Jordan on Wednesday at dawn rounded up and bussed 750 Sudanese asylum seekers to Queen Alia International Airport for deportation to their home country, an official source told Jordan News. The Sudanese nationals were driven to the airport under heavy guard of security forces and gendarmerie from the Khalda neighborhood in north-western Amman, where they lived in tents in front of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) building.
More than 3,000 Sudanese still live in Jordan, most of them in Aman, where they have refugee status, having fled the war in Darfur, western Sudan, which began from 2003.
In Israel there are an estimated five to ten thousand Sudanese, most of whom live in Tel-Aviv, Arad, Eilat and B’nei B’rak. Following pressure from UNHCR, a temporary humanitarian protection arrangement was established in 1999, benefiting refugees from war-torn countries in Africa. In 2002, an Israeli asylum procedure was established with the launch of the National Status Granting Body, an inter-ministerial agency responsible for assessing asylum applications processed by UNHCR Israel, advising the Minister of the Interior, who held the authority on final decisions.
There have been mixed reaction in Israel to the influx of Sudanese: there were large protests against their presence by residents of neighborhoods in South Tel Aviv who complain that their safety and life quality were ruined by the presence illegal immigrants from Sudan and Eritrea. There have also been demonstrations in support of the refugees, mostly by people who can afford to live far away from them.
According to Israel’s Supreme Court, the employers of refugees and asylum seekers may not be fined, which constituted a de facto approval of their working in Israel under a quasi-legal status. In February 2015, the government informed the Supreme Court that since 2009 there have been 3,165 asylum requests from Sudanese nationals, of which 45 received a reply. Of those 45, 40 were rejected and 5 were granted temporary residency. 976 Sudanese asylum seekers withdrew their requests or left Israel. Only four Sudanese or Eritrean persons have been granted refugee status.