"The Tax Authority has an interest in collecting its share in the huge sums paid as brokerage fees for the legal employment of migrant workers in Israel," said Ministry of Finance representative Yuval Yaakobi to the Knesset's committee on migrant workers, which addressed the illegal payments that are being collected from workers. "Aside from the criminal felony it involves, the practice also has a financial aspect, since it involves large incomes that go unreported."

Shalom Ben-Moshe, who is in charge of the migrant workers' unit in the Ministry of Industry Trade and Labor, told the Committee that the industry in question is worth "300 million dollars a year." His estimate is based on the illegal commission fees migrant workers pay, starting at 10,000 dollars and peaking at 18,000, the sum paid by workers from China, and the fact that in 2006, 30,000 foreign workers entered the country to work legally.

Ben-Moshe emphasized that the State was never able to deal with the phenomenon of brokering in workers and the collection of illegal fees from them. He outlined a grim picture in which employers "steal" workers from one another and the "price" of the worker increases as the end of his employment term nears, since it is then possible to charge him for renewing his working visa. He said that this severe situation creates an incentive for employers to bring more workers than needed in order to pocket brokerage fees, and it creates, naturally, a preference for migrant workers over Israeli ones.

Yossi Adelstein, chair of Migrant Workers' Enforcement Unit in the Ministry of Interior, endorsed Ben-Moshe's testimony and pointed that authorities in Israel fail to touch the heart of the matter, as the main problem remains shortage of evidence. This is the result of workers' reluctance to admit that they paid commission fees unless they are arrested. Adelstein stressed that the worker is required to pay for each phase of his employment, "and the arrangements involve the work of numerous brokers and lawyers that take their share of the commission fee."

Rachel Gershuni and Yigal Tsarfati from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, who are in charge of human trafficking issues, said that the Ministry's position is to prefer importing workers only from countries that have diplomatic relations with Israel. Another way to combat the phenomenon is through bilateral agreements with those countries. Ben-Moshe proposed giving preference to workers from countries with diplomatic representation in Israel, but the more reliable solution consists in bringing the workers through the International Organization for Migration exclusively, and not through job brokers.

The chair of the committee, Knesset Member Ran Cohen (Meretz), said in conclusion that we face "an international mafia network that involves criminal agents from across the globe. The State must shift to a higher gear in its struggle against them, and regard brokers as criminals," said Cohen. "Not until I see the first employer go to prison will I be convinced that the state begins taking this matter seriously."

Ben-Moshe accepted Cohen's proposal to issue a procedure stipulating that working visas could be issued only for workers from countries with diplomatic representation in Israel, and announced that such procedure would be issued soon.