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Israeli lawmakers yesterday called for a halt to the "manhunt" for foreign workers, warning their deportation of foreign workers and that of their children would constitute a "terrible injustice" and infringe on the children's basic rights. The Knesset's Committee on the Rights of the Child yesterday discussed the state's treatment of foreign workers and asylum seekers' children, following the police's extensive drive to round up and expel foreign workers. MK Nitzan Horowitz (Meretz), who called the discussion, said the roundup and deportation would have harmful implications on the workers' children, who had been born and raised here and have no other country but Israel. "This is a terrible injustice. They're deporting people while bringing new workers into the country," Horowitz said. "If the policy was to deport foreign workers in view of rising unemployment, so be it. But bringing in new workers casts doubt over the motives for the deportation scheduled for August." "These children were born here, Hebrew is their language and Israel is the only country they know. They're not Jewish, but they're Israelis. The immigrants from Russia also have numerous non-Jews among them but receive a legal status here nonetheless," he said. Tziki Sela, commander of the "Oz" task force, which replaced the former Immigration Police, told the committee that some 300,000 foreign workers reside in Israel illegally. Some 2,800 children of migrant workers and asylum seekers live in Israel, according to the Knesset Research and Information Center. MK Ilan Gilon (Meretz) called on the authorities to "stop the manhunt on foreign workers immediately." Dr. Yitzhak Kadman, director of the National Council for the Child, said "thousands of children in Israel have no legal status. They are not entitled to health services and are forced to receive treatment from unauthorized persons. Israel turns its back on those who have no status," he told the committee. Committee chairman Danny Danon (Likud) compared the foreign workers' children to the children of the settlers who were evacuated four years ago in the disengagement from the Gaza Strip. "I see the evacuated children and the traumas they sustained since then. We must treat these children with sensitivity," he said. The immigration task force rounded up 60 migrants earlier this week and sent them to a detention centre in Holon. The force detained 300 migrants last week.