Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Breaking News

Africans Protest Israel Detention Plan

Some 300 Sudanese protested on Sunday outside Tel Aviv’s Kirya government headquarters against plans to imprison African asylum-seekers in a Negev detention facility. They called on the state to examine their individual requests for recognition as refugees and grant them their rights and protection. The refugees also complained that the United Nations does not do enough to safeguard them.

The protesters chanted “We are refugees, not infiltrators” – the latter being the government’s term for them – and “We are human beings.” They held aloft banners in Hebrew and English proclaiming “We are not criminals – why are you putting us in prison?” Other signs read “We came to ask for protection, not to look for work,” “We did not chose to be refugees – Israel and the UN have failed to protect us,” and “Where are Jewish ethics?”

“We want Israelis to know that the Sudanese are not coming here for work. We are refugees,” said Suaba Osman from the Darfur region in Sudan, clutching a refugee’s ID card issued in Egypt. Osman entered Israel five years ago and has lived here since with her husband and son. “I’m holding this so that everyone will know that we are refugees,” she said.

For more go to Haaretz.com

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

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.

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 polarized discourse..

Readers like you make it all possible. Support our work by becoming a Forward Member and connect with our journalism and your community.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

Join our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.