The following paper is based on a talk by Assaf Adiv, Executive Director of MAAN – Workers Association, at the Construction Industry Safety Conference at Al-Qasemi Academic College in Baqa al-Gharbiyye, 5 September 2026.
Introduction
MAAN was formed between the years1995–2000. At the same time the organized workforce in the construction industry was collapsing, as a result of the massive replacement of Arab workers, citizens of Israel, as well as Palestinian workers from the oPt with migrant workers. That same process is similar in part to what is happening today. During those five years, and for the first time, Israel allowed a huge influx of migrant workers and continued to employ Palestinians from Gaza and West Bank. But as the economy slowed and as the country entered an economic downturn, approximately 45,000 Israeli Arab workers were dismissed, as contractors found that migrants and Palestinians were cheaper. Also the industry underwent a profound upheaval when the Histadrut, which had previously been the backbone of the industry’s organized workforce, disappeared from the scene almost completely[1].
An organized effort to bring local workers back to the construction industry
As Israel faced a major economic recession following the 2000 2nd Palestinian Intifiada and the 2000 Dot.Com international crisis the Government decided to reverse course and started to take steps to reduce the number of permits for migrant workers.[2] An important element in this new policy was the recognition of the need to fight high unemployment rates especially in Arab communities.[3]
Beginning in 2002, the Government decided to gradually halt the unregulated employment of migrant workers in an effort to encourage construction companies to employ local workers – both Jewish and Arab. In 2008, the government approved the report of the Committee for the Formulation of Policy on Non-Israeli Workers.[1] According to the approach promoted by the committee’s chairman, Professor Zvi Eckstein, who at the time served as Deputy Governor of the Bank of Israel, the employment of foreign workers should be severely restricted because of its significant social consequences. Among other things, the Eckstein Committee recommended that Israel sign bilateral agreements with the countries from which workers were recruited, and that their employment be supervised by dedicated organizations such as the International Organization for Migration (IOM), in a manner that would protect their rights and prevent trafficking in persons.
During these years, MAAN itself led a campaign aimed at stopping the hemorrhage and work to organize construction workers. As part of this effort, in 2002, I met with Adv. Yehiel Katz, who had been appointed by the Ministry of Finance as the authorized administrator of the pension and insurance fund for construction workers (the Construction Workers’ Fund), with the task of rescuing the fund from its difficult situation and managing its rehabilitation. Adv. Katz described how the Histadrut had operated during those years in the service of construction companies, in a manner that could only be interpreted as a decision to dismantle the construction workers’ union altogether. This enabled construction companies to employ migrant workers without making pension contributions for them, thereby reducing the cost of their employment by tens of percent.
He explained that the result of this policy was twofold and damaging: on the one hand, the preference for a cheap foreign workforce and the dismissal of local workers; and on the other, the undermining of the Histadrut’s construction workers’ union and the depletion of the resources of its pension fund, until the fund went bankrupt.[2]
As part of its campaign to organize construction workers (2001 – 2008), MAAN conducted a project aimed at re-integrating Arab-citizens of Israel back into the construction industry, after they had been dismissed and gradually excluded from the industry during the 1990s in favor of a vulnerable and cheap migrant workforce.[4] For several years, we worked with the major construction companies, the Israel Builders Association, and the Employment Service, trying to persuade leading companies such as Solel Boneh, Danya Cebus, Shapir, Ashtrom, and others to recruit organized (MAAN) groups of workers from the Arab community under fair wage conditions and with full social rights. Hundreds of MAAN workers were recruited in this campaign.
The shift to subcontracting and the starvation of the safety system
This positive development gradually came to a halt in 2007–2008. Workers recruited by MAAN and directly employed by construction companies under lawful working conditions were dismissed and rehired through subcontractors. The major companies had now “discovered” subcontracting as a profit making technic . At the same time, stronger and more skilled workers among the Arab citizens that were recruited to the construction industry realized that they could profit at the expense of their fellow workers by becoming contractors themselves and employing their neighbors and relatives “off the books,” without pension contributions. When this trend took over MAAN’s project seemed redundant and closed.
Construction sites, which for decades had served as a kind of on the job professional “training” schools, where experienced workers mentored and trained younger workers, became something resembling a “Tower of Babel.” Dozens of different contracting groups operate in them, employing Jewish, Arab, Palestinian, and migrant workers from different countries side by side – each group with its own subcontractor, with no familiarity or communication among the different workers.
Raising public awareness to workplace accidents
This negative trend, that saw construction companies turning to indirect employment and shirked off any responsibility to train workers and guarantee their future had also a devastating influence on the situation of safety in construction sites. This trend was aggravated by the deliberate starvation of the Safety Administration, much as has happened throughout the entire public sector. Since the adoption of the stabilization plan in 1985, and even more so since the 1990s, successive Israeli governments – both left and right, without distinction – have adopted the neoliberal model of reducing the government’s role in the economy and giving market forces freedom of action[5].
