Enas Al Hinti has cut staff pay in half and asked workers to take unpaid leave in an effort to keep her hotel in Jordan’s ancient city of Petra open, as Western holidaymakers fearful of conflict shun destinations in the Middle East.
A crisis across the region’s tourism industry since the start of the Israel-Gaza war 13 months ago is being felt acutely in Jordan, whose border with Israel along the Red Sea and Dead Sea is studded with beach resorts.
Sites such as Petra, Wadi Rum and crusader castles have been drawing visitors for decades – more than a million a year before the war, mainly Americans and Europeans.
But on a recent visit to Petra, a city carved from rose-coloured rock and Jordan’s most-visited tourist attraction, businesses were boarded up.
“There are no revenues, it’s all losses,” Al Hinti, who runs the Nomads hotel, said.
Data and interviews with seven hotel and business owners and tour operators underline the damage to the tourist industry, which last year made up 12.5 per cent of the economy.
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