Child labour in Jewish settlements

by: Simone Korkus (MO, Dec. 11, 2008) Half past one in the afternoon. At the military checkpoint of Male Efraim, West Bank, soldiers slowly start moving. Three Palestinian kids run up the hill. At the background, a sea of greenhouses shines under the hot desert sun the striking view of the Jordan Valley in the eastern part of the West Bank, specialized in the growth of vegetables and fruit. For the 9,400 Israeli settlers of the 38 settlements in this area living here is attractive, because the authorities give subsidies and tax reductions. The poor Palestinian villages scattered around the settlements -with their 47,000 inhabitants- deliver cheap labor. But for the Palestinians the road to the Jewish settlements partly running through military firing zones is long and dangerous. Seven checkpoints (called hatcheries by the Palestinians, because they have to go through fences with hundreds at a time) close the area from the rest of the West Bank. And the IDF patrols the area for suspect persons and illegal workers. The Palestinian boys show their birth certificate, the proof that they are younger than eighteen and can pass. Palestinian adults are only allowed in if they live or work here and have a special labour permit and magnetic card. The three stop, panting, at an open area, where the Palestinian labour subcontractor will pick them up with his car later. Nimer (14), the bravest and most curious one of the three, approaches us. He works with his friends Bilal and Saher also fourteen years old in the greenhouses in Pezael, a Jewish settlement at the border with Jordan. He thinks that around hundred minors work there in the high season. A year ago the Palestinian subcontractor Nimer does not want to give his name came to their village and proposed this job to him. Nimer changed his schoolbooks for brooms and hedge-clippers. Now he cleans the greenhouses and helps with the packing, planting and pruning of eggplants. Nimer works eight hours a day, six days a week. His daily wage: 50 NIS (9 euro). This morning he started at five oclock. Every day the boy has to pass the checkpoint by foot and endure the checks by the guards at the settlement. Sometimes I m pushed or beaten by the guards, Nimer says. When I ask him what he does when he comes home in the afternoon, he looks startled. Play football? Read a book? I try. Nimer shakes his head. Hes too tired for those things. Doesnt he find it a pity that he cant finish school? He shrugs his shoulders. My father is sick, and unemployed, he sighs, and then, proudly adds: I am the provider for my parents and my five brothers and sisters.

Bargain prices Soeha Canaan explains that child labour is common for many years in the Palestinian region, but on a small-scale, after school time and usually in the family business. Canaan is director of the research branch Labour Population of the Palestinian Central Bureau for Statistics. What worries Canaan is the rise in dangerous labour circumstances and the longer hours. Minors have to take the dangerous road to work and pass military zones and checkpoints.

Because of the conflict and the occupation another element enters the story: exploitation. Salwa Alinat is a staff member of the Israeli organisation for labourers rights Kav La Oved, who also advocate for child laborers. For minors the Jewish settlements on the West Bank and factories in Israel are often the only places where they can find work. The employment is organized via Palestinian subcontractors who recruit minors for bargain prices in refugee camps and villages. The reason is the severe poverty in the Palestinian territories and especially in the Jordan Valley, says Alinat. The building of the separation barrier made working in Israel almost impossible for the 150,000 adult Palestinians. Severe restrictions on labour permits and entry passes complicated or prevented finding work on the Israeli settlements. Minors are cheaper and can easily slip through the checkpoints. They end up in the illegal traffic of the traders. Scorpios and snakes Some children live in camps close to their workplace. We receive a tip that such a camp exists in Al Jeftlik, north of Jericho and together with Alinat we go and have a closer look . On the right side of the entrance to the village we find a slum,a group of poor huts, built up from corrugated iron sheets and old rags. Blankets and filthy mattresses function as beds. Ten boys between the age of thirteen to eighteen sit on the ground and smoke a cigarette. They work at the neighboring settlement of Argaman. At this time there are about fifty laborers living in this camp, but within a few weeks when the harvest of dates begins that number will double. In the summer the temperature in the huts rises to forty degrees. In the winter the terrain changes into a mud pool. An unsecured electricity cable runs to a light bulb; a tap outside is their only washing facility. There are scorpios, flees, snakes. Scorpios stung five adolescents. The injuries werent reported, Alinat tells, because they feared theyd get fired. What frightens the minors the most are the patrols of Israeli soldiers , who sometimes round up and beat illegal workers. Achmed, a boy of fifteen with the aura of a cherub, works in the area for four consecutive months during harvest time. The rest of the year he works in Israel as a construction worker. He works like this already for over four years now. The boys pay the subcontractor for lodging, Achmed tells. He doesnt know the exact sum, because they get a net wage and rent is already deducted. Hes afraid to ask how much his gross wage is, because they might sack him. For ten hours work a day, he gets 60 NIS (11 euro). From that money he still has to buy food. He shows us a cage with birds the boys caught. To eat, Achmed gestures.

