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Sudanese refugees in Israel refers to citizens of Sudan who have sought refuge in Israel due to military conflict at home, and to those who moved there illegally as migrant workers. In 2008, there were 4,000 Sudanese in Israel, 1,200 from Darfur and the remainder Christians from South Sudan. The majority entered through the Israeli-Egypt border. Most live in Tel Aviv, Arad, Eilat [1] and Bnei Brak. [2]
The civil wars in Sudan that have been taking place on and off since 1955, the subsequent destabilization and economic collapse caused by the country's infrastructure and economy, and the fighting in Darfur, forced millions of Sudanese civilians to flee their homes and cities. [3] In 2006, largely owing to the extensive flow of Sudanese and Eritreans crossing into Israel by land from Egypt, Israel witnessed a significant rise in the number of asylum seekers. While in 2005 only 450 applications were registered, the number for 2008 had risen to 7,700. [4]
The increase in Sudanese entries to Israel since 2006 is attributed to a demonstration by Sudanese refugees outside UNHCR's offices in Cairo in 2005, where Egyptian police killed 28 asylum seekers. Sudanese asylum seekers also say that deteriorating asylum conditions and lack of durable solutions in Egypt has played a major role in their decision to come to Israel. Since the majority have been living in Egypt since the 1990s, their crossing into Israel can be described as a case of onward secondary movement. [4] Israel is also perceived as a bridge to Europe, and its strong economy compared to neighboring countries has encouraged asylum seekers to pursue their luck there. [4]
In 2008–2009, around 30 migrants were shot and killed by Egyptian security forces as they attempted to cross into Israel. [4] In addition, many African migrants en route to Israel face torture, organ theft, rape and assault by traffickers in the Sinai who hold them for weeks, sometimes months, to demand more money. A survey of 284 migrants published in late February 2011 found that over half told of abuse by the smugglers that included being burnt, branded, hung by the hands or feet and raped. [5] [6] [7]
In 2012, due to a near-doubling in the flow of African seeking refugee status, Israel began building a fence along the border and publicized plans to build a detention facility for infiltrators. [5]
In spite of the risks and abusive treatment by smugglers, smuggler networks run by Bedouin groups in the Sinai desert have transported growing numbers of Sudanese and other African asylum seekers across to Israel. [4]
Israel supported the founding of the 1951 Convention relating to the Status of Refugees, becoming a signatory to the Convention in 1954. But although it actively participated in the development of the international refugee system, Israel did not institute the corresponding legal framework at home. [4]
Following pressure from UNHCR, a temporary humanitarian protection arrangement was established in 1999, benefiting refugees from war-torn countries in Africa. In 2002, an Israeli asylum procedure was established with the launch of the National Status Granting Body, an inter-ministerial agency responsible for assessing asylum applications processed by UNHCR Israel, advising the minister of the interior, who held the authority on final decisions. [4]
However, Israeli authorities have yet to devise and implement a clear approach towards asylum-seekers. Due to authorities' inexperience with asylum, early official responses to the new arrivals from the Egyptian border included conflicting and ad hoc policies. Finally, in July 2008, the government established the Population, Immigration, and Border Crossings Authority, responsible for processing asylum requests and determining refugee-status. In July 2009, Israeli authorities officially took over this responsibility from UNHCR, and since then asylum policies have become clearer. [4] The Israeli have granted temporary protection, assistance, and work permits for asylum seekers, but they have also detained thousands and forced hundreds of Sudanese and other African asylum seekers to return to Egypt. [4]
Among Sudanese refugees in Israel, 850 are asking for asylum from persecution in Sudan, including 200 children. [8] The fact that Israel and Sudan lack diplomatic relations have complicated the status of Sudanese asylum seekers. Since Sudan is considered by Israel as an "enemy state", many Sudanese refugees have been detained according to Israeli law. But detainees were sometimes released in order to make room for new arrivals. Additionally, Sudanese have avoided detention by registering with UNHCR in Tel Aviv.
At the same time, Israeli authorities have partnered with UNHCR in Israel to grant some form of temporary protection for thousands of asylum seekers, even granting them access to social services and allowing them to work. [4] Although Israelis are legally barred from employing Sudanese asylum seekers, the ban is not enforced, as it is in the authorities' interest for asylum seekers to support themselves financially. [9]
According to a Supreme Court of Israel decision on 13 January 2011, [10] [11] the employers of refugees and asylum seekers will not be fined; thus, de facto, they can legally work in Israel.
