This morning (May 5, 2010), three human rights organizations – The Hotline for Migrant Workers, the Association for Civil Rights in Israel, and Kav LaOved – petitioned the Central District Court for Administrative Affairs seeking to prevent the deportation from Israel of a migrant worker from the Philippines, who is in her eighth month of pregnancy.

Jenny came to Israel from the Philippines with a B1 work visa to work as a caregiver. She is legally employed, and met her partner, also a legally employed migrant worker from the Philippines, in Israel.

In January 2010, Jenny became pregnant by her partner, and as a result was fired from her job. The Interior Ministry’s regulation concerning pregnant migrant workers stipulates that a migrant worker in Israel who becomes pregnant must choose one of two equally bad options: to send the baby back to her country of origin and continue working in Israel, or to leave Israel with the baby, without completing her term of employment.

Members of the Oz unit, who arrested Jenny, told her that she was being detained due to her romantic relationship with another migrant worker, although she had declared she would send the baby to the Philippines, so that she could conclude her permitted period of employment in Israel.

After Jenny understood that she would be deported the same day, the three organizations urgently petitioned the court. Their appeals sought the revoking of the restraining order and the arrest warrant, the cancellation of the decision that her work permit was no longer valid, and the cancellation of the administrative instruction prohibiting migrant workers in Israel from conducting conjugal relations.

Attorney Hanny Ben-Israel from the Kav LaOved: “The Interior Ministry’s policy prohibiting migrant workers from maintaining conjugal relationships is embarrassing and unacceptable. Migrant workers who are brought to Israel by the state are not just “work force”, but human beings with rights, wishes, and needs. It is deplorable that the Interior Ministry no longer sees migrant workers as people, and finds it acceptable to imprison an eight months pregnant migrant worker simply because she dared to enter a relationship with a partner.”