Israel to open 1K tourism jobs for Filipinos by December

MANILA — At least a thousand jobs will be opened for Filipino workers in Israel’s tourism industry by the end of the year, an envoy said on Monday.

In a media interview, Ambassador to the Philippines Rafael Harpaz said the Philippines was the first country that Israel signed an agreement with to fill hotel and restaurant job openings in its country.

“We decided to open Israel to a limited amount of overseas workers all over the world.

We start with 2,000, and 1,000 of them will be Filipinos,” he said on the sidelines of the water technology forum in Makati City.

With the increasing tourist arrivals to Israel every year, Harpaz noted they saw a lack of workers in their tourism industry prompting them to seek overseas jobs with Filipinos as priority.

“Why Filipinos? Because you have the best service in hotels and restaurants,” the ambassador added.

Israel has prioritized Filipinos to work and stay in their country due to the “good relationship” established by government leaders of the two countries.

It is also “grateful” for the service provided by at least 40,000 Filipino caregivers to their families, he added.

This developed following President Rodrigo Duterte’s visit to Israel in September 2018 where he signed the bilateral labor agreement improving and regulating the recruitment process and the rights of overseas Filipino workers, and drastically reducing placement fees.

It involves government-to-government hiring process so private recruitment agencies are not necessary.

In an earlier report, Philippine Ambassador to Israel Nathaniel Imperial said the labor cooperation agreement will “hopefully ensure that the exploitative placement fees that are being charged to our workers would be substantially reduced, if not eliminated.”