Israel Ministry of Tourism has announced Sammy Yahia’s appointment as the new Director of Tourism for India & Philippines markets effective 3rd June, 2019. He will be responsible to lead the tourism board’s initiatives in India while overseeing the development of policies and strategies to strengthen Israel’s reputation as a world-class tourism and travel destination.
A champion marketer by profession, prior to his appointment to India, Sammy was the Director of Marketing & Communications for Israel Ministry of Tourism from 2012 to May 2019.During his tenure there, he was awarded ‘Employee of the Year – Civil Service Commission’ and a certificate of appreciation from the Minister of Tourism and the Director General for his valuable contributions.
With an MBA in Marketing and Communication from the University of Derby, Sammy Yahia also completed his BA in Social Sciences, Sociology and Anthropology from the Hebrew University
of Jerusalem.
The new Director brings great expertise and know-how to the role with extensive and holistic experience in tourism marketing, strategic government relations and investment facilitation. He will be instrumental in integrating the ideologies of the Israel travel industry with the Indian market to facilitate effective marketing strategies for the destination in India. Being at the helm, Sammy Yahia will help maximise all opportunities to achieve continued growth in tourism arrivals
from India.
Commenting on his appointment, Sammy Yahia said, “I look forward to working closely with various partners in India by building on existing partnerships alongside initiating new ones. India has a rich heritage, culture and history, similar to Israel, and is an exciting market for me to take charge of. I foresee ample opportunities for us to push boundaries and reinvent the ever evolving and dynamic Indian traveller.”
While talking about his vision for the India office, he added, “The arrivals from India have amassed expectations in the last few years to present some record-breaking numbers. While keeping the current momentum going, the goal is to place India as one of the top global source markets
for Israel.”
“Besides the metropolitan cities, continuing to capture Tier II cities would be the strategy to lure travellers to consider Israel for a leisure holiday offering dynamic experiences catering to varied interests. Having said this, our office will aggressively work towards increasing connectivity between India & Israel by introducing new airlines to service the route, he added.
Hassan Madah has headed the Israel Ministry of Tourism’s Office in India office for over 6 years, starting in October 2012. He began his journey overseeing the outbound tourism from India to Israel and opened the Israel Ministry of Tourism India Office in Mumbai in August 2015.
During his tenure, he has grown to love and understand the country and has developed effective and long-lasting ties with media houses, travel trade, airlines and more. With many accomplishments to his credit, Hassan Madah successfully achieved consistent growth from approximately 35,000 arrivals from India in 2014 to almost 71,000 in 2018.
