PM reportedly orders study of new proposal as cabinet meet to approve plan to tell migrants to leave or face indefinite jail

Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has reportedly asked officials to examine the feasibility of forcibly deporting thousands of African migrants, in the latest escalation of an anti-migrant campaign.

According to a report in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz, Netanyahu instructed the national security adviser, Meir Ben Shabbat, to look into forced expulsion as his cabinet met to approve a plan to offer 40,000 people the choice of being deported with a cash payment or being incarcerated indefinitely.

Despite controversy around the existing plan, Netanyahu, following concerns over cost and prison space, asked officials to go a step further and ask if the migrants could be expelled by force – a proposal that would almost certainly be challenged in the courts.

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On Tuesday, details were disclosed of a much-criticised scheme starting in April to persuade people to leave through a combination of the threat of prison and the incentive of a cash payment of $3,500.

Most of the migrants in question – largely Sudanese and Eritrean people – arrived in Israel in the second half of the last decade, crossing from Egypt before new security on the border sealed the route.



Many people settled in poor neighbourhoods of south Tel Aviv, prompting a campaign against them by local Israeli residents, which attracted the support of Netanyahu despite at times being heavily coloured by racism.

Speaking at the cabinet meeting that approved the scheme, Netanyahu said the “mission” was “to deport the illegal infiltrators who entered Israel prior to the construction of the new barrier with Egypt”.

He said: “Today the cabinet will approve the plan for deporting the infiltrators from Israel. We will step up enforcement and we will allocate budgets and personnel to implement the plan. I think that it is important that people understand that we are doing something here that is completely legal and completely essential.

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“The infiltrators have a clear choice – cooperate with us and leave voluntarily, respectably, humanely and legally, or we will have to use other tools at our disposal, which are also according to law.”

The plan has been opposed by human rights groups including the Centre for Refugees and Migrants, Amnesty International Israel and the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, who recently signed a letter demanding the deportations be halted. “Anyone who has a heart must oppose the expulsion of the refugees,” the letter says.

Referring to a widely reported deal to pay Rwanda $5,000 per person to accept the migrants, the groups added: “Rwanda is not a safe place. All the evidence indicates that anyone expelled from Israel to Rwanda finds himself there without status and without rights, exposed to threats, kidnappings, torture and trafficking.”

The latest move comes amid a rash of right populist moves by Netanyahu’s coalition, which some have suggested is being pursued ahead of expected police recommendations against the Israeli prime minister in two corruption cases.

Earlier this week Israel’s Knesset voted to prevent Jerusalem being divided, despite similar legislation already being on the statute books.

Then, in the aftermath of the cabinet meeting that discussed the fate of the African migrants, Israel’s parliament gave preliminary approval to a bill making it easier for “terrorists” to be sentenced to death after Netanyahu said it was necessary in extreme cases.

That proposed legislation requires three more votes in parliament to become law and is being pursued despite the fact the death penalty – although never applied in Israel since the hanging of the Nazi Adolf Eichmann – is also on the statute book.