Three NGOs on Sunday published a blistering joint report rejecting Israeli arguments against accepting migrants and criticizing the government for using force to deter the Africans from entering Israel. The report was published just as Interior Minister Eli Yishai wrote a letter calling on the justice ministry to allow for the resumption of arrests of African migrants in Israel.
The NGOs – Human Rights Watch, the Hotline for Migrant Workers, and Physicians for Human Rights – listed Israeli excuses for denying the migrants entry. “Israeli authorities contend that asylum seekers to whom it denies entry can request asylum from Egyptian authorities, that Israel has the right to seal its borders, and that its obligations toward asylum seekers do not extend to those who are prevented from entering its territory.”
They continued: “None of these arguments are correct under the Refugee Convention or international human rights law, the three rights groups said.”
The report citing specific examples of IDF soldiers allegedly denying food and water to migrants, beating them with fists and guns, and pushing them across the Israel-Egypt border with long metal poles.
The NGOs stated that the migrants face extreme violence if denied entry into Israel, including torture and rape by Sinai traffickers.
“There is simply no loophole justifying Israel’s denial of protection to asylum seekers by rejecting them at the border without fully considering their individual cases,” said Gerry Simpson, senior refugee researcher and advocate at Human Rights Watch. “To accept such a claim would be to accept the evisceration of refugee protection.”
Interior minister pens letter urging mass migrant arrests
Yishai on Sunday called on Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu and Justice Minister Yaacov Neeman to instruct the Justice Ministry to carry out a government decision to begin populating the Negev detention facilities with African migrants, despite recent court decisions that have scuttled the plan.
In a letter sent on Sunday, Yishai said that court decisions against the plan “cancel and contradict decisions made by the government to place the Sudanese infiltrators in the facilities.”
Yishai, who only mentions Sudanese migrants in the letter and not Eritreans, who make up the majority of the migrants in Israel, adds “as you know, the problem of infiltration to Israel is one of the most difficult and complicated problems which Israel has dealt with since the founding of the state, a problem which threatens our identity, character, and future.”
The minister, who has been the most outspoken government voice against the “infiltrator problem,” added that while residents of Israel are shouting for help to deal with the problem “we remain deaf to their cries, in the face of a legal situation that ignores all the decisions made by the government. My hands are tied as a result of the decisions made by the courts, which don’t hear the distress of the citizens of Israel.”
Yishai said this reality demands that we use the facilities for what they were intended and that “they weren’t built in vain in order to be ghost towns, rather, as facilities to house infiltrators before they are removed from the country.”
A source close to Yishai said the letter is directly related to the upcoming elections in January, and Yishai’s desire to ensure that the “infiltrators issue” remains on the table, so that Shas doesn’t lose potential voters which it could draw from the Likud who are frustrated with Netanyahu’s handling of the issue.
The official said that the election campaign that Aryeh Deri plans to run for Shas will be based on social issues and will not highlight the African migrants issue. The official said that both Deri and Minister of Housing and Construction Ariel Attias will focus on the social issues campaign, which has left Yishai concerned that the migrants issue will fall off the agenda and cost Shas potential votes. He added that Yishai and Deri do not see eye to eye on the migrants issue.
Last week, the state attorney ruled that the court should throw out an earlier order temporarily freezing any mass arrests of migrants, and dismiss a petition seeking a permanent freeze, in a response to a petition on Thursday before the Jerusalem District Court.
The state said that since no decision on the issue of mass deportations and arrests has been made, there is no decision for the court to freeze, and the petitioners jumped the gun in filing their petition to stop the arrests.
A group of NGOs filed a petition on October 3rd seeking a freeze to mass arrests of migrants, which Yishai had vowed to carry out beginning on October 15th.
On October 11, the Jerusalem District Court issued an order freezing any impending mass arrests of migrants until a final hearing on October 30, giving the state until Thursday to file a response.
These NGOs treat Israel like a butler instead of a sovereign nation. Israel need to tell the NGOs to eff off.
These NGOs should get kicked out of IL for sedition!!!!
Democracy does not require to accept any moronic organization in the country. Let them all go to Iran, Syria, N-Korea, SA and Gulf states.
why the Israeli government should take any notice of or give credence these NGO’s who atre agents of Foreign Governments hostle to Israel I cannot understand we should not give them any publicity. Do Rabbis for Human Rights respect the rights of Jews and Christians who wish to pray on the Temple Mount. Who pays the salaries of Peace Now and Yesh Din, never mind the UN human Rights org. who ignore murder of Christians and even Moslems by Moslems
What happened to the proposed law that was supposed to ban foreign founded NGOs in Israel?
Throw out the NGO’s. What business do they have insinuating themselves into Israel’s internal affairs? But that is the fault of the Israeli government which allows them to.
Let the NGO’s take that up with the Egyptian government. Why is Israel responsible for what may happen to these refugees in another country?
HAARETZ clarification – Since NGOs and leftist media are in bed with each other, it’s appropriate to mention that Haaretz is officially “clarifying” statements it made alleging Jewish racism.
Even the very popular Breibart had an article on Haaretz original allegations: http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Peace/2012/10/24/HaAretz-paints-israeli-jews-racist
Why is the UNHCR option absent from this discussion? Israel is not obligated to take in millions of Africans affected by war, hunger, persecution, etc. There are literally millions of Africans and Asians who could qualify as “asylum seekers”. But that does not mean that Israel has to take any of them in. Or Europe. The UNHCR is tasked with looking after refugees in, or as close as possible to their countries of origin in proper refugee camps. Why isn’t this option ever mentioned is a mystery to me.
There are questions too as to why Israel is taking in Syrian refugees, coming from a country that is not even at peace with Israel: http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/160905
Why the need to justify?
WHY?
That’s not Brian Gerrish’s channel. My apologies. He does not have his own YouTube channel.
Disclaimer: I just watched half of that video and I thought he had very good ideas about the NGOs. I’m not endorsing anything else because he’s new to me.
MOST NGOs ARE FASCIST FIFTH COLUMN UNITS FOR THE UN – VIDEO – How UN-sponsored NGOs are taking over democratic decision making. I watched about half of this video late last night and it’s quite good. It deals with the corrupted and evil power elite manipulating NGOs. BRIAN GERRISH, Alex Jones’ guest, tells how NGOs have slithered their way into different levels of government, overriding the will of the people in order to push the UN agenda.
Gerrish posted the interview on his own YouTube channel, so you will find more of his videos on the subject. The video starts with Alex Jones talking about the latest BBC scandal, and then the conversation turns to NGOs – Anyway, both issues are connected at the bottom of the same cesspool. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pp3vq2OLhrg