Originally published July 31 2022
A little more than one month ago an event marking World Refugee Day took place at Bialik-Rogozin school in Tel Aviv. The location was not a coincidence. For several years now, the school serves as the main education institution for the children of refugees and asylum seekers in south Tel Aviv. The heart of the event was the book “Going Far”, a collection of testimonies of young Eritrean women, who described their hellish but hope-inspiring journey from their homeland to Israel (full disclosure, the book editor is my partner, Osnat Winkler-Rapoport, M.R.). The opening remarks, however, were delivered by the representative of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Israel, Damtew Dessalegne.
In a quiet voice, Dessalegne clearly and sharply challenged the official and public Israeli narrative about the refugees. “There should be no illusion as if the Eritreans and the Darfurians who fled to the State of Israel came here of their own free will, in search of a better life”, said Dessalegne. “They fled from their communities and countries because they didn’t have a choice… therefore it is unjustified, legally and morally, to define these people as ‘illegal migrants’, or even worse, as ‘infiltrators’, and to absolutely avoid the term ‘refugees’ and the rights and duties it includes”.
Dessalegne knows from first-hand experience what it means to be a refugee. He left his homeland, Ethiopia, at the age of 25, and found asylum in Canada, but he never left the world of refugees. He began to work on refugee matters in Canada, and then joined UNHCR, the UN Refugee Agency. For 25 years he wandered between Switzerland, Romania, Egypt, the UNHCR Europe office in Italy, Armenia and Cyprus. He arrived in Israel four years ago, and at the end of the month will end his tenure here in Israel. This will be his last position. After his time in Israel he will retire.
Dessalegne’s extensive experience gives him a comparative perspective of the situation of refugees in Israel and in other parts of the world. Israel, he tells us in an interview we conducted with him in the UNHCRs modest office in Tel Aviv, is not the most racist country he has seen. Far from it. He saw here demonstrations for the refugees of such magnitude that he hadn’t seen in other places; there is less organized violence against refugees than in places such as Germany or South Africa, and also, as a black man he feels less racism in Israel than in other places.
However regarding the refugees, one thing sets Israel apart, also in relation to the European countries he is familiar with, as well as the poorer countries he has lived in. Israel does not grant asylum seekers who fled to the country a glimmer of hope. They do not have, nor do their children who grew up in Israel or were even born there, an horizon, any way to receive any status and to be officially recognized as refugees. The state does everything it can to make their life miserable, in numerous ways, among them a special tax on refugees, not granting health and social services, detention, encouraging them to leave, restricted areas of residence and unending incitement against them.
In Europe, every asylum seeker knows when their refugee status request will be examined, when they will receive citizenship if they are recognized as refugees. In poor countries that accept millions of refugees, the refugees are granted status. In Israel, the maximum the state grants is a “temporary release visa”, in other words release from detention. That’s all. “I was shocked the first time I saw this, I couldn’t believe it”, he says about the document that every asylum seeker carries in their pocket, and that only owing to the intervention of the High Court of justice also enables them to work.
This pressure is most likely one of the reasons that no less than 4,000 of the 28,000 asylum seekers living in Israel – as Dessalegne reveals here – have submitted applications to move to Canada, as part of the program in which Canadian citizens sponsor them and guarantee to support them financially during their first year. This program, admits Dessalegne, may reduce the pressure on the government of Israel to arrange the status of the refugees living here, but “experience has taught us not to wait for someone else.”
The following is the interview, condensed for reading purposes.
United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) Representative – the Office in Israel, Damtew Dessalegne ©Oren Ziv
In your speech at Rogizin you spoke out against the tendency in Israel to call refugees by derogatory names such as “infiltrators”. Can you elaborate?
“I’ll give you some context. There is an international Convention that tells us who is a refugee. The definition cannot change from country to country. Israel was a main player in formulating the convention after World War II, because the convention itself was the result of the Holocaust and the displacement it brought with it.
“The determination who is a refugee is not made by politicians. It is made by experts. Just like a doctor determines who is sick, not a politician. Now the politicians call them infiltrators. This is a problem.
