Amnesty International called on, today, Wednesday, Israel to provide the vaccine against the new Corona virus to the Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip, noting that international law obliges Israel to do so.
This call comes despite the fact that the authority in the West Bank, where 2.8 million Palestinians live, has not publicly requested assistance from Israel to purchase the vaccine.
In addition, Hamas officials in the Gaza Strip, which has about two million people, are not expected to ask Israel for help to obtain the vaccine.
Amnesty said that Israel must "stop ignoring its international obligations as the occupying power and act immediately to ensure equal and fair provision of Covid-19 vaccines to the Palestinians living under its occupation in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip."
On Monday, the Palestinian Ministry of Health announced that it expects to receive the first dose of the vaccine next month through the UN-supported "COFEX" program, explaining that it will be used to vaccinate Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.
Israel began vaccinating its citizens, including settlers, in the occupied West Bank on December 19, when it began vaccinating medical workers and citizens over the age of 60 years.
Israel said that more than a million people have so far been vaccinated.
For his part, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu expressed his hope on Saturday that 2.25 million Israelis, or a quarter of the population of about nine million people, would receive two doses of the Pfizer / Bionic vaccine within a month, to obtain optimal results.
Israel has counted 451,000 cases and more than 3,400 deaths since the announcement in February of last year, the first cases of the emerging coronavirus.
As for the West Bank, more than 100,000 injuries and 1,101 deaths were recorded, while the poor and besieged Gaza Strip recorded 43,134 injuries and 404 deaths.
Israel occupied the West Bank and the Gaza Strip in 1967. It later withdrew from the Strip, but imposed a tight siege on it since 2007 after it was controlled by Hamas, which has fought three wars with it since 2008.
The authority said it had contacted potential vaccine suppliers.
The Palestinian Ministry of Health confirmed that it would do its utmost to ensure that the Pfizer / Biontech vaccine was stored according to the required conditions.