In February 2015, the government provided figures to the High Court regarding requests for asylum from Sudanese citizens. [12] Since 2009, there were 3,165 such requests, but only 45 received a reply. Of those 45, 40 were rejected and 5 were granted temporary residency. [12] In addition, 976 of the Sudanese asylum seekers withdrew their requests or left Israel. [12] Only four Sudanese or Eritrean persons have been granted refugee status. [12]
There is a mixed reaction in Israel: Large protests have been organized mainly by citizens of neighborhoods in South Tel Aviv who claim that their safety and life quality was ruined by the presence of illegal immigrants from Sudan and Eritrea. [13] [14] Also, there have been demonstrations in support of the refugees. [15]
 | Parts of this article (those related to this section) need to be updated.(February 2019) |
According to the Israeli Interior Ministry, the number of African migrants entering Israel illegally through Egypt has fallen drastically since Egyptian political upheaval began in January 2011. Around 700 migrants entered Israel in January and February, less than half the average monthly number in 2010. The decrease in migrant flow is attributed to the increased violence in the Sinai desert between Egyptian police and Bedouin smugglers. [5]
In February 2012, Israel's Interior Ministry announced that South Sudanese nationals must repatriate by March, arguing they no longer need protection since South Sudan gained independence. They will be given $1,300 and a plane ticket if they voluntarily resettle, but any who do not repatriate will be deported. [16]
As of March 2021, there were about 6,200 Sudanese migrants in Israel. [17] The Israeli and Sudanese governments discussed the potential return of migrants to Sudan after their normalization agreement. [17]
There are tens of thousands of Sudanese refugees in Egypt, most of them seeking refuge from ongoing military conflicts in their home country of Sudan. Their official status as refugees is highly disputed, and they have been subject to racial discrimination and police violence.
The Prevention of Infiltration Law is an Israeli law enacted in 1954, which deals with unauthorised entry of people into Israel, which it terms infiltration. The law defines offenses of armed and non-armed unauthorised entry to Israel. The law authorises the Minister of Defense to order the deportation of an infiltrator before or after conviction.
Human trafficking in Israel includes the trafficking of men and women into the country for forced labor and sex slavery. The country has made serious efforts to reduce the problem in recent years and now ranks 90th out of 167 countries who provide data. Identification of victims, criminal justice work and efforts to co-ordinate with business and government agencies has been concerted in reducing this problem in the last decade.
African immigration to Israel is the international movement to Israel from Africa of people that are not natives or do not possess Israeli citizenship in order to settle or reside there. This phenomenon began in the second half of the 2000s, when a large number of people from Africa entered Israel, mainly through the then-lightly fenced border between Israel and Egypt in the Sinai Peninsula. According to the data of the Israeli Interior Ministry, 26,635 people arrived illegally in this way by July 2010, and over 55,000 by January 2012. In an attempt to curb the influx, Israel constructed the Egypt–Israel barrier. Since its completion in December 2013, the barrier has almost completely stopped the immigration of Africans into Israel across the Sinai border.
Sudanese refugees are persons originating from the country of Sudan, but seeking refuge outside the borders of their native country. In recent history, Sudan has been the stage for prolonged conflicts and civil wars, as well as environmental changes, namely desertification. These forces have resulted not only in violence and famine but also the forced migration of large numbers of the Sudanese population, both inside and outside the country's borders. Given the expansive geographic territory of Sudan, and the regional and ethnic tensions and conflicts, much of the forced migration in Sudan has been internal. Yet, these populations are not immune to similar issues that typically accompany refugeedom, including economic hardship and providing themselves and their families with sustenance and basic needs. With the creation of a South Sudanese state, questions surrounding southern Sudanese IDPs may become questions of South Sudanese refugees.
Israel – South Sudan relations refers to the bilateral ties between the State of Israel and the Republic of South Sudan.
Large numbers of refugee kidnappings in Sinai occurred between 2009 and 2014. Refugees from Sudan, Ethiopia and Eritrea were transported to Sinai and held hostage by members of Bedouin tribes. Typically, the hostages were forced to give up phone numbers of relatives and were tortured with the relatives on the phone, in order to obtain ransoms in the range of $20,000–$40,000. If the families could not pay, the hostages were killed. The Egypt–Israel barrier, designed to keep out African migrants, caused the Rashaida traffickers to lose income from transporting refugees to the border, so they started to concentrate on kidnappings.
