Managing the Despair: Monitoring Report – Asylum Seekers at the Holot Facility April–September 2014

The rapidly-enacted fourth amendment of the Anti-Infiltration Law, which was 

passed in December 2013, brought about the opening of the Holot facility, a facility 

surrounded by a tall fence and operated by the Israel Prison Service (IPS), but 

not defined as a prison because those detained within it are free to exit its gates 

between the three daily roll calls they are required toattend. The creation of Holot 

was a turning point in the lives of asylum seekers in Israel. Thousands of men 

were summoned to report to the facility, whether they met the criteria set by the 

Ministry of the Interior or not. 

On 12 June 2014, the media reported that the authorities were considering turning 

certain wings of the adjacent Saharonim prison into “open” wings, similar to 

Holot, in order to provide enough space for all the asylum seekers summoned to 

Holot.

According to the current criteria, all Eritrean asylum seekers who came 

to Israel before the end of May 2009 (about 19% of the Eritrean community in 

Israel) and all Sudanese asylum seekers who arrived before the end of May 2011 

(approximately 56% of the Sudanese community in Israel) are to be imprisoned 

at Holot. At the same time, imprisonment at Holot excludes minors, women, and 

men who manage to prove they are fathers to children in Israel or are married in 

Israel. According to Ministry of the Interior (MOI) figures, almost twelve thousand 

people meet these criteria – about three-and-a-half times the number of beds 

at Holot. 

This report follows up on From One Prison to Another, a report published by the 

Hotline for Refugees and Migrants (hereafter “the Hotline”) on 30 March 2014, as 

part of the Hotline’s ongoing monitoring. This is the second report examining the 

situation at the Holot facility and its impact on the asylum seeker community 

in Israel. This report was written together with Physicians for Human Rights 

(hereinafter “PHR”) and also discusses the right to healthcare of detainees at 

the facility and its realization in practice. In the five months since the first report, 

Hotline and PHR employees and volunteers have continued visiting the facility, 

conversing with the staff and detainees, and documenting the goings-on.