Coalition MKs, Zionist Union back migrants plan in first vote

Lawmakers, including from the opposition Zionist Union party, approve a government plan that would shutter the Holot migrant facility in southern Israel in four months in anticipation of wide-ranging deportations of illegal migrants to other African countries.

Holot, an open facility in the desert that can host 1,200 migrants who are allowed to leave to work during the day, would be closed three months from December 16, according to the decision.

The proposal will allow for further extensions to keep Holot open in the event the mass deportations are stalled. It passes its first reading with 53 MKs in favor, 10 opposed.

In closing the facility, migrants will be given an ultimatum: Leave the country or face imprisonment.

“What is wrong with you?” Meretz MK Tamar Zandberg rages against the Zionist Union party in the plenum. “Have you lost your minds? This is no longer a tactic to win votes but rather [a matter of] the most basic values. It’s the ability to distinguish between good and evil.”

“What is the difference between you and Miri Regev and Oren Hazan?” she asks, referring to Likud MKs. “What will your extra seat be worth if you are the worst populists?”

“Soon you’ll be putting the president in a keffiyeh,” she says, referring to photos circulating online by critics of President Reuven Rivlin. “You are not the opposition.”

Israel tacitly recognizes that Sudanese and Eritreans cannot be returned to their dangerous homelands, so it has signed deals with third countries, which agree to accept departing migrants on condition they consent to the arrangement, according to activists.

In August, the High Court of Justice approved the emigration policy, but also ruled that Israeli authorities had to first ensure that the countries to which migrants were being deported were safe. Though the state has not named the third countries, they have been identified in media reports as Rwanda and Uganda.