“Refugees leave without asking anyone for permission. It is unreasonable to require them to obtain a passport or a visa. According to the Convention, it is prohibited to penalize refugees for the way they enter a country. Eritreans and Sudanese came to Israel without being invited, without a passport and a visa. They acted according to the Convention. They sought asylum, they are not tourists. If they are called ‘infiltrators’, this security language. Language is important. But we do not know of any case of harm to national security (on the part of the refugees, M.R. and O.Z.).
“What took place now in Ukraine should serve as a good lesson. You can become a refugee in a second, it happens out of the blue. To the Jews this is nothing new. You have to let people feel that they are human beings. You don’t have to be generous you simply have to call them by their real name: ‘refugees’ or ‘asylum seekers’. Not ‘Infiltrators‘”.
From your experience, where does Israel stand compared to the world regarding the refugees?
“I have been doing this work more than 25 years. I have gained experience and knowledge, and have seen that the life of a refugee is tough everywhere in the world, in the north and the south, in the west and in the east. This is not unusual. What is special in Israel compared to other OECD countries is that there isn’t a positive policy for dealing with the refugees. There is no policy of receiving them, requiring rapid examination of their files, a policy that will ensure minimum access to health services, to vital services in order to survive.
If you are in Europe, the day you arrive you will know when you will have your first interview, what the process is until the day you receive citizenship, if you are approved as a refugee, of course. Here there is only hopelessness. You are not permitted to drive, are not allowed to send money, there is a deposit from the wages, they can only work in certain sectors, children are sent to separate schools.”
How do government officials in Israel explain this policy?
“Due to the political situation (this refers to the frequent elections, M.R., O.Z.), it was difficult to conduct serious discussions with government officials here, but it isn’t a personal matter. It isn’t a specific political politician who says: ‘I don’t like refugees’. There is a national consensus that Israel is a Jewish state and must remain a Jewish state. The attitude towards the refugees stems from this perspective.
“This ideology is fine, Israel has the right to accept only Jewish migrants. All countries have the right to decide who migrates to them. But if the access to citizenship and residency is only through the Law of Return, then there is no back door, and they (the government officials) view the receipt of the refugees as a back door. I saw countries in Europe that only wanted Christian migrants. But it doesn’t work that way. I say to the authorities here: the Law of Return and refugee rights can go together, they are not contradictory.”
Over the past decade almost half the population of asylum seekers from Sudan and Eritrea has left, many of them under pressure of detention at the Holot “facility” or due to the difficult living conditions. Dessalegne details the situation in Israel compared to the world.
“The numbers are very limited. All in all 28,000. Over the years at least 30,000 refugees have left, at least 10,000 of them left through the UNHCR.
4,000 asylum seekers requested to leave for Canada within one month. Queuing for visa renewals ©Oren Ziv
“Countries such as the U.S., Canada and Sweden, as well as France, agreed to receive asylum seekers from Israel. 250 refugees every year. Additionally, there is a Canadian program in which private individuals find Canadian citizens who will sponsor them, will guarantee to receive them and to support them for at least one year. However, they need recognition that they are refugees from the government or the UN Refugee Agency.”
Do you have the authority to declare someone a refugee?
“Yes, we have the authority, but we don’t like to use it. We used to do it in Israel up until 2009, and at the government’s request we transferred them this authority. This is the government’s job, we don’t want to intervene. If someone from Congo or from Ukraine requests protection, we don’t intervene.
“In the case of Eritreans and Sudanese, the government granted them temporary collective protection, they are non-deportable and therefore this is sufficient for us in order to interview them and see if they meet the condition of the Refugee Convention, and then we issue them a letter which they can take to the Canadian Embassy to request ‘private sponsorship‘.
“Last year, 2021, within one month we received 4000 inquiries. We are processing these requests, are already half way through, and hope to finish by the end of the year.”
Doesn’t this process of the move to Canada encourage Israel not to grant status to asylum seekers?
“There is a difficult question of balance here. You have to decide between doing something and easing the pain, suffering and hopelessness that people are contending with, or not doing anything, letting people suffer, and then the government will be forced to do something. Our experience has taught us not to wait for someone else. Do what you can.”
