Spring Roll strike supports Israel's foreign cooks

Spring rolls are off the menu as Asian chefs go on strike in Israel, according to the wire services. The problem with these chinese foodworker strikes is that two weeks later, you have to go on strike again. What to do for sushi and noodle addicts? The problem goes beyond ginger pork or kosher cuisine - it's cutting back on foreign workers.

Israel's Asian restaurants went on a one-day spring-roll strike yesterday in protest over government plans to rid kitchens of foreign chefs, and said sushi and noodles would be the next items off the menu.

Proprietors are angry at government plans to purge Japanese, Chinese and Thai eateries of Asian cooks and replace them with Israelis as part of a broader programme to cut the number of foreigners working in the Jewish state.

The Israeli Ethnic Restaurant Organisation said the country's 300 Asian restaurants refused to serve spring- or egg- rolls – among their most popular dishes – and planned a follow-up strike in two weeks for sushi and noodles.

"Today there is no egg roll and in two weeks' time there will be no sushi and noodles," said Arnon Volosky, head of the organisation.

Israel attracts virtually no immigrants from Asia since anyone seeking citizenship here must prove they have Jewish family or links to the country.

Seeking to plug a gap in the labour market during the first Palestinian uprising, Israel allowed in foreigners to work. But now it is trying to limit those numbers to create more jobs for Israelis.

This year, the government is granting 500 permits to Asian chefs compared with 900 last year. Next year, no permits will be issued, although restaurants willing to pay twice the average national salary will be allowed to employ chefs as "experts".

The government says Israelis can be trained. "Everyone can make Chinese food; it's not impossible to learn," said Shoshana Strauss, a lawyer on foreign worker issues for the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Labour.

Asian restaurants started dishing up chicken chow mein and Thai green curry to Israelis about 30 years ago and have evolved into a £140m industry.

Jewish 'Law of Return' loopholes raise concerns

The new Interior Minister of Israel, Meir Sheetrit, decries the number of "quasi-Jews" infiltrating the Holy Land. African refugees and Russians who lack traditionally Jewish roots make him jittery about demographics. There's a white-hot discussion about who should be allowed to make aliyah over on Ynetnews

"It's time to bring only Jews to Israel," newly elected Interior Minister Meir Sheetrit said Friday in an interview with Yedioth Ahronoth, and called for a new discussion on the Law of Return. "If we don't discuss these issues now, within a few years Israel will no longer be the State of the Jews."

New immigration minister cites forgeries as reason for examining existing criteria. 'It's obvious that some immigrants haven't the slightest connection to Judaism' he says

Sheetrit said he was shocked to discover statistics about the number of non-Jews living in the country.

"Seventy percent of emigrants from the Former Soviet Union are not Jewish, the Falash Mura continue to pour in from Ethiopia, Jewish organizations roam the world and bring here quasi-Jews from all sorts of tribes, thousands of illegal residents from the Palestinian Authority live and work here uninterrupted, and thousands Africans infiltrate to Israel, when only a minority are Darfur refugees," he stated.


Sheetrit, who took up the position last week, said it was time for Israel to decide who it wants to see living here. "We retuned to our homeland after 2,000 years in exile in order to build a Jewish, Zionist state here, not a Foreign Legionaries country. Entrance to the country should not be automatic." His main concern, he stated, was that Israel might lose it Jewish majority due to reckless immigration policies.


According to Sheetrit, Israel should institutionalize a mechanism that would examine candidates for aliyah and make sure they are Jewish, and also that they have a clean record.


How would you decide who should be allowed in and who shouldn't?

"The way I see it, it is our duty to accept every Jew who wants to and is capable of coming here, on the condition that he feels he shares our destiny and wants his children to live here. Additionally, other criteria must be set, for instance 'criminality tests.' I don't want any criminal being imported here."

Sheetrit stated he was considering introducing citizenship tests in Israel, as well as obligating new immigrants to swear allegiance to the state. However, he added that he opposed using financial criteria, because "the Jewish and Zionist element is till the most important one."