Sep 9, 2014 3 min read

JERUSALEM – Thousands of Sudanese migrants to Israel and hundreds of Eritreans have returned to their home countries this year as a result of an Israeli policy that amounted to “unlawful coercion,” Human Rights Watch said Tuesday. The group said the migrants had been left little option but to go back even though they were at risk of imprisonment or abuse at the hands of repressive governments, and despite protections that Israel is obligated to provide under international conventions.

The New York-based human rights group said in a lengthy report that it had documented seven cases in which citizens of Sudan were detained and interrogated in the capital, Khartoum, on their return.

While four of the seven were released after short periods, the report said one was tortured, a second was put in solitary confinement and a third was “charged with treason for visiting Israel,” which does not maintain diplomatic relations with Sudan. The group said that under Sudanese law it is a crime to visit Israel, punishable by up to 10 years in prison, and that at least 6,400 Sudanese had returned between January 2013 and the end of June 2014.

The report also said 367 Eritreans had returned home after reaching Israel, but neither Human Rights Watch nor the representative in Israel of the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees had any confirmed information about them.

In many cases, migrants were offered a choice between going home or facing the threat of “indefinite detention” in a semi-open but remote facility in the Negev desert that does not allow them to work.

“International law is clear that when Israel threatens Eritreans and Sudanese with lifelong detention, they aren’t freely deciding to leave Israel and risk harm back home,” said Gerry Simpson, senior refugee researcher at Human Rights Watch and the author of the report.

Israel strongly contested that assessment, saying it encourages repatriation or departure to a third country but does not compel asylum seekers to do so.

“There are very many baseless accusations against the state, just as these organizations criticize every one of the western countries because of the way they deal with illegal infiltration,” Gideon Saar, Israel’s interior minister, told Israel Radio.

The ministry said the Human Rights Watch report was an attempt to influence Israel’s Supreme Court, which is expected to rule soon on a petition against a recent amendment to Israel’s law guiding illegal entry to the country.

Israeli officials say the government offers refugees willing to leave $3,500.