Prison visits and court hearings

It's been one month now since I started volunteering with the Hotline for Migrant Workers (hotline.org.il) and Monday I visited the detention center for migrant workers and refugees for the third time. So far, I've spoken to African refugees from Sudan, Eritrea, Chad, Guinea, the Ivory Coast, Senegal, Nigeria and more. After all those years of convincing myself that Spanish was the most practical language to study in school, I'm seriously regretting not having taken some French. But with some cobbled-together version of simplified English and French, I've been conducting interviews about the circumstances of their arrests and the conditions in the prison. Monday, I actually did three interviews in Hebrew which (in my opinion) was super impressive considering that there's no way I could have done that a month ago. We're hoping to get some people out on technicalities (such as being held for more than 3 days before seeing a judge) and to gather information on the arrest and prison conditions in general in order to petition for their improvement.

There have been heartbreaking stories, like 21-year-old boy from Guinea-Bissau who has been in jail since before his 18th birthday and just wants to go back to his mother's family and finish high school, and uncomfortable moments, like, what do you say to an African refugee who tells you that you've touched his feelings and can he just get your phone number to stay in touch? (The male volunteers who come with us never have problems like this!) The worst feeling for me is when the only reason that someone is still in prison is because of bureaucratic red tape – they want to go back home and the Israeli government wants them to as well – but they haven't been released yet and no one at the Hotline or at the prison can explain why.

The other volunteers and I are currently trying to find a way to bring French language books to the prison, which is one of the most commonly requested items. Apparently there is a library somewhere, and once a week a guard is supposed to bring a cart full of books that the prisoners can borrow from, but it has only happened once in anyone's memory. This is especially frustrating considering that volunteers from the Hotline in the past have brought books only to be stashed away in a library that no one has access to.

Leaving the prison each day that I go (and now we are going 2-3 times a week) leaves me feeling drained but still ready to go back again. Yesterday, for a total change of pace, I went to another court hearing, this time, at the District Court in Jerusalem. I always find it kind of hilarious when security guards say, “Neshek???” asking if I'm carrying a weapon. Me?? But once we were in it was very interesting. The case was about whether the Ministry of the Interior would release the protocols for deciding whether a refugee gets asylum. Thus far, they've only approved or denied the case and we were hoping that they would tell us why and what factors they weigh. Unfortunately we only partially won, but the lawyer from the Hotline is going to try again on a slightly different issue now that we have more information.

This week an article came out in the NY Times about Israel and migrant labor that is EXACTLY what the Hotline deals with. In fact, the organization quoted, Kav LaOved, shares a building with us and collaborates with us on many of our campaigns. At least five people sent it to me asking if I'd seen it - but if you haven't read it yet, check it out here.