PRESIDENT Ferdinand Marcos Jr. on Tuesday said more than 1,400 Filipinos have reached out to the government for repatriation from different countries in the Middle East as war in the region escalated, but evacuation efforts remained stalled due to airport closures and ongoing missile strikes.
In a press conference, Marcos said about 586 Filipinos from Dubai, 297 from Israel, 270 from Abu Dhabi, 231 from Bahrain, 22 from Jordan and 10 from Iran have asked to be repatriated.
“Altogether that’s 1,416 Filipino nationals who have requested repatriation,” he said.
However, the president said that it has become challenging to repatriate them, as airports in these countries have closed.
“Those who helped America and the countries which helped the US are being attacked by Iran as retaliatory strikes,” the president said.
“Our situation is very fluid. Our assessment is that it’s dangerous to fly right now even if we are able to get airplanes because number one, the airports are closed. They are all no-fly zones. This is a combat area,” he added.
The president said they have initially planned to repatriate overseas Filipinos through areas that were not affected in the beginning.
Marcos said that even transporting the Filipinos by land was also dangerous due to friendly fire incidents.
“It’s an active combat zone and if they see that there are a lot of vehicles, maybe they will attack them because they will misidentify it as some hostile movement,” he said.
Marcos said the government remained in constant contact with labor attachés, ambassadors, labor and defense attachés, to determine the situation on the ground.
The president also assured the overseas Filipinos in the Middle East that despite the challenge, the government would find ways to get them out safely.
He advised them to “stay in a safe place and stay indoors and stay away from areas of danger.”
“And that is the advice we have given to our nationals in Israel and also our nationals everywhere else if you are in a safe place, if you’re far from the conflict, just stay put and be safe. And we will slowly try to find ways to get you out safely,” he said.
Israel – the most dangerous area
The president also said that “the most dangerous area for our people now would be Israel.”
Filipina caregiver Charlot David, who has been in Israel since 2008, made the run back and forth to the bomb shelter several times before deciding it was better to simply stay there.
The 44-year-old mother of four, who has lived through “several wars” since moving to Israel, knew exactly what to do when the ear-splitting alert on her mobile phone first woke her on Saturday.
“Our flat is three minutes away from the bomb shelter, so we really have to run fast,” she told Agence France-Presse (AFP) in a video interview from her employer’s home in Rehovot, a city 20 kilometers south of Tel Aviv.
The caregiver is one of an estimated 2 million overseas Filipino workers (OFWs) in the region, sending billions of dollars in remittances home each year to families in the Philippines that depend on them as the primary breadwinners.
“There were several alerts until we concluded, OK, this is no joke. It’s Iran. So, we decided to stay inside the bomb shelter,” David said.
Eight months earlier, a neighbor had not been so lucky when hostilities first erupted between Iran, Israel and the United States.
“A ballistic missile hit our area, a flat occupied by Filipinos... A fellow Filipina died there, our neighbor,” she said, calling the experience deeply traumatic.
Anita Bautista, who said alerts had sounded “from morning until dawn,” said the latest conflict was “more scary” than others she has lived through in her 12 years in Israel.
“Before, [the missiles] were not hitting the ground, but now some people are getting killed,” said the mother of two who works in the Tel Aviv suburb Petah Tikva.
On Sunday, the new outbreak of hostilities claimed their first victim from the archipelago nation of 116 million: Mary Ann Velasquez de Vera, a 32-year-old caregiver killed as she attempted to escort her elderly ward to an Israeli bomb shelter.
Filipinos working in Dubai and Bahrain described being woken by window-rattling explosions and witnessing drones zipping overhead before exploding into nearby buildings.
The Philippine government said Monday there were no plans in place for wide-scale repatriations — an expensive and logistically complicated proposition.
However, about 80-100 OFWs working in the United Arab Emirates were seeking repatriation, with a similar number of requests from Israel, Migrant Workers Secretary Hans Leo Cacdac told an afternoon briefing.
But Josie Pinkihan of labor rights group Migrante International urged broader action.
“Before the Iran-US war worsens, our countrymen should be repatriated now,” she said in an interview at the group’s Manila headquarters, saying the scale of evacuations demanded the process begin immediately.
David, the caregiver, however, said she could not envision leaving Israel unless she had “no choice.”
“We have families in the Philippines who rely on us,” she said.
To date, only de Vera has been confirmed as fatality on the Philippines’ behalf. She died from a bomb shrapnel following an airstrike on Tel Aviv.
Military ready
The Philippine Air Force (PAF) on Tuesday said it was ready to deploy planes if the Philippine government calls for an immediate repatriation of Filipinos stranded in the Middle East.
Col. Ma. Christina Basco, PAF spokesman, told reporters in a press briefing in Camp Aguinaldo they would most likely deploy its C130s. The Philippine Navy is also ready to deploy sealift vessels, Capt. Marissa Martinez said.
Rear Admiral Roy Vincent Trinidad, AFP spokesman for the West Philippine Sea, said the entire military is now drafting contingency plans awaiting signal from higher authorities for deployment.
Deep concern
Sen. Erwin Tulfo, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, on Saturday expressed deep concern over the latest escalation of tensions in Iran and other parts of the Middle East following major combat operations between Israel, the United States, and Iran.
“We are deeply alarmed by the latest escalation of tensions in various areas in the Middle East,” Tulfo said in a statement. “The situation poses serious risks to civilian populations, including our fellow Filipinos in the region.”
Tulfo said the Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) has been proactive in ensuring exit points for about 823 Filipinos currently in Iran, as well as the thousands of Filipinos residing and working in Israel.
He added that Philippine embassies in other affected areas have already established procedures for Filipinos seeking assistance.