Risk To Life vs Jobs: A Dilemma Facing Indians In War Zones

Last week, we spoke of bombs and ballistic missiles as a fierce air war raged between Iran and Israel. This week, the conversation turned, almost incongruously, to tourist hotspots in conflict-scarred neighbourhoods.

“The Dead Sea is beautiful,” says 50-year-old Soma Ravi from Telangana, a care-giver in a Tel Aviv suburb. “Every year, I go there and lie back, relaxing on the water’s surface without sinking. It is a good life. Why should I leave? Why should anyone leave?”

A fragile truce now holds between the two long-standing adversaries, bringing their twelve-day war to an end. Ravi has spent nearly two decades in Israel and now heads the Israel Telangana Association, representing over a thousand Telugus.

This week, he rang again, and our conversation turned to why so many Indians continue to work in war zones.

“We are familiar with bombs, so we are not scared,” he said, matter-of-factly, sledgehammering a quiet but decisive shift reshaping global labour migration. Care-givers and construction workers from India, Sri Lanka, Nepal, and Southeast Asian countries like the Philippines are increasingly moving not only to wealthy nations but also to conflict-scarred regions—Israel, Iraq, Lebanon, Libya, and Syria. These are informed choices, made by workers who weigh risk against income, duty, and family survival.

In recent days, I spoke to several Indian care-givers who chose to remain in Israel despite the option of repatriation. “Very few want to go back to India. Some students, researchers, and a few visiting businessmen chose to return, but no one with a decent job here is leaving, not even for five lakh rupees. Why would they?” says Ravi. “Highly skilled professionals—doctors and engineers—might find good jobs in the US or Canada. But where else will someone without special skills earn at least Rs 1.5 lakh a month, with free board and lodging? Care-givers are typically not trained nurses. They only need a month or two of basic instruction—how to check blood pressure, sugar levels, things like that. We stay with the family; have the same meals.”

Similar stories surface across the region.

Over 5,000 Indian workers are currently deployed at the Karbala Refinery Project in Iraq. Lebanon, long beset by political and economic turmoil and the spillover from Syria’s civil war, continues to host nearly 170,000 foreign domestic workers. Many are women from Ethiopia, Kenya, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Bangladesh, and the Philippines, according to the UN’s International Organisation for Migration (IOM). Indian migrant workers in Israel and elsewhere typically steer clear of references to the big geopolitical picture and the horrors in Gaza and elsewhere.

Yet the realities on the ground remain challenging for many.

“Unlike traditional migration destinations such as Europe or North America, Israel does not offer long-term settlement or a pathway to citizenship. Despite this, the number of Indian care-givers arriving in Israel continues to grow each year,” wrote doctoral scholar Suraj Rajan Kadanthodu in a Times of Israel blog on 25 March 2025. "For many Indian care-givers, migration to Israel is driven by economic necessity. They often take on significant debt to pay exorbitant agency fees. Some see their time in Israel as a stepping stone to securing care-giver visas in countries like the UK or Canada which offer better prospects. Many care-givers live in their patients’ homes, providing 24/7 care with minimal personal time... Limited vacation days and strict leave policies further exacerbate their struggles… Despite such incidents, many care-givers express a sense of security,” he added.

In February this year, 16 Indian workers returned to New Delhi after being stranded for six months at a Libyan cement company’s plant in Benghazi. Reportedly held in ‘prison-like’ conditions, they alleged long shifts, unpaid wages, and confiscated phones after they protested. It was thanks to Tabassum Mansoor, principal of the Indian International School in Benghazi, that they could contact the outside world. Their Bangladeshi co-workers bought their groceries.

Sending countries like India, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, and Indonesia must acknowledge that conflict zones are no longer anomalies in migration. Blanket deployment bans and broad advisories are blunt tools. So governments must embed crisis preparedness into the migration process: safety briefings, insurance, embassy support, and risk communication should be routine.

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The Philippines’ alert system and India’s evacuation track record offer useful models. In June 2025 alone, under Operation Sindhu, India evacuated 3,154 persons from Iran, including Nepalese and Sri Lankans, and over 800 nationals from Israel. These frameworks could underpin a joint ASEAN–South Asia taskforce, pooling consular resources and intelligence for coordinated emergency response. Labour agreements must go beyond salary brackets and agency oversight to include binding protections: secure housing, wage continuity during crises, emergency repatriation, and access to psychosocial care. Countries like Israel, Lebanon, and Iraq—dependent on migrant carers for essential services—must codify these responsibilities.

Encouragingly, regional conversations have begun. At the ASEAN Workshop on Fair and Ethical Recruitment in June 2025 in Pasig City, the Philippines proposed a shared checklist covering transparent hiring, legal aid, and crisis protocols. Backed by the International Labour Organisation and IOM, the agenda will feed into the 2026 ASEAN Summit.

South Asia must not stand aside. As migration scholar Binod Khadria argues, migrant workers from India share vulnerabilities with their Southeast Asian counterparts, and there is much to be gained from sending countries banding together and negotiating collectively with migrant-receiving countries for a collaborative crisis response.

Patralekha Chatterjee is a writer and columnist who spends her time in South and Southeast Asia, and looks at modern-day connects between the two adjacent regions. X: @Patralekha2011