The Israeli Embassy in Bangkok reopened its doors on April
3rd and resumed full services, after Israel's diplomats ended a 10-day strike
that closed the country's overseas missions.
The strike ended the previous day after the union of
Israel's Foreign Service signed a new agreement with the Ministry of Finance to
improve the job conditions of Israeli diplomats.
The strike, the first of its kind in the state’s history,
was the culmination of a labor dispute that stretched back to the beginning of
2013 over salaries and work conditions for diplomats serving at the ministry in
Jerusalem and abroad. The full-scale strike followed by some three weeks
crippling labor actions that saw Israel without representation at countless
meetings around the world for the past month, and left scores of Israelis
without consular services.
Foreign Minister Avigdor Liberman welcomed on Wednesday
evening the end of the strike. Liberman said that “the agreement that was
signed is a good agreement. It creates a new employment model geared to the
needs of the professionals in the Foreign Ministry and an economic model that
provides a solution to the needs of employees at all levels of wages in the
Foreign Ministry.”
The chairman of the workers committee, Yair Frommer, said
the agreement included “a number of significant achievements. I hope that the
signed agreement will make it possible for us to continue to recruit into our
ranks the best workers in the public sector.”