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Israel Is Not Deporting Refugees

(Times of Israel) Dr. Emmanuel Navon - There are 37,288 illegal immigrants in Israel. Most entered Israel from Sinai between 2006 and 2012, and many live in south Tel Aviv. Israel completed the construction of a barrier on the Israel-Egypt border in 2013 and put an end to illegal immigration. Like other signatories of the UN Refugees Convention (1951), Israel is bound to grant refugee status to people who flee "genocide, war, persecution, and slavery to dictatorial regimes." It did so in 1977 when it accepted Vietnamese "boat people." It has been doing so for the small percentage of African migrants who are actual asylum seekers. Israel is far from being the only democracy that sends back illegal immigrants. The U.S. expels 400,000 illegal immigrants every year. In 2017, Germany expelled 80,000 illegal immigrants. Some claim that Israel is only expelling illegal immigrants from Africa but not from eastern Europe. This accusation is both malicious and false. In 2017, Israel expelled 3,361 illegal immigrants from the Ukraine and 844 from Georgia. Israel is the only country in the world that brought in Africans (Ethiopian Jews in 1985 and in 1991). The writer teaches at Tel Aviv University and at the Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya.
2018-02-02 00:00:00
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