we discovered that it’s false: They’re happy. There are always parties – people are always in the streets.”

Moreover, he added, “there’s really good wine here. I don’t understand why there’s no Israeli wine in Europe.”

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“It’s amazing that people are so open they’ll invite someone they met just a few days ago to their home,” Keitmann said. “I could never go to my family and say, ‘I met this guy and he’s spending Christmas with us.’”

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Francois Tilman, a 32-year-old chef from France who lives in England, felt called by God to come here and search out his Jewish roots, even though he’s Christian. This isn’t his first visit and he’s enthusiastic about Israel.
“Israelis are an example to the world,” he said, declaring that Muslims don’t understand that they’ll never take Israel “because God has a plan. This is a wonderful country, politically and religiously, and despite all the danger it’s still safe. In Europe, everyone’s scared of the Muslims. They have no idea, they have no God, they just trust in politics. But here, they don’t just trust in politics; religion plays a significant role.”

Jonas and Eva Wanner of Germany said they are religious Christians who came here to see where Jesus lived and died. He’s a 26-year-old engineer and she’s a 27-year-old medical student. They said Jerusalem reminded them of Rome, “except we hated Rome and loved Jerusalem because of the history.”