Fear Mounts Among Africans Over Deportations
Many African migrants in the country are living now in a state of fear, more worried than ever about being deported.
“They told us in January they were removing our collective protection, but it’s only now that we’re seeing action in the field, and it’s starting to close in on us,” said Bernard Abbot, who came to Israel 15 years ago from the Ivory Coast.
“I’ve been living here many years and I never believed that there would come a day that they [the authorities] would start pursuing the few Ivory Coast citizens who live here,” he continued. “But this morning we understood that it will reach everyone, because they’ve arrested a woman and child from the community.
“It’s a hard situation, because people live full lives here, with families and children,” Abbot said. “You can’t hole up now at home and hope that they won’t come. Still, people aren’t going out unless it’s absolutely necessary.”
Ismail, a migrant from Darfur, is also afraid, even though the collective protection offered by authorities to citizens of northern Sudan, including those coming from Darfur, is still in place.
For more, go to Haaretz.com
I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.
Now more than ever, American Jews need independent news they can trust, with reporting driven by truth, not ideology. We serve you, not any ideological agenda.
At a time when other newsrooms are closing or cutting back, the Forward has removed its paywall and invested additional resources to report on the ground from Israel and around the U.S. on the impact of the war, rising antisemitism and the protests on college campuses.
Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.
Make a gift of any size and become a Forward member today. You’ll support our mission to tell the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO
Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.