The Refugee Issue In Tel Aviv

In the last several years, several thousand refugees have flooded into Israel, some legal and some not legal from mostly African countries like the Sudan.  As of this date, over 40,000 refugees have settled in Southern Tel Aviv which historically has had a population of people of lower or no incomes, a high crime rate and many migrant workers. Binah, a social action and study organization which has a liberal perspective, is actively working with these people and trying to promote education about the very complex issue.  Binah  has organized a gap-year program in Tel Aviv where students volunteer to help immigrants.

As the 27 of us walked through a neighborhood in Tel Aviv filled with African refugees, I struggled with the feeling in the pit of my stomach. I was unsure of exactly the reason, but simply observing the poverty and hardships faced by the residents of the neighborhood pained me. As we walked deeper into the neighborhood, witnessing more atrocities, the reason for the feeling I had suddenly dawned on me. Although what I was seeing upset me, the fact that I was seeing it without the ability to do anything to solve it upset me more. What right did we as the American tourists have to come in and impose on their town? It seemed to me that we were using someone's home as somewhat of a tourist attraction, something nearly impossible for me to reconcile.

After I made the point to one of my friends, she responded that there might be a reason. It was true that at the time it felt like nothing more than an observation of the hardships that life can bring, but our group was also being educated on exactly that. Often education is the first step towards advocacy, and this solution could be the case in our group as well. As we boarded the bus and looked out the window one last time, students spoke about the ways they could help and the possibilities of taking a gap year in Israel and helping this village. That alone was inspiring, proving that although the situation had at first been difficult, it had in fact resulted in a thought provoking experience for many.

Posted by Jill Merrick