The spat between Israel's Interior Ministry and Ukraine over the treatment of Ukrainians arriving in Israel has intensified in recent days, with Kyiv's envoy accusing Interior Minister Moshe Arbel of "blatant lies."
Follow Israel Hayom on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram
This has even escalated to the point that the ambassador threatened that if the deportation of Ukrainians arriving in Israel as tourists won't stop, Israelis would be banned from making the annual religious visits to Uman, where the gravesite of the Breslov rebbe is located. The embassy says that during the first half of 2023, 2037 Ukrainians were deported (compared to 2705 throughout all of 2022).
Video: Reuters / Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy arrives at the NATO summit in Vilnius
This issue has generated headlines in Ukraine, but Arbel has recently shot back in response, saying that he "fully rejects the claims of humiliation of Ukrainian citizens upon arrival in Israel." He further added, "In cases where there is suspicion of an improper use of the tourist visa for the purposes of labor or residency, the Population and Immigration Authority exercises its prerogative under the law."
Ukraine was outraged by these comments and Ambassador Yevgen Kornichuk said that "the minister's claims are just blatant lies. The calls [by Ukrainians to the embassy] have been recorded, and if needed, we will submit the recordings."
The embassy shared with Israel Hayom the transcripts of Ukrainian citizens' conversations with its call center, in which they elaborate on the ordeal they have had to go through upon arrival at Ben-Gurion International Airport.
"At passport control, they took us to the offices of the Population and Immigration Authority," Anastasia Avramchuk said in one call, having arrived in Israel on a flight from Krakow on July 8 with her mother and 3-year-old daughter.
"We were interrogated and fingerprinted. The officer spoke to us in Russian, shouted at us and insulted us, and threatened that we would go to prison; he demanded that we give him our phones, and looked at my conversations on Messenger," Avramchuk said in the transcript.
"After the questioning was over, we were taken to an office where from which we were prohibited from leaving; going to the bathroom was only possible with an escort." Avramchuk said that this lasted some three hours, and when she asked whether she could buy food at a nearby store, she was told, "This is not a restaurant" and "Sit until we tell you that leaving is allowed."
According to Avramchuk, she was informed that all three would be deported, "but the tickets were bought for July 12, and until then we were to be held in detention. We were told we could buy tickets for an earlier date, so we bought tickets the following day. We spent the night together with another ten Ukrainians on chairs."
What made things worse was that they were only given back their documents upon boarding the plane. Avramchuk added that she found slips of paper stuck in her passport on which the Israeli officials wrote that she and her family members had lied during the interrogation and that they had in fact, supposedly, arrived in Israel to work illegally. "They even wrote this for my 3-year-old daughter," she added.
Tetyana Griziuk, a student at Chernivtsi University, arrived in Israel for vacation on July 7. "My parents asked that I visit the holy sites to pray for victory in the war," she said according to the transcript. "Upon landing in Israel, the agent didn't even check my documents and just declared, and I'm quoting, 'A young woman from a country that is at war cannot allow herself to have some recreation in her country.' She then took my passport and I was taken to a waiting area, where I was told that I would be sent on a plane back to Ukraine the following day."
Another troubling complaint made to the call center was recorded on June 14. Zinaida Panchenco, who had arrived with her daughter on a flight from Chişinău through Istanbul, told the embassy that even when her condition deteriorated during the interrogation, the Israeli official refused to provide medical attention.
"Having waited for ours, I felt ill and informed the Population and Immigration Authority agent before my questioning began," she wrote. "But instead of seeking first aid, the officer continued questioning me, even though I could not answer coherently; he then informed me that I was going to be deported. I was then taken to a hallway with a barrier, where the deportees were waiting for the next flight. It was very cold there and there were only chairs. We waited five hours, during which my condition worsened, and I collapsed in the bathroom and lost consciousness. I only regained it when I was being taken to the hospital." She further says in the transcript that upon arrival at the Shamir Medical Center, the staff said that she had suffered a heart attack and that she had broken some bones.
Panchenco claims that she has guarantors in Israel and that in Kyiv she has a large apartment, a car, and a job, and therefore there is no reason to believe she would not return. Moreover, the daughter goes to school there. "All the textbooks [for the next school year] are waiting to be picked up," she said.
Subscribe to Israel Hayom's daily newsletter and never miss our top stories!
