A Real Opportunity: Israel Urges Ukrainians Jews To Immigrate

In light of the Russia invasion of Ukraine, about 100 Ukrainian Jews have arrived in Israel and government officials say some 10,000 are expected in the coming weeks.

Occupied East Jerusalem – Israel is keen on bringing in Ukrainian Jewish refugees for the purpose of maintaining Jewish demographic “supremacy” over the Palestinian population, academics and analysts say.

Since the outbreak of the war with Russia on February 24, the Israeli government has called on Ukrainian Jewish refugees to immigrate to Israel and removed bureaucratic hurdles to secure their arrival as quickly as possible.

“We call on the Jews of Ukraine to immigrate to Israel – your home,” Israel’s Ministry of Immigration and Absorption said in a statement on February 26.

So far, at least 100 Ukrainian Jews arrived on two flights, one from Kyiv and another from Odesa. Some 300 others will arrive on three flights on Sunday. Government officials said some 10,000 are expected to arrive in the coming weeks.

On Sunday, the World Zionist Organization’s Settlement Division – which is funded by the Israeli government and falls under its direct control – announced the building of 1,000 housing structures for Ukrainian Jewish families in both Israel and settlements in the illegally occupied Palestinian territories.

“Israel is seeing in the Ukraine crisis a real opportunity to bring Jewish people to increase the number of Jews in Israel,” Lana Tatour, professor of settler-colonialism and human rights at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia, told Al Jazeera.

“While it is important to recognise that there is a real refugee crisis in Ukraine,” which “everyone has a duty to care for”, Tatour said it must be noted that “Israel is not opening its borders for Ukrainian refugees – it is opening its borders for Jewish Ukrainian refugees.”