Bilateral agreements for foreign workers
Bilateral Agreements – The Right, Just, and Safe Path for Bringing Migrant Workers to Israel
In recent months, we have witnessed what appears to be a coordinated campaign promoting the recruitment of foreign workers through private intermediaries and contractors, rather than through the bilateral agreements to which Israel is a signatory.
Israel indeed faces a growing need for foreign workers in construction, agriculture, hospitality, and caregiving. Yet alongside this need stands a moral and legal responsibility: to ensure that the workers who arrive here are not exploited and do not become bargaining chips in the hands of middlemen. This is precisely where bilateral agreements come in — the most effective, transparent, and ethical mechanism for recruiting migrant workers.
A bilateral arrangement is a formal agreement between the Government of Israel and the government of a worker’s country of origin. It eliminates, almost entirely, the dependence on private manpower agents and ensures direct, supervised recruitment without illegal brokerage fees. These agreements have already proven their value: recruitment costs for workers have dropped substantially, procedures are more transparent, and both employers and workers benefit from clarity and predictability.
Beyond the administrative and financial advantages, this is fundamentally a moral issue. For years, private recruitment models created fertile ground for black-market practices, crushing debt, and the treatment of human beings as “commodities.” Workers arrived in Israel burdened by thousands of dollars in debt — a phenomenon widely recognized as a form of modern human trafficking. Bilateral agreements virtually eliminate this risk and restore a basic right: to migrate for work without mortgaging one’s future.
One of the central pillars of this regulated system is the call center for foreign workers, operated for the Population and Immigration Authority by CIMI — the Center for International Migration and Integration. This center serves as a vital safety net: it provides information in workers’ native languages, assists in cases of exploitation, investigates complaints against employers, and ensures that every worker recruited through a bilateral agreement receives real protection — not merely promises on paper. At a time when migrant workers often fear speaking out, the existence of an accessible, neutral, professional body is indispensable.
CIMI’s work is a key component of Israel’s forward-looking approach: not only to bring workers here fairly, but also to accompany them throughout their stay, ensure they understand their rights, and assist them whenever needed. It is a model of constructive partnership between civil society and the state, ensuring that regulated processes remain meaningful in practice.
Israel is bound by international conventions to prevent human trafficking and to guarantee fair labor conditions — and when the state signs a bilateral agreement, it is in fact fulfilling this obligation. Choosing private recruitment channels, by contrast, harms workers, harms the economy, and at times even harms Israel’s global reputation as an enlightened nation.
It is important to note that the Population and Immigration Authority, the Ministry of Justice, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs all regard bilateral agreements as essential, effective, and especially critical today, at a time of international isolation.
Ultimately, bilateral agreements are far more than an administrative mechanism — they are a moral declaration. They affirm that Israel cares about ensuring that the foreign workers who sustain core sectors of the economy arrive here with dignity, transparency, and a fair human cost. This is in everyone’s interest — as a society and as a nation