The safety inspection division was starved of resources, and despite the dramatic growth in the scale of construction projects, fewer and fewer inspectors remained in the field capable of ensuring workers’ safety and lives.
Since its Worker Placement project ended in 2008, MAAN has concentrated its efforts on workplace safety. As early as 2009, we exposed the shocking fact that the rate of fatalities in construction accidents in Israel, per 100,000 workers, was more than twice the average in European countries.[6].
During these years, we promoted a dedicated safety-training program for Arab workers, in cooperation with the National Insurance Institute’s Manof Fund, and worked to raise public awareness of accident victims through the media[7]. We exposed the failure to prosecute those responsible for safety violations – since under the law, sole criminal responsibility for safety matters was placed on the site manager – and even in the few cases in which indictments were filed, the sentences were derisory.
For example, we assisted Osama Masarwa of Arara, who fought for justice for his late father, Tawfiq, who was killed in a workplace accident in 2006 as a result of the contractor’s criminal negligence. In this unusual case, an indictment was indeed filed and the manager was convicted. Yet despite the fact that the company’s negligence had resulted in the loss of human life, the judge sentenced the construction-site contractor to three months of community service and the scaffolding contractor to a suspended prison sentence. Each of them was ordered to pay a ridiculous sum of app. NIS 6,600 in compensation to the family and app. NIS 2,500 in fines .The price tagged here on the life of a construction worker was nowhere near a deterrent punishment or one that would encourage companies to invest in safety and prevent the next disaster.
As part of our public campaign, Gal Gabai and Roy “Chicky” Arad created a moving documentary about workplace accidents in the construction industry, helping bring the issue into the headlines[8]. Indeed, in November 2015, our efforts gained significant public and institutional attention: MAAN joined a group of activists and civil-society organizations, including Adv. Hadas Tagari, Kav LaOved, MAAN and dedicated activists from the Forum of Work Managers, including Reuven Ben-Shimon and Adv. Israel Assal – succeeded in bringing workplace accidents, neglect, and the dramatic lag in inspection and accident investigations onto the public agenda. The Knesset Labor and Welfare Committee began holding regular discussions on the issue, and a dedicated team was established to address the failures. The Coalition to Combat Workplace Accidents succeeded in placing the issue on the public agenda[9].As a result of the new public awareness to the neglect and criminal disregard, several important reforms were advanced, including strengthening the Safety Administration and imposing a mandatory closure order of at least two days on construction sites following a fatal or serious accident (2016)[10].In addition, the “Peles” unit was established as a dedicated branch within police department Lahav 433 , tasked with leading the investigation of accidents and the prosecution of contractors and managers whose criminal negligence caused a disaster (2018). New legislation was also enacted expanding the responsibility of senior management for safety, which until then had rested entirely with the site manager (2025)[11].Yet since 2022, the issue has once again disappeared from public debate. For four years, the Netanyahu government has been leading the systematic destruction of civil service institutions in Israel. The utter disregard for the construction industry and workers’ safety is clearly reflected in the fact that for more than a year there has effectively been no full-time Minister of Construction and Housing and no full-time Minister of Labor. Construction Minister Haim Katz simultaneously serves as minister in four different ministries[12], while Labor Minister Yariv Levin simultaneously serves as Minister of Justice, Minister of Religious Services, Minister for Heritage, and Minister of Labor.
The complete abandonment of Palestinian workers
Palestinian workers from the West Bank were the backbone of Israel’s construction industry for decades[13]. This is a very large group of workers who, under the current circumstances, are left without protection, without supervision, and without medical insurance in the event of an accident.
The first group consists of Palestinian workers employed in settlements (located in Area C), without any mandate of supervision by the Safety Administration. For example, at the Extal factory in Mishor Adumim, Noor Owaisat (40) was killed in July 2025 while working for a subcontractor installing an industrial crane. Reports received by MAAN from factory workers indicated that the company itself is very strict about safety measures when the matter is under its direct control, but because this was an employee of an outside company, supervision was neglected. The accident was not investigated at all. No safety order was issued requiring the site to be closed for two days – a mandatory measure within Israel proper – and, most seriously, there was no professional investigation of the circumstances of the incident.
This absurd situation, where a fatal accident was not investigated at all was to due to the complex legal situation of the Israeli businesses who employ Palestinians in the settlements in the West Bank (Area C). As these settlements are located outside of the sovereign territory of state, the Safety Administration does not enforce safety laws there. It is important to note that since 2007 Palestinian workers are entitled in the settlements to the same rights as their colleagues who are Israelis[14]. Also it should be mentioned that the Labor Branch of the Inspection department does operate in these areas with regard to protective labor rights, such as minimum-wage law. But for bureaucratic strange reasons the safety inspectors refrain from applying their authority there. Thousands of workplaces, a significant proportion of them involving construction, industry, and agriculture with a potential risk of accidents, are not on the Safety Administration’s agenda on the flimsy pretext that these areas lay outside Israel’s sovereign territory[15].