The Saharonim Prison is an Israeli detention facility for African asylum seekers located in the Negev desert. It is the largest of a planned four camps with its total capacity of 8,000 inmates. Together with the Ktzi'ot prison, Sadot prison and the Nachal Raviv tent camp they detain South Sudanese, Sudanese and Eritrean asylum seekers who crossed the border from Egypt to Israel.
Galia Sabar is the president of Ruppin Academic Center, one of Israel leading public colleges. Prior, she was a professor of African Studies at Tel Aviv University and the Chair of African Studies at the Department of Middle Eastern and African History at Tel Aviv University, where she also served as the coordinator of African Studies at the S. Daniel Abraham Center for International and Regional Studies. Sabar has published seven books and dozens of articles in professional journals. In addition to her academic research, Sabar has been a leading social activist in Israel mainly in relation to Ethiopian immigrants as well as in partnership with various NGOs assisting African labor migrants and asylum seekers. In May 2009, in recognition of her work combining academic rigor with social activism, Sabar received the Unsung Heroes of Compassion Award, sponsored by the international organization Wisdom in Action and delivered by the 14th Dalai Lama.
Sound of Torture is a 2013 documentary film written and directed by Israeli filmmaker Keren Shayo which follows Eritrean radio host and human rights activist Meron Estefanos as she reports on Eritrean refugees who have been captured in Sudan while migrating across the Sinai Peninsula into Israel.
A refugee crisis can refer to difficulties and dangerous situations in the reception of large groups of forcibly displaced persons. These could be either internally displaced, refugees, asylum seekers or any other huge groups of migrants.
The Mustapha Mahmoud Park Massacre denotes a 2005 incident in Cairo, in which dozens of Sudanese asylum seekers were killed. The civil wars in Sudan that have been taking place on and off since 1955, the subsequent destabilization and economic collapse caused by the country's infrastructure and economy, and the fighting in Darfur (2003), forced millions of Sudanese civilians to flee their homes and cities. Many of them arrived in Egypt, the neighboring country.
Azezet Habtezghi Kidane is an Eritrean-born British nun and human trafficking activist working in Israel.
Sheffi Paz is an Israeli activist against illegal immigrants and border infiltration, living in south Tel Aviv. In the past she was an activist in the Israeli political party Meretz, and since 2012 she has been one of the leaders in the movement against illegal immigration to Israel, and the concentration of these infiltrators in the old neighborhoods of south Tel Aviv.
The term non-Jewish African refugees primarily refers to the Sudanese and Eritrean refugee population migrating to Israel through the Sinai Desert. Israeli policy concerning these refugees has evolved from a policy of neutrality to a policy of deterrence. These refugees began arriving in Israel in the 21st century, led by Bedouin smugglers. The current non-Jewish African refugee population in Israel is approximately 36,000.
The Hotline for Refugees and Migrants (Hotline) is a human rights organization that utilizes direct service provision, litigation, and advocacy to uphold the rights of refugees, migrant workers, and survivors of human trafficking in Israel. In Hebrew, the organization is known as המוקד לפליטים ולמהגרים (hamoked l'plitim v l'mehagrim).
Usumain Tukuny Baraka is a Sudanese activist and asylum seeker living in Israel. He is a leader of Israel's asylum-seeking community and the first Darfuri refugee to graduate from a Hebrew-language program in an Israeli university.
Jamal Abdelmaji Eisa Mohammed is a Sudanese-born runner competing internationally over 5,000 and 10,000 metres. Mohammed was one of 29 athletes across 12 disciplines who representing the refugee Olympic team at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.
An ongoing refugee crisis began in Africa in mid-April 2023 after the outbreak of the 2023 Sudan conflict. By December, more than 1.5 million people have fled the country, while more than 5.6 million had been internally displaced. These included at least 75,000 migrant returnees and other third-country nationals.
Ethiopian refugees in Sudan are individuals from Ethiopia who have sought asylum in Sudan due to various reasons, including the two-year civil war in the Tigray region and other challenging circumstances in Ethiopia.
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