How do you compare the attitude towards the refugees from Eritrea, Sudan and Africa in general to the attitude towards the refugees from Ukraine?
“I see a big difference. Throughout the world, not just in Israel. The response was positive and generous at all levels: how people were received into the territory quickly, without difficulties, without asking questions. Because if you leave a country, you don’t have to waste too much time on questions about why you came. This is exemplary behavior and this is the way it should always have been.
“What we are asking is that the same thing be done for all the other refugee communities. You don’t really have to listen to the personal stories of people today fleeing the Democratic Republic of Congo, from Mali, from my former country Ethiopia, from South Sudan, or in order to understand that there is a story of a country, that people are being killed and suffering from displacement.
“You can’t compare the scope of the funding that the UN and other organizations receive for programs and support of Ukraine, compared to what is allocated to refugees from Yemen, and from Syria and from Africa. This shouldn’t happen. This reflects the society we live in. There must not be preferential treatment, the humanitarian response must be neutral to color and race. The human being suffers, not their color or their religion.”
How do you compare the scope of the crisis in Ukraine to other crises in the world?
“There is no precedent in the history of recent years of the number of people who within a short period of time were displaced from their homes and remained in Ukraine or left to other countries. It is much greater than Syria. On the other hand, as opposed to other refugees, half the Ukrainians who left the country have already returned. Afghans have already been refugees for four decades and more. In Syria and Pakistan there is also a situation of continued refugee status. The Ukrainians were not forced to enter camps. The Ukrainians come to private homes.
“There is also no comparing the public sentiment. For the first time in a long period of time refugees are described positively, are called by their real name.”
And you hope that this will have an impact?
“It is our hope. For many years, politicians, and the media in many countries, Britain and Australia for example, described the refugees as swindlers, thieves, murderers, rapists. Before the crisis in Ukraine, if you opened a tabloid, that’s what you would see on the front page. It was a deliberate attack on the most vulnerable people, that can’t be explained except as racism. It is so refreshing to open a newspaper and see a positive description of refugees. It is wonderful and we want it to remain that way.”
Let’s get back to Israel, what is the difficult problem that asylum seekers in Israel face?
“The most serious problem is the lack of hope. You can deal with the material lack or the inability to find work. You can tell yourself that it is temporary. But the minute you lose hope, when there is no horizon, when you can’t lean back and say: this is the place I’ll be in two years, in five years, in ten years, this is how my children’s future will look like, that is hopelessness. Especially when you are alone, and you don’t have family support, when you don’t have who to rely on. And your children ask you every day where they will study after they graduate from school, will they be able to serve in the army like their friends.
“Don’t get me wrong, for the refugees not everything is bad in Israel. I don’t know of any other country that in one day 25 thousand people came out to demonstrate in support of the refugees. I don’t know of any such example.”
Does civil society in Israel express solidarity with the refugees?
“Yes. The people who come out against the refugees are very few. When we were in Cyprus we conducted a survey, and we asked whether you support integration of the refugees. The vast majority said ‘yes’, but not in Cyprus.
“In Israel there is a good combination. There are realistic people who say: if there were no Sudanese and Eritreans in this country, a quarter of our restaurants would close, the streets would be dirty, the garbage would not be collected on time. These people (the refugees) take any job, work hard, pay taxes, and the taxes that are taken from them contribute to our wellbeing. 25 thousand people came out to demonstrate for the refugees (in 2018 against the deportation, O.Z., M.R.).”
Do you hear from refugees about racism on a daily basis?
“As a black person I rarely experienced racism here, me and my family. My engagement may have been limited, but after all I go shopping or to restaurants or on trips.”
In other countries did you experience racism as a black person?
“Yes. People stop and ask you: where are you from? Rarely have people asked me this here (in Israel) on the street or given me an ugly look, pushed me.
“The indications are if there are racist attacks, killings, destruction of property, frequent protests against refugees. In Israel the violence is limited to a small group, that we know who they are. You don’t see here organized violence against refugees like we saw in Germany or what happened in South Africa recently. There have been some incidences over the years, but not daily violence.