Once a month the boys may go home for two days. And then the subcontractor pays Achmed his wage. He get a lot of money then, but doesnt feel rich. Achmed : I feel like a mailbox .I get an envelope with money, sometimes even a 1000 Shekel. But I have to give it to my dad immediately. By chance we meet a subcontractor in one of the poorest cities deep in the West Bank. Eleven minors work for him. The subcontractor lets call him Mohammed gets a fee of 50 NIS a day, deducted from the wage of his workers. Mohammed: Ever since I was twelve I worked on a Jewish settlement. One day my boss asked me if I could get him some other laborers. Its easier to recruit minors because they dont need a permit. Ive got a vehicle with a special permit and can take the minors via the checkpoints to their work. But even the subcontractor thinks that the salary en the labor conditions of these minors are unreasonable. He would like to raise the salaries, but the employer refuses , he explains: And thats the end of it, because I have to earn my living too.

Bruises How dangerous child labor can be, we understand when we visit the Palestinian town of Beit Foerik. I saw Hameds body lying on the side of the road, Yousouf (18) tells with empty eyes. On april 11,2008, Yousouf, his little cousin Hamed and two other minors received work via a subcontractor (a man called Khitmat) at the settlement of Hamra. Yousouf reckons that they were with twenty others. They slept in a camp in the area of Hamra. The settlers dont want Palestinians in their settlement at night. On Tuesday morning, Hamed had enough of the work. He took his belongings and went home by foot. That was the last time Yousouf saw his cousin alive. The next morning he found Hameds body. They tortured him terribly, Yousouf whispers. He shows the pictures he made with his mobile telephone: Hameds front teeth broken off, his eyes were removed from their sockets, a finger ripped off, a bruised and battered stomach. Yousouf thinks settlers have murdered Hamed. The police of Male Efraim has no clue as to the identity of the culprits. But some facts are undeniable, Mihal Tadjer says, a lawyer of Kav La Oved. The road to and from work, with military zones and checkpoints, and the circumstances under which Hamed and other child laborers have to work, are dangerous and unhealthy. And this makes that this sort of labor illegal for all minors. Circumventing the law The Israeli law which governs the settlements and the Palestinian law say the same: child labor under the age of fourteen is strictly forbidden. From the age of fourteen only light work that does not endanger the health and development of children is allowed. The settlers working with Palestinian subcontractors have no contracts with the minors and this allows them to circumvent the Israeli law: They pay less than the minimum wage of 15,5 Shekel and do not insure the minors, according to Tadjer.

When I phone Orit, administrator of the settlement Pezael, and confront her with the stories about under aged workers, she dismisses them as exaggerated. The farmers at the settlements work already many years with Palestinian subcontractors who bring their laborers with them. Maybe sometimes kids come along with their parents. She goes on: Palestinians and Israeli have lived here in peaceful coexistence for over forty years, and everybody is happy with the situation. Believe me, Palestinians with Palestinian bosses earn not even half of what they earn here. But that the situation in the Palestinian territories is even worse does not make right what is wrong, Tadjer believes. If Israeli, Palestinian, and international law protecting the rights of children are de facto violated on a daily basis, then the authorities have to act. I submit our findings to the Ministry of Trade and industry more particularly to the labor inspection responsible for the settlements on the West Bank. Their representative says her department does not have any data and directs me to the police who directs me back to the labor inspection. Tadjer believes that the labor inspection does not have enough manpower and budget and hardly any inspectors in the West Bank. Vicious circle The problem of under aged laborers nurtures itself. Israeli and Palestinian employers act illegal and keep quiet. Subcontractors do not want to lose their lucrative trade. There are no protests from Palestinian parents and minors,for fear of losing their job. Apart from the small-scale investigations of Kav La Oved, Israeli organizations hardly take action. Palestinian authorities have no authority in the Israeli settlements. Even our research for this article was obstructed.We received several threatening

anonymous phone calls. Alinat describes the dilemma of the aid worker: If I help minors to get better labor circumstances and wages, I keep an illegal system alive. If I fight child labor, the children are fired and they end up on the street or even in a worse exploitive situation. Because the work prevents getting a school education minors are uneducated and have no perspective on better jobs. And as long as minors like Nimer, Hamed and Achmed have to keep looking for a way out of their desperate situation, child labor will remain. Rising child labour in the Palestinian territories The Palestinian Central Bureau for Statistics monitors since 2004 the developments of child labor in the Palestinian territories. The data are not published for the public but Soeha Canaan, director of the research branch Labor Population of the bureau could give us the following results: - In 2004 there were 43,000 child laborers between 5 and 17. In 2007 there was a rise to 47,000; in the first half of 2008: 53,500. - 4,6 % of the Palestinian youth under 18 works. - The highest concentration of child laborers is in the West Bank, more specifically in Jericho and the Jordan Valley (13,5 per cent). - 1,900 child laborers work in settlements or in Israel. The demand for workers is rising. - The average daily wage is 41,90 NIS (7,50 euro) and the average workweek for a minor 30 hours. From the preliminary field research of Salwa Alinat of the Israeli organisation for the rights of employees Kav La Oved one could assume that the number of child laborers might be even higher. It is very difficult to establish numbers because children get their jobs through subcontractors who do not register these contracts. The Central Buro for Statistics cannot check these data in Israel and in the settlements. (sk) Auteur: Simone Korkus, translation by Matthias Somers. Quelle: http://www.kavlaoved.org.il/media-view_eng.asp?id=2049