Labor leader Hatem Abu Ziadeh has quietly made history. In February, the 45-year-old Palestinian father of six from Jericho sat down with Morris Zarfati, the owner of the Zarfati car-repair garage in the Mishor Adumim Industrial Zone in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. For years a “war” had raged between the two men following Abu Ziadeh’s unionizing work and subsequent dismissal from the garage. Now, over tea and smiles, they came to a collective-bargaining agreement that improved wages and working conditions for Abu Ziadeh and his fellow employees, a first for Palestinians working for Israelis in the West Bank.
Zarfati garage workers also benefited from the support of WAC-MAAN, a small, independent Israeli labor organization that’s openly against the occupation. “The [Israeli] settlers want Israeli law to apply here,” explained Yoav Tamir, a rare Arabic-speaking Israeli organizer. “But when it’s about worker rights, they argue that it’s Jordanian law,” which is still on the books in the West Bank. (Jordanian law, when applied, concerns only Palestinians and not Israelis living in the West Bank, who are subject to Israeli law.)
Overall, WAC-MAAN paid about $20,000 in legal expenses to get Abu Ziadeh reinstated, according to Tamir. Under the new collective-bargaining agreement, the employer covers the remaining legal fees. Each employee also receives an average compensation of 35,000 shekels (nearly $10,000) for lost payment. Going forward, the workers will get vacation and sick days, as well as a minimum wage (and, at last, official pay slips), with a structure in place for pay raises based on years worked.
Not all Palestinians welcome the help from Israelis like Tamir, which runs afoul of the Palestinian anti-normalization movement. The Palestinian Authority has even forbidden Palestinians—if only symbolically, since the PA has no enforcement mechanism—from working in Israeli settlements and industrial zones. Unionization also threatens the status of middlemen, who can earn a princely sum procuring coveted and costly Israeli work permits. The Palestinian General Federation of Trade Unions, itself a complicated and political body, has no jurisdiction in Israeli settlements.
Still, Abu Ziadeh continues to spread the union gospel. Across Israel, unionizing has been on the rise since the 2011 social-justice protests against the high cost of living and the passage of pro-union legislation. The once nearly all-powerful Histadrut, Israel’s largest and state-aligned trade union, is now trying to rebrand itself, after years of decline, as a workers’ organization that transcends Israel’s religious, racial, and geographic divides.
The ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hezbollah, which came into effect on Wednesday, November 27, marks the end of the war in Lebanon. If it holds, a period of reconstruction will begin, bringing a dramatic increase in the need for workers in the construction sector. Meanwhile, tens of thousands of Palestinians are waiting for the government to allow them back into construction sites in Israel. Thousands of contractors are also desperate for skilled labor, reporting that the foreign workers they have managed to recruit are too few and insufficiently trained.
Have you ever felt that your supervisor treated you like a piece of trash? Intisar (not her real name) experienced this situation over and over again. She is a Palestinian who worked in a factory located in the outskirts of Jerusalem since August 1, 2023.
On October 6, 2024, the verdict of the Jerusalem Regional Labor Court (presided by Judge Rachel Berg Hirshberg) was published, concerning a sexual harassment lawsuit filed by a former employee of the “Maya Food Industries Ltd.” factory in Mishor Adumim (Area C of the West Bank).
The smiles on the faces of the 17 graduates of the beekeeping course were uplifting. The buzz in the room even resembled the hum of a beehive. Since the course ended in June, these women have been busy maintaining the beehive each received for her home. The certificate ceremony took place on September 9 at the “MAAN Workers’ Association branch in Baqa al-Gharbiya, attended by course graduates, the project’s leading team, and members of the MAAN’s women’s forum.
For years, Israel’s olive harvest has relied on 10,000 Palestinian workers (usually some 3000 families) from the West Bank who receive permits to work in Israel in the season. The sector employs these workers each year to pick tens of thousands of tons of olives from September to December, in groves stretching from the Negev to the Upper Galilee.
Three complaints were filed early August against an Israeli lawyer from Be’er Sheva, alleging that he illegally charged Palestinian workers from the West Bank thousands of shekels and traded work permits in Israel.
אנא כתבו את שמכם המלא, טלפון ותיאור קצר של נושא הפנייה, ונציג\ה של מען יחזרו אליכם בהקדם האפשרי.
رجاءً اكتبوا اسمكم الكامل، الهاتف، ووصف قصير حول موضوع توجهكم، ومندوب عن نقابة معًا سيعاود الاتصال بكم لاحقًا
As an organization committed to the rights of workers without distinction of religion, race, nationality, gender, or profession - democracy is our essence. We strongly oppose the authoritarian laws that the extreme government of Netanyahu, Lapid, Bennett, and Smotrich is attempting to impose.
Without democracy, there are no workers' rights, just as a workers' organization cannot exist under dictatorship.
only a victory of the democratic camp will enable a discussion on the Palestinian issue and lead to an alternative solution to occupation and apartheid while ensuring human rights and citizenship for all, Israelis and Palestinians alike. As long as the apartheid regime persists, the democratic camp will not succeed in defeating Israeli extremists. Therefore, we work to involve the Arab and Palestinian society in the protest.
We invite you:
To march with us in protests and to build an alternative, democratic, Jewish-Arab professional union in Israel. Join our quiet WhatsApp group today, "Marching with us in protest."
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