Israeli security and military officials have offered to regularize the status of asylum seekers who want to join the Israeli offensive in the Gaza Strip, in which hundreds of soldiers have died since last October. The Israeli newspaper Haaretz obtained exclusive testimony from migrants who were offered permanent residency and confirmed this information with defense and security sources.
According to defense sources, the offers are not isolated but are being made “in an organized manner,” with the advice of legal advisers. Haaretz noted that there are about 30,000 African asylum seekers in Israel and that the majority are young men, employed as cheap labor. So far, none of those who participated in the war have been granted asylum, the newspaper said.
A migrant told Haaretz On condition of anonymity, he received a call from a man who identified himself as a police officer. Over the next two weeks, the interviewee had several meetings with “security officers” who told him that they were recruiting asylum seekers for the war in Gaza. The interviewee decided not to accept the offer, but then met again with one of the officers, who told him that if he continued, he could receive “the documents of the State of Israel”; he also promised him a good salary.
“The guy told me they were looking for special people. I asked him why I was special, he didn’t know me at all,” the migrant told Haaretz.
Ultimately, he withdrew before starting the two-week military training, which the officer told him he would undergo with other asylum seekers. His rejection angered the officer, but it did not completely close the door on the interviewee’s possibility of joining the army later. Thanks to his temporary residency, he currently enjoys most of his rights, but he must renew this permit periodically and is not guaranteed to be able to stay in Israel for long, according to Haaretz.
Military sources confirmed to the newspaper that asylum seekers have participated in several military operations. The same sources added that internally, the fact of “exploiting people who fled their country because of the war” to fight for Israel has been criticized, but that these critical voices have been “silenced.”
Haaretz ” asked the responsible defense organization and they assured that the recruitment of migrants was done “legally”. The newspaper did not give further details on the deployment of asylum seekers because its publication is prohibited.
