OVERSEAS Filipino workers (OFWs) bound for strife-torn Israel will have to wait a while.
The Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) yesterday said the deployment of 400 caregivers to Israel later this month has been suspended while tension remains high between Israel and Palestine.
“We are suspending their actual departure while the tension is still high,” Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III in a statement. “It will just be about a few days of delay. We just want to be sure they will be safe.
“We appeal to our departing caregivers and healthcare workers to postpone their departures for a few days to avoid getting in danger,” Bello said.
Bello said despite unsafe conditions in Israel, there is no deployment ban being imposed there.
“We have not banned the deployment of our workers to Israel. The processing of those who already qualified continues,” he added.
Last Wednesday, the Philippine Overseas Employment Administration (POEA) said 400 caregivers are set to be deployed in Israel. POEA Administrator Bernard Olalia said they were assured by their Israeli counterparts that the caregivers won’t be deployed to conflict areas.
The POEA is looking to increase its annual cap on healthcare workers to be deployed abroad as the demand from other countries continues to rise amid the pandemic.
Olalia said they seriously considering increasing the 5,000 HCW deployment cap.
“We are already anticipating that, in the near future, we will already reach that cap given the high demand for HCWs. And once we get nearer that cap, we will already talk to the Inter-Agency Task Force on Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF-EID),” Olalia said.
He said that several countries have increased their request for nurses and other medical frontliners due to the pandemic.
“They include traditional markets of United Kingdom, Germany, Japan, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. We also have newer markets like New Zealand and others with shortage of HCWs,” said Olalia.
He said there are over 3,000 HCWs who have been deployed overseas from January to May 2021, adding the target deployment cap might be reached by June.
Meanwhile, the Department of Foreign Affairs said it is prepared to repatriate Filipinos who want to return home amid the Israel-Palestine conflict. The DFA said Israel and the West Bank are under Alert Level 1 while the Gaza Strip is under Alert Level 2.
“The DFA and the Philippine Embassies in Tel Aviv, Amman and Cairo are jointly monitoring the situation in Israel and the Gaza and are prepared to assist Filipino nationals who may be affected by the conflict,” the DFA said in an advisory, adding there are 29,473 Filipinos in Israel and 91 in Gaza.
Alert Level 1, which is the lowest security category of the government for Filipinos overseas, means there are valid signs of internal disturbance, instability, and external threat to the host country while Alert Level 2 entails restriction of non-essential movements and preparation for possible evacuation out of the conflict zone.
The advisory said Filipinos in Israel may reach the embassy in Tel Aviv at its Facebook page PHinIsrael or through its emergency hotline: +972 54 466 1188.
It said the embassy in Cairo may be reached at its embassy Facebook page PHinEgypt or through its Assistance to Nationals (ATN) hotline at +20-122 7436472 while the Facebook page of the embassy in Cairo is at PHinJordan and at its emergency hotline: +962 777988818. — With Ashzel Hachero
