Originally Posted by
BATLV
One of the reasons is that they do not cook on Friday nights and Saturdays. So you get heated and not fresh food. For the same price of course. I am not an expert but there is some kind of regulation that requires major hotels in Israel to keep kosher. I think the only exceptions are a few boutique hotels in Tel Aviv and Arab owned and operated hotels such as the American Colony in Jerusalem (which is an amazing hotel, speaking of).
Now Eilat being a dump does not draw significant non-Jewish tourism, hence there is a large demand for kosher. It is a closed circle.
Just about every hotel in Israel is Kosher including the King David, the Waldorf Astoria, the Intercontinental, etc. and none of these make Tel Aviv hotels bad per se.
I think what ruins Eilat is the corporate package tour machines that drive low-mid level employees of Israeli corporates to 3-4 day family vacations there. I have been a guest for some of them and they can be quite eye-opening in terms of the guests and their behavior. There are hotels in Eilat I would not return to because of this.
Interestingly I have found AirBnB rates in Eilat to be quite reasonable so clearly it isn't so much of a supply/demand issue of Eilat.