Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has said the border fence constructed along Israel’s border with Egypt is holding back a potential “flood” of illegal migrants from Africa, and charged they were worse than terrorists in the Sinai peninsula.

Speaking at an event celebrating the Negev region held in Dimona, this week, Netanyahu said that Israel has recently completed a fence along “more than 200 kilometers of the border with Sinai.”

Without the fence, “we would be faced with … severe attacks by Sinai terrorists, and something much worse, a flood of illegal migrants from Africa,” he said.

The comments come as Israel has embarked on a highly controversial campaign to deport thousands of African migrants in the country.