The Israeli tied visa regime, known as the ‘binding arrangement’, provides a path into the country for seasonal migrant labourers. It exchanges a tied relationship with a designated employer for a legal job in the construction, care and agriculture sectors, and to a lesser extent in services and industry. These sectors are characterised by harsh working conditions, long and exhausting working hours, and low wages. They are all sectors that struggle to recruit local workers.
The Israeli system shares many aspects with the other tied visa regimes covered in this series. But it has some unique aspects which make it a different sort of target for political and legal interventions.
One aspect I’d like to focus on here is how it behaves vis-à-vis two distinct sets of non-citizen workers. One is Palestinian workers from the Occupied Territories. The other is migrant workers recruited since the 1990s.
Palestinian workers in Israel prior to October 2023
Palestinian workers entered the Israeli labour market soon after the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza Strip in 1967. About 130,000 Palestinian permit holders were working in Israel and settlements prior to Hamas’ attack on October 2023, most of them (about 75,000) in the construction sector.
Most commuted and returned home at the end of each day. Unlike for other temporary migrant workers, their employment period is not limited by law and some workers have worked for the same employer or in the same sector for many years.
Since October 2023, most Palestinian workers have not been allowed to return to work in Israel. The Israeli government has adopted measures to replace at least some of them with migrant workers, which we shall get to. But it is worth recalling how the ‘binding arrangement’ worked for Palestinians up until October 2023 as it was such a unique aspect of Israel’s seasonal worker system.
The binding of migrant workers, unlike that of Palestinian workers, was not meant to serve national security interests
Until 2020, Palestinian workers were bound to the employer listed in their work permit. This measure existed to supervise their whereabouts and control their movement. But in practice, trade in permits, subcontracting and work for other employers were common. Workers were also subject to constant surveillance while in Israel, reflecting the state’s perception of their presence as a threat to national security.
In 2020, a new arrangement was adopted to end the binding of Palestinian construction workers. This arrangement redefined the employment model in the construction sector, and under the new model permit-holding workers were to be able to move freely between different employers within the construction sector, subject to registration. The new model also included a mechanism which enabled permit-holding workers to enter Israel to seek employment. The construction sector, like all sectors employing Palestinian workers, was still subject to a set quota limiting the number of Palestinian workers it could bring into the country.
These measures were expected to reduce binding and the high recruitment fees paid by the Palestinian workers, who relied on brokers to find them a job. However, research conducted in 2021 following the adoption of the new model showed it did not significantly improve labour market mobility and many workers were not aware of the policy changes.
Migrant workers post-1990
The history of non-Palestinian migrant labour in Israel is intimately connected to these same Palestinian workers. Migrant workers were first recruited in significant numbers in the early 1990s, to replace Palestinian workers following the first Intifada (the Palestinian uprising which began in the Occupied Territories in 1987).
But their binding, unlike that of Palestinian workers, was not meant to serve national security interests. Rather, it was adopted as a migration control measure to supervise their presence and ensure departure from the country, as well as to restrict their work to specific sectors and jobs. The binding to specific employers – accompanied by the risk of loss of status, deportation, and unpayable debt in the country of origin – led NGOs to successfully challenge the arrangement in court.
In 2006, the Supreme Court of Israel struck down the binding arrangement. Its harshly worded judgment held that such arrangements violated the basic rights of migrant workers and infringed upon their liberty and their dignity. The judgment led to the adoption of a “sectoral binding” model, providing migrant workers with permits to work in a specific sector – agriculture, construction, care – and permitting them freedom of movement between employers within that sector.
This development was significant as a defence of the constitutional rights of non-citizens, but the judgment achieved little on the ground. A substantial percentage of non-Israeli workers continue to be bound to their employers.
Refined binding
Strangely, the same supreme court that rejected the binding arrangement as “a modern form of slavery” has subsequently and repeatedly approved new forms of binding.
In the construction industry, the court approved the binding of thousands of workers to foreign construction companies that operate in Israel and directly employ the migrant workers who work for them. Workers in foreign construction companies are subject to restrictions on changing employers.
The first attempt to challenge the binding to foreign construction companies at the supreme court involved the Turkish construction company Yılmazlar. That case was still pending when the court gave its groundbreaking judgment on the binding agreement. But despite strong evidence concerning poor working conditions, economic coercion, restrictions of movement, threats, and violence, the court did not remain consistent with the ruling it had just given. It considered those working for Yılmazlar to be safe from coercion and exploitation, and allowed their continued binding to the company.
The court opted to help subsidise affordable care at the expense of migrant caregivers
It is possible that the judges considered outside factors when ruling on this case. Yılmazlar’s operations at the time were closely and questionably tied to a large arms deal between Israel and Turkey, and both Israel’s foreign relations and the benefit of the arms trade between the countries were raised during proceedings.
Relations have since cooled but the company continues to operate and exploit its workers without hindrance. Even a case where the company’s worker was recognised as a victim of slavery by Israel’s Immigration Appeal Tribunal did not lead to any change (disclosure: I represented the claimant).
The dubious success of the Yılmazlar model led to its expansion. Employment via Chinese construction companies was introduced to the sector in 2016. These arrangements were once again challenged in the supreme court, but the court ignored serious concerns of coercion and exploitation and later reports of workers’ rights violations. Today the Immigration Authority’s regulations only allow movement between different Chinese companies in “exceptional” cases, and transitions to local employers in the sector are prohibited. Evidence shows that in reality workers are unable to change employers.
In the care sector, the court allowed – even supported – the introduction of restrictions on workers’ movement between different geographic regions, between patients, and on changing employers after already being in the country for a few years. In-sector mobility has also been rejected, denying caregivers the opportunity to work in a more central location, bargain for higher wages, or work for a less demanding patient.
These restrictions reinforced binding within the care sector, making it harder for workers to change employers even in cases of abuse, harassment, and denial of basic rights. The court was sympathetic to the arguments of patients and manpower agencies in the care sector, and opted to help subsidise affordable care at the expense of migrant caregivers.
In various sectors, workers who left their registered employers are still sometimes referred to as ‘abandoners’ or ‘runaways’. In October 2023, a minister suggested denying compensation to agricultural workers who chose to leave the country because they feared for their safety.
This proposal received no support and was unsuccessful. Yet, like the cases and examples above, it reflects a common thread: a deeply ingrained sense of entitlement for cheap, available, and compliant labour power for the most dirty, demanding, and dangerous jobs. The ‘binding arrangement’ might have been abolished – but binding has not.
Explore the rest of the series
This series looks at how seasonal worker visas, which usually tie workers to their employers, are putting migrant workers around the world at risk of exploitation.
- Seasonal worker visas are tying migrants into exploitation
Caroline Robinson, Worker Support Centre - Exploitation embedded in Spain’s seasonal worker programme
Yoan Molinero-Gerbeau, Comillas Pontifical University - Migrant workers demand justice after abuse, exploitation in Canada
Amanda Aziz, Migrant Workers Centre - Seasonal worker visa puts migrants at risk on UK farms
Valeria Ragni, Worker Support Centre - Non-citizen workers still exploited in Israel, despite court ruling
Maayan Niezna, University of Liverpool - Israel is going backwards on protecting migrant workers
Aelad Cahana, Kav La'Oved - Did Brexit unleash new suffering on UK farms?
Margarita Permonaite, Worker Support Centre - Why I quit being a migrant farm worker in the UK
Jean-Pierre du Toit, seasonal migrant worker - The wage slaves of the Kafala system
Vani Saraswathi, migrant-rights.org
