“Now I am also Israeli”: From Illegality to Legality ‐ Life experiences and identities of migrant workers’ children after receiving civil status in Israel
| Published date | 01 June 2018 |
| Author | Anabel Lifszyc‐Friedlander,Galia Sabar,Deby Babis |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/imig.12367 |
| Date | 01 June 2018 |
“Now I am also Israeli”:
From Illegality to Legality - Life experiences
and identities of migrant workers’children
after receiving civil status in Israel
Deby Babis*, Anabel Lifszyc-Friedlander** and Galia Sabar***
ABSTRACT
In 2006 and 2010, following demands from local and international civil society organizations,
Israel granted civil status to approximately 1500 undocumented migrant workers’children.
This was considered a “one time humanitarian gesture,”not to be repeated. Thousands of other
children, who did not fulfill the required criteria, were left without civil status. Within the con-
text of Israel, the homeland of the Jewish people, this mixed-methods study explored how the
children’s life experiences have been constructed and reconstructed since the inception of their
new civil status. According to the findings, 80 per cent of migrant workers’children reveal a
high degree of belonging to Israeli society, defining themselves as Israelis. For them, receiving
civil status has four practical implications: being able to serve in the Israeli army; the ability
to travel abroad; better access to the job market; and freedom from fear of deportation. Our
study also revealed difficulties due to their religious and ethnic identities, reflected in the chil-
dren’s understandings of what it means to be Israeli. The complex manifestations of their
newly acquired civil status is embedded in the concept of “freedom,”i.e. to do and to be what
they really want to be.
INTRODUCTION
Worldwide, migrant workers’children navigate their lives in the territories of illegality (Negron-Gon-
zales, 2013). Some reside illegally in the host countries, while others have legal status while their fam-
ilies do not. In one way or another, the experience of illegality is an integral part of their everyday
existence. In some cases, they are denied their universal human rights, granted by the UN, to educa-
tion, health and welfare, and live under constant threat of deportation from the state they consider to
be theirs (Abrego, 2006; Ley, 2014). In light of these circumstances, obtaining the long-awaited offi-
cial civil status is a significant and fateful event that affects their own and their families’lives.
1
This article explores the life experiences of children born to migrant workers in Israel following
receipt of formal civil status. Migrant workers from Latin America, Africa and South East Asia
(mainly the Philippines) began arriving in Israel in the 1980s (Kemp and Raijman, 2008). Most of
their children were born in Israel, while some arrived in the country at a very young age. Although,
* Ariel University and Hebrew University of Jerusalem
** Tel Aviv University and Gordon Academic College of Education
*** Tel Aviv University and Ruppin Academic Center
doi: 10.1111/imig.12367
©2017 The Authors
International Migration ©2017 IOM
International Migration Vol. 56 (3) 2018
ISSN 0020-7985Published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
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