I should be noted that workers paying a National Insurance Institute fee in these areas are entitled to be covered in the event of a workplace accident. But exercising their right is often difficult and depends on the worker’s ability to access, communicate, and transfer documents and data – a task that is almost impossible for a Palestinian worker, since the National Insurance Institute is not equipped to provide him with digital access to its website or to issue him a personal login code. As a result, thousands of workers who are entitled to compensation lose it every year. MAAN together with Kav Laoved are working in this field to compel the National Insurance Institute to create a secure, accessible, and simple access route for Palestinian workers that will enable them to exercise their rights as provided by law.[16]
The second group of Palestinian workers consists of those who since the events of October 7 are employed in Israel without permits. These workers, whose number stands at more than 50,000 at any given time, are completely abandoned when they are injured[17]. They are employed without any safety protection and without medical insurance. Their employment is conducted entirely through oral agreements, and payment is made “under the table,” without any registration. Since their employment under the current circumstances constitutes a criminal offense, many employers prefer to completely disavow any worker who is injured in an accident in order to avoid exposing themselves to fines and punishment. Injured workers, sometimes in very serious condition, are put into a taxi and dropped off in the nearest Palestinian city, without the contractor who employed them assuming any responsibility for the accident.
Against this harsh and complex reality, MAAN is working to protect and advance the status of Palestinian workers in the construction industry – especially after their entry into Israel was banned by an arbitrary decision lacking any factual or professional basis since October 2023[18]. The central justification given for halting the employment of Palestinians in Israel after October 7 was the security argument that workers’ entry posed a danger to public safety in Israel. However, factual research by Professor Esteban Klor of the Institute for National Security Studies (INSS)[19] presented in 2024 shows that this claim is unfounded. According to Professor Klor’s findings, during the 17 years from 2007 to 2023, the number of Palestinian workers with permits who were involved in terrorism was almost zero, and he therefore concludes that their return to the Israeli labor market does not constitute a security threat.
Uncontrolled replacement of the workforce and the thwarting of corrective action
A massive and uncontrolled replacement of Palestinian workers with migrant workers has been taking place over the past two years, exactly as happened in the 1990s. And once again, it will not stop with Palestinian workers – this trend will come directly at the expense of local workers in Israel: first and foremost Arab workers, and later Jewish workers as well. If we see migrant workers from India and Sri Lanka today in supermarkets, hotels, and garages, we must understand that they are not replacing Palestinians alone; they are replacing the local workforce and thwarting any possibility of improving wages, ensuring fair working conditions, and providing genuine attention to safety. The Ministry of Labor published a summary report in July 2026 on 2025, indicating that the massive importation of migrant workers is harming workers in Israel.[20]
Workers from India, Uzbekistan, and China, who now number approximately 80,000 in the construction industry, compared with only about 20,000 on the eve of the war, are employed through manpower corporations and subcontractors. All the protections, supervision, and regulation introduced since 2002 to prevent exploitative and abusive employment of migrant workers were overturned by Government Resolution 1752 of May 2024, which permitted the mass entry of foreign workers without bilateral agreements with their countries of origin. MAAN’s position, published in May 2024, stated that “the government’s decision to approve the potential employment of 330,000 foreign workers in the economy is contrary to all economic logic; contradicts labor-market planning; and opens the way to a dangerous expansion of trafficking in persons for employment in Israel.”[21]
Today, construction sites are filled with workers who have no basic communication with the site managers. Some do not speak Hebrew or English, and communicating with them requires interpreters. Israel’s flawed safety culture is becoming even more extreme and dangerous in a situation in which the government gives companies and contractors complete freedom of action, allowing them to trade in labor as though workers were commodities.
The failure here is compounded. At MAAN, we are convinced that the most urgent task facing the government that emerges after the upcoming elections will be to rebuild the public sector and appoint qualified and appropriate professionals to permanent positions. The blanket ban on the employment of Palestinians must be cancelled – a ban for which there is no security, economic, or human logic.
What is required is a complete U-turn toward an effective government and administration committed to workers and to an efficient public service with real enforcement powers, one that will establish effective regulation and ensure that anyone who leaves home for work in the morning returns home safely.
It is essential that laws and regulations be applied and enforced on the ground for all workers. A state and society that allow a group of workers to suffer fatal harm simply because they belong to another religion or have a different skin color will ultimately abandon and harm their own workers and citizens as well.
