A video showing an Israeli tourist pushing a Sri Lankan tour guide off a boat and into the sea has circulated widely on social media, drawing criticism of the tourists’ treatment of the local worker.
The footage shows a group of Israeli tourists travelling on a boat in Sri Lanka when one of them pushes the male tour guide into the water while he is drinking, the Daily Mirror reported.
The incident has prompted anger online, with many questioning the behaviour of the tourists and how the guide was treated.
The tourists’ explanation
Israeli journalist and social activist Daniel Amram, who brought the video to public attention, later shared the tourists’ account of what happened.
According to Amram, the tourists said it was a joke, that the tour guide knew about the prank and was involved in it, and that there was no intention to disrespect or humiliate him. They said he was not injured.
“It was a joke, the worker is fine, it wasn’t meant to be mean,” the tourists reportedly said.
How the footage reached circulation
The provenance of the clip is worth setting out, because it shapes how much weight the account can carry.
The Daily Mirror states that the footage was shared by the Russian state-funded outlet RT. The tourists’ side of the story reaches the public through Amram rather than directly. This desk has not seen a statement from the guide himself, and he is not named in the report; nor are the tourists.
What is not established
The report does not say when or where in Sri Lanka the incident took place, or which operator the guide worked for. No Sri Lankan authority is quoted — there is no comment from the Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority, the police, or any tour guides’ association, and no complaint or investigation is reported.
Whether the guide regarded the incident as a prank he had agreed to is asserted only by the tourists, relayed by a third party. That claim is unverified.
Tourism is a central earner for Sri Lanka, which recorded 1,862,304 arrivals in the first ten months of 2026 and 168,625 in October alone. Conditions for the workers who serve that trade are a recurring subject of public debate, and the reaction to this clip belongs to it.
Not reported
No official response of any kind has been reported. It is not known whether the guide has made a complaint, whether the tourists remain in the country, or whether any employer or regulator is examining the incident. This report rests on a single verified newsroom; the story was also carried by Ada Derana, whose pages could not be retrieved to confirm its date, so it is not cited here.
