The Palestinian Authority said on Sunday that Israel was responsible for providing vaccines against the coronavirus to the Palestinians in the West Bank.
According to the PA, international laws and conventions require Israel to purchase and distribute vaccines to the Palestinian people who are living “under its military occupation.”
In addition, the authority said, it was Israel’s duty to give the vaccine to Palestinian security prisoners held in its prisons.
The PA announcement, made by the Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, came amid controversy surrounding Israel’s responsibility for vaccinating the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
Palestinian officials have in the past two weeks made contradictory statements as to whether the PA had asked Israel for vaccines.
PA Health Ministry officials said in late December that they did not ask Israel to provide the Palestinians with the vaccine. The officials said they were seeking to obtain the vaccines from various companies, with the help of the World Health Organization.
Last week, however, a senior PA official told The Jerusalem Post that the Palestinians were examining the possibility of asking Israel for vaccines.
But a PLO official said last weekend that they have not asked Israel for the vaccine.
The ministry denied a report by Kan, the Israeli Broadcasting Corporation, which said that Israel had secretly sent dozens of doses of vaccine to the Palestinians. The ministry said that Israeli “non-governmental” organizations had offered to send 20 doses of vaccines to the Palestinians as an “experiment.” The offer was turned down, the ministry added, without elaborating.
Meanwhile, the PA Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement that Israel, as an “occupying power,” was obliged to provide vaccines to the Palestinians.
“The Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates affirms the duties of Israel, the occupying power, to provide vaccines against the coronavirus to the Palestinian people, at a time when it provides these vaccines to its own citizens,” the statement read.
It warned that if Israel ignores its “duties,” this would be regarded as “racial discrimination against the Palestinian people and a denial of their right to healthcare.”
The ministry claimed that Israel was “trying to absolve itself of its duties as an occupying power, and fully blame the Palestinian government.”
Noting that the PA was making an effort to secure vaccines from various sources, the ministry said that this does not “exempt Israel from its responsibilities towards the Palestinian people in providing them with vaccines” in accordance with international laws and conventions.