At a time when Israel is engaged in war against Hamas for last more than three months, India has signed agreement with Netanyahu led government for safe mobility of workers. This will ensure that Indian labourers will be taken care of by governments of both the countries. This information was shared by Randhir Jaiswal, the spokesperson of the External Affairs Ministry on Thursday.
“We have labour mobility partnerships with several countries across the world, and we have an agreement now with Israel as well,” the MEA Spokesperson said. Interestingly the agreement was signed recently amidst the war, even though talks on this was ongoing for quite a long time. Israel had some issues with this agreement, but when Hamas attacked inside Israel and Israel later decided to reduce the number of Palestinian workers, it invited Indian labourers to work there. “The agreement itself started long before the conflict erupted. We concluded it, initiated it much before. The idea behind this agreement was that we put in place an institutional mechanism which regulates migration to that country,” he said in reply to a question during the press briefing.
Though Indians are there in Israel working in different sectors for quite some time, but this is the first time that an agreement has been signed for such an endeavour. Government generally don’t prohibit anyone from going and working to another country, but an agreement makes legal migration in the eyes of both the nations concerned.
“Through this agreement, we want to ensure that there is regulated migration and the rights of the people who go there are protected,” he said and added, “Let me tell you that labour laws in Israel are very strict, robust. It’s an OECD country, therefore labour laws are such that it provides for protection of migrant rights, labor rights.”
