Twentieth International Conference on Diversity in Organizations, Communities & Nations

Abstract

Migration, the driving force behind increased urbanization, has made cities much more diverse places in which to live. Nearly one-fifth of all migrants live in the world’s twenty largest cities. In many of these global cities, migrants represent over a third of the population. While variations in the receiving contexts have been examined primarily on the national scale, few studies have examined the local (urban) level. During the past decade, massive numbers of labor migrants and asylum seekers have migrated from African countries to Israel via Egypt. Their motives for leaving their countries of origin include ongoing and bloody wars on the African continent as well as corruption, severe conditions of poverty and hunger, and economic and political disintegration. After traveling a long, dangerous and expensive route, most migrants prefer settling in large global city in the target countries. Thus, most of the migrants and asylum seekers in Israel found their way to the metropolitan Tel-Aviv area. There they are concentrated in poor neighborhoods in the southern part of the city, where they live under conditions of crowding, poverty, and poor sanitation. Israel has been forced to cope with these migration waves. Its first attempt was to build a massive security fence along its border with Egypt to stop the migrants and asylum seekers from entering the country. The objective of this study is to examine the policies of the State of Israel and implications for the waves of migrants from African states.