On December 21st, the Jerusalem Post reported how PA Health Ministry officials stated unequivocally the PA did not expect Israel’s help in procuring a Covid vaccine.
The Palestinians have not approached Israel for help in obtaining COVID-19 vaccines and are planning to purchase them on their own with the help of the international community, Palestinian and Israeli officials said on Sunday.
A senior official with the Palestinian Authority Ministry of Health said that the Palestinians do not expect Israel to sell them, or purchase on their behalf, the vaccine from any country.
The official told The Jerusalem Post that the Palestinians will soon receive nearly four million Russian-made vaccines against COVID-19.
The PA, with the help of the World Health Organization, has managed to secure the vaccine from other sources, the official added, without elaborating.
Another PA Ministry of Health official said that he expected vaccinations in the West Bank and Gaza Strip to begin next month. He, too, clarified that the PA has not asked Israel to supply the Palestinians with the vaccine. “We are working on our own to obtain the vaccine from a number of sources,” the official added. “We are not a department in the Israeli Defense Ministry. We have our own government and Ministry of Health, and they are making huge efforts to get the vaccine.”
Last week, PA Prime Minister Mohammed Shtayyeh said that the Palestinians were working hard to obtain the vaccine against COVID-19 from a number of sources, including Russia, the US, China and Britain.
They almost sounded offended at the idea that Israel should somehow intervene.
Then began the litany of mainstream media news reports and other articles (unfairly) accusing Israel of not helping.
Now the PA have changed their tune, seeing the propaganda value of blaming Israel for not supplying them with vaccines.
The Palestinian Authority (PA) has said it expects to receive its first COVID-19 vaccine doses in March under a deal with British drug giant AstraZeneca, and accused Israel of ignoring its responsibilities to ensure vaccines are available in occupied territory.
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The Palestinian foreign ministry said in a statement Israel had been “ignoring its duties as an occupation power and committing racial discrimination against the Palestinian people, depriving them of their right to healthcare”.
“The search by the Palestinian leadership to secure the vaccines from various sources doesn’t exempt Israel from its responsibilities towards the Palestinian people in providing the vaccines,” it said.
If only they put as much effort into helping their own people as they do into lying and demonizing us.
Update: The PLO is now going all out pushing the blame Israel line.
