Data: Only 14% of new immigrants to Israel given citizenship

Only 14 per cent of immigrants who arrived in Israel over the past eight years have received Israeli citizenship, a report issued by Israeli NGO Hiddush revealed today.

Reporting Israeli media sources, Quds Press said 86 per cent of those who had moved to Israel were not Jews according to Jewish law, which states that only the child of a Jewish woman or a person who completes a recognised conversion process is considered Jewish.

Under the 1950 Israeli Law of Return only Jews could immigrate to Israel. However this was extended in the 1970s to include the relatives of Jews, including children and grandchildren even if they were not Jews under Jewish law.

The amendment also allowed the spouse of a Jew, the spouse of child of a Jew and the spouse of a grandchild of a Jew to immigrate to Israel.

According to data from the Israeli Administration of Border Crossings, only 25,375 of the 179,849 immigrants (14.1 per cent) were Jews, Quds Press reported.

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