ANTI-tourist protests have erupted again after raging vandals slashed the tyres of car rentals in Tenerife.
Spanish cops have launched an investigation after a total of 11 rental cars were targeted in Sibora.
The cars that were damaged in the early hours of March 1 were all holiday rentals – which prompted the Civil Guard to investigate whether the attacks were linked to anti-tourism protests.
The holiday hotspot is no stranger to anti-tourism strife.
Last year, benches were scrawled with graffiti saying: “Tourists go home” and in Costa Adeje, South Tenerife, tourist haters set fire to 20 rental cars.
The vandals showed zero remorse as they filmed the flaming damage and overlaid the video with the theme tune to Jaws as they smashed car windows.
One Canary Island activist Roberto Mesa shared the video with the comment: “Peaceful means have been exhausted”.
Local press responded to the video by saying the perpetrators were “exhausted by mass tourism, overpopulation in their neighbourhoods, and the complete lack of redistribution of the so-called wealth generated by tourism”.
Tenerife has been at the heart of backlash against overtourism in Spain in recent years.
Protests reached a climax in April 2024 when 30,000 people took to the streets, holding banners saying ‘You enjoy we suffer’ and ‘Tourism moratorium now’.
Activists who organised the march say the government’s estimates of 30,000 protestors are false, and that over 80,000 people marched in the region.
Graffiti raged against the injustice of tourist versus local wages with phrases including: “My misery your paradise” and “Average salary in Canary Islands is 1,200 euros”.
But one response in English scrawled on the wall said: “F*** off, we pay your wages.”
Canary Islanders called on their government to tackle the lack of affordable housing and pollution, problems they blame on tourists flocking to the paradise holiday destination.
In October 2024, furious demonstrators swarmed a Tenerife beach and surrounded holiday-makers in their bikinis and swim shorts.
But Tenerife is not the only island declaring holiday war against tourists.
Majorca, Granada, the Balearic Islands and the rest of the Canary Islands have also exploded with mass protests against tourists, with haters chanting: “Go home!” in English.
During one protest in Barcelona, activists armed with water pistols let loose on the crowds, and last month 500 rental boxes were superglued shut in Granada by anti-tourist campaigners in an act of targeted ‘sabotage’.
Some leaders have condemned the protests, with the Balearics Islands Government vice-president Antoni Costa damning the actions as, “unacceptable.”
But Majorca is geared up for another summer of strife as activists threaten further disruption.
It comes as Brits are said to be shunning the Spanish island amid intensifying anti-tourism demonstrations.
Fifty-six per cent who normally go there on holiday said they went elsewhere this year.
