Deportations dominate as migrant roundup rolls on

It will be interesting to see how long it will last, but for now the roundup of foreigners from Israel’s streets is still making major headlines in the Hebrew press. As the second day of operation “Returning Home” concluded yesterday with the arrests of dozens more African migrants in preparation for deportation, Israel’s newspapers remain fascinated by the novel phenomenon and offer in-depth coverage, commentary and analysis of it.

Yedioth Ahronoth leads the paper with the headline “The Deportation.” The simple, laconic headline is featured beneath a dramatic, close-up photo of an African woman and her young daughter who stand to be deported, snapped over the shoulder of an Oz immigration officer. The subhead cites a quote from Interior Minister Eli Yishai explaining that “It is an operation to protect the identity of the Jewish state.”

Maariv’s front page is dominated by a photo of immigration officers standing next to an African woman and her children, with the family’s luggage resting at their feet. The headline, in the form of an expanded photo caption, reads “Operation Deportation,” and the piece reports on the results of the second day of the roundup — more than a hundred arrests (mostly in Eilat) and a rise in requests for voluntary exit by some of the South Sudanese migrants.

Haaretz’s main story reports on the next stage of the operation, answering the question what happens to the migrants after their arrest. The headline reads: “A new migrant city in the heart of the Negev: 20,000 people in tents and cargo containers.” The story reports on the start of construction of a new massive detention facility and the concerns of local residents fearing the effects of the facility on the region.

Israel Hayom designates a slightly lower placement for coverage of the operation, under the fold and below a fluff piece on the prime minister injuring himself in a sporting mishap, and runs the basic headline “Dozens of infiltrators already arrested.”

No line uncrossed

The second story making major headlines this morning is yesterday’s disturbing vandalism at Yad Vashem. Photos of desecrated Holocaust memorials make the front pages of Haaretz and Israel Hayom, accompanied by wall-to-wall condemnations of the act, which is believed to have been perpetrated by anti-Zionist religious extremists.

Maariv’s top headline this morning calls into question the viability of the government’s pledge to build 300 housing units in the West Bank settlement of Beit El as compensation for the evacuation of the Givat Ulpana neighborhood. The story reveals that much of the land slated for the new structures is, like the land on which Givat Ulpana rests, privately owned by Palestinians. The attorney general is reportedly hard at work to find a legal solution.

Should leftists be concerned about being the next minority to be rounded up? Haaretz has a front-page exclusive on police issuing summons to leaders of last year’s social protest movement, ordering them to show up for interrogation over their plans for the upcoming summer. The summonses were ostensibly issued so that the police can coordinate with the activists and better prepare for weeks ahead, but the activists say they feel ill at ease with the investigation methods and intimidated by the unannounced visits to their homes.

What makes an offbeat story about a car being towed away with a sleeping child in it Page 1 material? When the child in question is the offspring of a high-tech millionaire. Unfortunately for the press, since the child is underage, they can’t report his name, but that didn’t stop Israel Hayom and Yedioth from running the story on the front page. What will happen to the boy’s nanny, who said she left him in the car for only a few minutes and chased down the tow truck all the way to the impound lot, and to the inspector who failed to spot the boy sleeping in the back seat, remains to be seen.

Though only Israel Hayom deemed it front-page news, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s sports injury does appear in all the papers. Both Maariv and Yedioth feature it on the back page, the spot reserved for the colorful and bizarre stories of the day. Both papers feature two photos of the striker-in-chief, one showing him gearing up for the powerful kick and the other showing him seated with a bandaged left foot. Maariv offers the ironic headline “Left with the right.”

Many of the papers feature the IDF’s contribution to gay pride week, a photo of two male combat soldiers walking hand in hand. The photo, displayed on the IDF Spokesperson’s Facebook page, alongside the caption “Did you know that the IDF treats everyone equally?” has reportedly garnered tens of thousands of “Likes.”

Another ‘existential threat’

Ofer Shelah of Maariv decries the government’s alarmist rhetoric over the threat posed by the African migrants. Shelah writes that though many countries face similar problems with immigrants, none of their leaders resort to fearmongering with doomsday warnings of the demographic threat posed the country’s national character, as Israeli leaders do.

“It is fascinating to see how many fears are expressed by Benjamin Netanyahu, the first prime minister to be born in an independent Israel. Nothing for him is simply a matter of policy and action; it’s always an existential threat of historic proportions,” he writes. Shelah goes on to suggest that either Netanyahu is a cynic who believes that scaring the public with existential threats is a sure way to drum up support for government actions, or he is indeed a man so full of fears.

“It’s hard to know which of the two options is grimmer,” he concludes.

In Haaretz, Riki Tagabe writes about discrimination closer to home and the need to close, at a very early age, the educational gaps between children of veteran Israelis and children of Ethiopian immigrants.

“Today most investment goes to children of elementary and high school age. This is an essential investment, but neglecting younger children creates a gap that’s hard to close when they reach school,” writes Tagabe. She suggests that the biggest impact can come in the form of home guidance programs to immigrant families, but also argues in favor of the Education Ministry sending its best teachers to the nurseries, kindergartens and schools where Ethiopian children are being educated.