On Saturday, Igor Tsehansky posted to Facebook a copy of the message he received from the proprietors of the Mattenhof guesthouse explaining that the Israeli guests can't stay there, which resulted in widespread outrage.
"We don't Want to have Guests from Israel, because our appartments are Not for them," it reads.
He told the Jerusalem Post that the group complained to online booking platform Booking.com, which has since closed the property on its site, saying that "we do not tolerate discrimination of any kind."
On Sunday the municipal government moved quickly to limit the damage to its reputation as a holiday resort, and issued a press release to declare that "holiday guests of all nationality are very welcome in Zell am Harmersbach!"
"There are 58 different nationalities currently living in Zell am Harmersbach. Communal life is characterized by mutual respect and regard for one another," the local authority said.
"We are deeply upset at what has happened here," their lawyer Samy Hammad told German newspaper Die Welt.
"This is a linguistic misunderstanding," and the family are not anti-Semitic, Hammad said.
"In the last year alone 60 to 80 Israeli guests stayed here," the lawyer said.
The mother had apparently wanted to convey that the guesthouse accommodation for international tourists was already booked at the time the Israeli party wanted to come.
The family explained that the hotel also has accommodation in the main building, but this is only reserved for German-speaking guests, because of the language barrier, Sputnik Deutschland reported.
