Israelis evicted to make way for Soviet Jews

Solemn young & adult faces among huge influx of Soviet Jewish immigrants crowding into terminal lounge, arriving at Ben-Gurion Airport. (Photo by David Rubinger/The LIFE Images Collection via Getty Images)

EIR Brief
July 27, 1990 Anno Domini

Israel ‘s homeless population is growing as the result of Soviet immigration, with poten­tially explosive political consequences. Squalid “tent cities” have been established in several Israeli suburbs, as a result of the immigration of some 50,000 Soviet Jews to Israel since January. The flood of immigra­tion has led to the doubling or tripling of rents for many apartments , simultaneous with increasing layoffs of the Israeli work force.

Soviet families arriving in Israel are guaranteed a year’s free rent by the govern­ment. Consequently, all the homeless are Israeli nationals who have been evicted to make way for the immigrants.

In June, Housing Minister Ariel Sharon addressed one such tent city, in Rishon el Zion, where he promised that they would all soon receive homes through a crash program of housing construction, some of which, it is said, will be on the occupied West Bank. Through this ruse, the Israeli government could honestly claim that it is not illegally housing the Soviet immigrants in the occu­pied territories.

One comment

Leave a Reply