Tony Wheeler, the founder of Lonely Planet—one of the world’s most popular and influential travel guide series—has declared that he will never visit Israel again.
In a post on his personal blog, the 78-year-old wrote: “Despite the horrors of the Hamas attack, I still cannot live with the Israeli attack on Gaza, which has now been going on for more than one and a half years. It has to stop.”
Wheeler, a British-born Australian resident, is one of the most recognized names in independent travel. Together with his wife, Maureen, he founded Lonely Planet in the 1970s, a travel guide series that became a cornerstone of modern backpacking.
Their first guide, written after an overland journey from the UK to Australia, was printed by a small press in Australia and became an unexpected success. The brand quickly grew into a global information empire, with books, websites, apps, and traveler communities. In 2007, after decades of activity, the couple sold most of their shares to BBC Worldwide in a deal estimated at 130 million Australian dollars.
Though he sold the company and parted ways with the brand he created, Wheeler continues to travel the globe and share sharp insights on his personal blog. On April 24, he published a post stating that he would no longer visit Russia, Saudi Arabia, the United States, and the Indonesian island of Bali. The list drew attention, and key excerpts were published in various media outlets around the world.
At the time, Wheeler wrote that he would not return to Russia as long as President Vladimir Putin “continues to kill innocent people” and while Moscow cooperates with North Korea and the U.S. in attacking Ukraine. On Saudi Arabia, he wrote: “There are so many reasons I never want to visit there again. Whether it’s the murder of journalists (Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul), the New York Times report on Saudi employers who killed East African domestic workers, or my personal experience in Somaliland in 2022, where I saw cheetahs rescued from smugglers who had tried to ship them to Saudi Arabia as pets—only for them to be killed once they grew too large.”
And as for the U.S.? “Right now, with 'the orange one' (Donald Trump) and his shady gang running the place, I have zero interest in going there. As long as 'Trumpistan' stands shoulder to shoulder with Russia and North Korea in creating global chaos—and adds insane tariffs on top of that—thanks, but no thanks.”
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That post made waves, and last month Wheeler published a follow-up list with three more countries he now refuses to visit—this time including Israel. “I’m surprised myself that when I published my ‘not going back there’ list, I somehow forgot to include Israel,” he wrote. “I’ve visited Israel more than once. In 2011, I not only crossed into Palestine/the West Bank from Jordan, but also traveled extensively throughout the country (or countries), though I didn’t go to Gaza. I did a lot of walking, both in the West Bank and in Israel—north, for example, along the ‘Jesus Trail’ from Nazareth to the Sea of Galilee, and in the south, in the Negev Desert. That journey led to the Israel and Palestine chapter in my book Dark Lands.”
His time in Israel included a stay at Fauzi Azar Inn in Nazareth, hosted by peace activist Maoz Inon, with whom he walked the Jesus Trail alongside two other Israeli friends. “If there was one person who gave me hope that some sort of peace and agreement could come to that troubled region, then it was Maoz Inon,” Wheeler wrote.
He also noted that Maoz’s parents were murdered in the October 7 Hamas attack at their home in Netiv HaAsara, and acknowledged Maoz’s continued efforts to promote coexistence. Nevertheless, Israel remains on Wheeler’s no-go list.
The other two countries newly added to Wheeler’s boycott list are Belarus and Myanmar. “Belarus’s brutal dictator Alexander Lukashenko looks exactly like what he is—a Soviet-era thug,” Wheeler wrote.
“His support for Putin’s war against Ukraine hasn’t exactly helped his image. In 2021, things got even worse when he hijacked a Ryanair flight from Athens to Vilnius. Belarusian authorities claimed there was a bomb threat and forced the plane to land in Minsk. Belarusian blogger Roman Protasevich and his Russian girlfriend Sofia Sapega, were forcibly removed from the Irish plane. Protasevich was later sentenced to eight years in prison—apparently for suggesting Lukashenko isn’t Europe’s most beloved ruler. Sapega was sentenced to six years, seemingly for going on vacation in Greece with Protasevich.”