“I call it ‘passive tolerance’. As long as you don’t bother me, I won’t bother you. As long as you are here temporarily, I reconcile myself to your presence. Passive tolerance is ok for a while, but it is not enough for the refugees. They need active tolerance. Active tolerance that embraces your fellow human beings, supports them.
“The public attitude reflects the ideology of the Law of Return. In other words, as long as you are temporary, it’s ok. Be our guests, but there is no thought of the refugees remaining here. That’s the barrier.
“Sheffi Paz would not object if the Eritreans or the Sudanese would come here for a year or two. In Israel both the politicians and the public don’t want the permanent situation (of the refugees).”
Asylum Seeker in Tel Aviv ©Oren Ziv
Would it have been correct if the government had not concentrated all the refugees in south Tel Aviv or is there no choice?
“Dispersal in general is a good idea. It is not good to have a large concentration of people in one neighborhood, especially if it is a ‘visible minority’ as they say in Canada. In Canada they have polite terms to describe minorities.
“But the reality is that throughout the world the refugees are concentrated in places where there is work, and there is work in large cities. Perhaps it is preferable that they live in small cities or villages, but the work opportunities there are limited. If you want a policy of dispersal, you have to prepare in advance the communities to which the people will be dispersed. If half the refugees who currently live in Tel Aviv will leave and move to Eilat or to Rehovot or to other places, there will be a war. You have to organize it. Methodically, with the necessary resources, schools and other means, otherwise it is inadvisable.
We were told that the only thing that Israel does according to the Refugee Convention is to grant the children of refugees education in schools.
“Yes, the children go to school. (However) it would be much more preferable if they would study together with other children, Israelis, and not only in schools for foreigners. This is a deliberate policy. The idea is that if you are a temporary guest, there is no need for you to begin the integration process. But the school is one of the best places for integration. Some politicians explicitly said that there would never be joint schools with foreigners. This is the only way you can maintain the notion that these people (the refugees) are here temporarily. But 15 years or twenty years is not temporary.
“Do you know what is written in their visa, even after 15 years? Temporary release visa. It does not even say ‘temporary stay’, not to mention residency. Temporary release, in other words release from detention.
“The idea is that you came illegally, and according to the Entry to Israel Law you have to be deported. But because we cannot deport you, we will give you temporary release from detention, because otherwise we would detain you. The fact that every time you look at your visa you see ‘temporary release’, is difficult. Even after twenty years. I was shocked when I saw this the first time, I couldn’t believe it. A temporary release visa for someone who they let in and let them stay.”
Whoever reaches the border and seek asylum should be allowed to enter. Protest of Holot detainees, 2014©Oren Ziv
Theoretically, if a refugee arrives at the Israeli border from Egypt, knocks on the gate in the border fence and says: ‘I’m a refugee’, according to the Convention do you have to let him enter?
“If the individual arrives at the border without documents, or lands at the airport, and presents themself to the border police and says: ‘I came from this and this country because my life is in danger, this is the first safe country I could get to, and I need your protection’, according to the procedures specified in international refugee protection law, this border police person is supposed to transfer the individual to the relevant authorities that deal with refugees.
“Then this individual will be given a request form or a date to fill the request form, will be given an interview date, usually within one month to three months. In the interview the individual is given the opportunity to present their case, the duration of the interview may take between one hour to ten hours. They will receive a translator if they don’t speak the language, and they will be able to submit the documents. Ultimately, it will be decided: yes, you are a refugee, no, you are not a refugee. Not ‘maybe’, not ‘let’s see.’
“If you are refused, you have the right to appeal, up to the Supreme Court. There are countries in which it takes five years, in many countries it is faster. Up until the final decision, you remain an asylum seeker and are entitled to enjoy the services provided by the state. The minute the final decision is made, the state has the full right to deport you, even forcibly, if you do not cooperate.
