Dangerous or endangered: the presence of African Israeli children in urban public spaces

This article explores the use of public spaces by African Israeli children in South Tel Aviv. These children were born to asylum-seekers from Eritrea and Sudan who crossed the Israeli–Egyptian border between 2006 and 2012 and live in Israel with no effective status. South Tel-Aviv has, in recent years, become a place of contestation and conflict, especially in connection to African asylum-seeker children and the Israeli aid organizations assisting them. The high visibility of these children in the streets coupled with the incitements against asylum-seekers and gentrification processes in the area lead to friction that makes their presence in public spaces unsafe. Drawing on ethnographic research, we analyze how the children’s presence is narrated and contested. We found that it is perceived as a symbol of ‘demographic concern’ that extends beyond the borders of the neighborhood and touches the nature of the Israeli state as a Jewish ethno-based or democratic state that respects human and refugee rights.