Israeli Hotels: Don’t Deport the Africans

Israeli-born David Blum is proud of his country’s history as a refuge for the persecuted. Why then, he asks, is the government stepping up efforts to deport African refugees? For Blum, the human resources chief at Isrotel, a hotel operator, the policy is also bad business: The Africans are the backbone of the restaurant and hotel industry.

More than 45,000 African asylum seekers—whom critics refer to as mistanenim (infiltrators)—reside in Israel, up from 3,000 in 2006, according to government statistics. Many Israelis say the migrants, mostly Muslims and Christians, threaten security and the country’s Jewish identity. In March the government instituted a program that speeds deportations and imprisons migrants who refuse to leave. “The State of Israel will not be the solution to the ills of Africa,” Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked said in a radio interview last year. Most of the Africans seeking asylum “are not refugees but labor migrants,” she added. In early June, Shaked said a “tough law” will discourage Africans from coming to Israel.