“That’s how it should have worked. You can’t look at the individual and say to them: ‘you don’t have a visa, you don’t have a passport, go back’. It is prohibited. You can’t say: we have a fence, so we don’t let you enter. You need to open more gates in the fence, and to let people enter and to see if they are refugees.”
Israel wants to bring the number of refugees down to zero. Is this rare?
“There are countries in Europe which say that they want a zero-refugee policy. But this is unrealistic. It can’t happen, and it won’t happen. Even in Hungary there are refugees, even though they want there to be less, the starting point of almost all the countries today is that they don’t want refugees. But when the refugees appear, the vast majority will not send them back home without a proper procedure.”
How do poor countries such as Jordan, Lebanon, Cyprus and others deal with refugees? Do they accept everyone? Do they enable them the proper procedure you described?
“In Israel there is lack of perspective, lack of proportions. The first message I received here from government officials was that Israel is a small country that is under constant threat, (I was told) that we are a rich country surrounded by poor countries, we are attractive and therefore we must be tough. If we even accept a few, this will be an invitation for others to come.
“One of the steps Israel took to reduce the pressure was to negotiate secret agreements with Ruanda and Uganda. I said (to government officials in Israel): ‘Do you know that in 2019 Uganda received within two months almost a million refugees from South Sudan? The answer was: so what will it matter to them if they receive another ten thousand?
“The system of international protection of refugees will only work if everyone takes part in it according to their abilities, not according to their wishes. Rich countries can’t take in all the refugees in the world. It is not possible geographically and will create social, economic and other tensions.
“The less rich countries are willing to receive and deal with a large share of the refugees. The reality is, and has always been, that eighty percent of the refugees in the world, except Ukraine, are in the developing countries. Usually in countries that have the least ability to deal with them.
“Therefore, in order for these refugees to receive protection and treatment, and for the international system to work, the rich countries, that receive very limited numbers of refugees, have to pay. Either you receive refugees or you pay those who receive them.
“If you give less in terms of money, then people will come to you. And this will cost more economically and politically. Political parties have lost power because of improperly dealing with refugees.
Protest against deportation of refugees to Rwanda and Uganda, Tel Aviv 2018 ©Oren Ziv
“Australia set a bad example to the world when it sent refugees to Nauru. Israel copied from it, and now Britain is imitating Israel. The poor countries, which as noted receive most of the refugees, track these examples. If they imitate what the rich countries do, who will be able to blame them”?
Activists and academics in the world say that the separation between refugees and economic migrants should be eliminated. They say that we need to call everyone ‘refugees’, because there shouldn’t be a separation between those who fled from war and those who fled because of the gap between the global south and north.
“I think that this is an entirely erroneous approach. It will not help, neither the refugees nor the migrants. Refugees and migrants are not the same thing. By no means should they be. According to international law, countries have no obligation to receive migrants. They are obligated to receive refugees. To call everyone by the same name will not improve the situation, it may alienate governments who want less refugees.”
Back to Israel. Before saying farewell, what are the most urgent things that Israel can do to improve the refugees’ condition?
“Don’t call them names, don’t call them infiltrators. It is not what will scare them away. Give them minimal conditions, let them work wherever possible.”
Now there is a new procedure issued by Interior Minister Shaked that forces asylum seekers to work only in a limited number of occupations.
“Will this policy strengthen Israel? No. It will only bring suffering. It is unfair that the refugees will only work in construction or in agriculture. If they will work in other occupations, it will not cost the state anything, and it will ensure that they will contribute to the economy.
“Regarding health insurance, there is a program of the Ministry. It is the minimum that can be done for these people. Access to the health system. And it can be done at a reasonable cost.
“You can’t close your eyes to the fact that 8,000 refugee children will soon reach age 18, and they don’t have a future. This is no small number. These children need support, because they won’t be able to rely on the support of their family.
“There is also the issue of the survivors of the torture in Sinai. How long can they wait for support? This chapter must be closed. These are not big things.
“There is a need to expedite examination of the requests. It’s not rocket science.
“This is my wish list before saying farewell. These things can be done. They will not be a burden on Israel. Put aside the residency and the citizenship. Give these people some hope for a different future.”
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