MIDEAST-PALESTINIANS/ISRAEL Israeli mayor imposes partial ban on Arab workers

Record ID: 398799

  • Title: MIDEAST-PALESTINIANS/ISRAEL Israeli mayor imposes partial ban on Arab workers
  • Date: 20th November 2014
  • Summary: ASHKELON, ISRAEL (NOVEMBER 20, 2014) (REUTERS) KINDERGARTEN LOCATED NEXT TO CONSTRUCTION SITE VARIOUS OF KINDERGARTEN UNDER CONSTRUCTION WORKER SITTING IN KINDERGARTEN CONSTRUCTION MATERIALS STORED IN KINDERGARTEN PLAYGROUND VARIOUS OF CHILDREN PLAYING IN KINDERGARTEN VARIOUS OF LABOURERS WORKING AT CONSTRUCTION SITE EXTERIOR OF ASHKELON MUNICIPALITY OFFICE (SOUNDBITE) (He
  • Embargoed: 5th December 2014 12:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Israel
  • Country: Israel
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVA7IC9VJC68UQ2JPV9OHI79W2GQ
  • Story Text: An Israeli mayor has imposed a partial ban on employing Arab workers in his city in a sign of mounting security concerns after a surge in deadly Palestinian attacks.
    Ashkelon Mayor, Itamar Shimoni, announced on Facebook on Thursday (November 20), that he was stopping "until further notice" the work of Arab labourers building bomb shelters in nursery schools in the city of 113,000, which is close to the Gaza Strip.
    He also said guards would be posted at about 40 pre-schools near construction sites where Arabs work.
    Justice Minister Tzipi Livni said she had asked the Attorney-General to examine the mayor's move, which came two days after two Palestinians killed four rabbis and a policeman in an attack on a Jerusalem synagogue.
    Shimoni brushed off the threat of legal action.
    "The goal is very simple, make the parents feel that their kids are safe. These moments, dozens of Arab-Israeli workers employed in construction sites all around the city, I don't have any problem with that. The problem is that inside a kindergarten, Arab-Isareli labourers are constructing the shelters, they are also our partners, meanwhile in the yard, children are playing outside," he said.
    "I suggested that the contractors will work during the afternoon, when the children are not in the kindergarten. They have a problem with that, so they will stay home for a few days. When they will come back, we will respect them, receive them with love, so they can come back and build." Shimoni added.
    Many Israeli building workers come from the country's Arab community, which makes up some 20 percent of the population, and Shimoni's edict drew criticism from senior government officials, including Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
    The Prime Minister said in a statement there was "no place in Israel for discrimination against its Arab citizens" and an entire community must not be blamed for the actions of "a small and violent minority".
    Ashkelon resident, Ovadia Keidar, condemned the Mayor's action.
    "We have to separate terrorists and civilians and especially Arabs from Israel where they are Israeli people. So I am sorry for this speech and I hope that he will change his mind because it is not fair to put all the Arabs in the same place," Ovadia Keidar said.
    Another resident, Avraham Atreshvili said he refused to live in fear.
    "It's just can't be. Every other day people are been killed and we will be afraid. It means, we can just give up and give them whatever they wants. They killed our children, they killed prayers in Synagogue, innocent people," Atreshvili told Reuters television.
    Also on Thursday, Public Security Minister Yitzhak Aharonovitch ordered that gun control rules be loosened so that private guards could carry weapons off-duty.
    More gun permits will be issued to retired military and security officers.
    Tuesday's (November 18), deadly attack stunned Israelis and followed several incidents in recent weeks in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv in which Palestinians killed five people.
    Palestinians have been waging stone-throwing protests in Jerusalem since July, when a Palestinian youth was burned to death by Israelis in alleged revenge for the killing of three Jewish teens by militants in the occupied West Bank.
    Visits by far-right Israelis to Jerusalem's most sacred compound - where al-Aqsa mosque now stands and Biblical Jewish Temples once stood - have also raised Muslim fears that Israel will lift its decades-old ban on Jewish worship at the site.
    Israel says it has no such plans.
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