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Both are Palestinian residents of Kafr ‘Aqab, a finger of territory which under Israeli law is part of greater Jerusalem, but which under international law is considered illegally annexed territory after its capture from the Jordan in 1967.
It is also isolated from Jerusalem by Israel’s gigantic concrete security wall. Jewish Israelis rarely come here except in uniform to carry out military raids.
Mahmoud Oudeh, like thousands of other townspeople, has Palestinian ID. His friend Anan abu Aishe has an Israeli identity card, which defines him as a permanent resident of East Jerusalem. This gives him the right to join Israel’s world-leading vaccination campaign, which is on track to meet the government’s goal of vaccinating the entire country by the end of March.
But at least 4.5 million Palestinians living in the West Bank and Gaza are being left behind. So far, none have had the injections, and most are unlikely to receive them anytime soon – as there is no Covid-19 vaccination campaign in the Palestinian territories.
So if Anan gets vaccinated and continues alongside his friend, slicing and selling meat from goat and cow carcasses dangling from hooks in the store, he says he would feel guilty.
“Half the people here can’t take it, so I’m not going to take it either, why would I take it when they can’t? I won’t,” he told CNN.
“It’s racist,” Mahmoud added.
According to United Nations experts, a vaccination policy that differentiates between those who have an Israeli identity card and those who do not is “unacceptable”.
The UN expert report says that Israel has been the occupying power in and above Gaza and the West Bank since 1967, and therefore is ultimately responsible for the health care of those living under occupation.
According to the expert report, released by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, Israel should expand its vaccination campaign to all Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank.
Experts also said: “4.5 million Palestinians will remain unprotected and exposed to Covid-19, while Israeli citizens living nearby and among them – including the population of Israeli settlers – will be vaccinated. Morally and legally, this differential access to necessary health care in the midst of the world’s worst health crisis in a century is unacceptable. ”
But while Israel’s vaccination campaign exceeds 20% of the Israeli population (including residents of East Jerusalem), this is not a characterization that Israeli Minister of Health Yuli Edelstein accepts.
“Our calculation was based on Israeli citizens. If we come to the situation where everyone in the country who wants to be vaccinated is vaccinated, we will be more than willing to share the vaccines with our neighbors,” Edelstein told CNN .
“At this point we are talking about Israeli citizens … I haven’t heard of any obligation from Israel to pay for vaccines for anyone else.”
The Israeli government recalls the Oslo accords, signed in the mid-1990s with the Palestine Liberation Organization, which led to the creation of the Palestinian Authority (PA). The first of these agreements contains a clause that gives the Palestinian Authority responsibility for the health of all Palestinians under its civilian administration.
Experts admit that it is no simple task to try to navigate between the responsibilities assigned by Oslo, which was not a final status agreement, and the obligations set out in the Geneva Conventions.
In his interview with CNN, Edelstein framed the decision in terms of interests rather than obligations.
“At this point, we are not providing any vaccines, but we understand that it is in Israel’s best interest to ensure that we do not end up in a situation where we are vaccinated and then come out of this problem, and on the Palestinian side there is another. increase in numbers, ”Edelstein added.
Palestinian Authority Health Minister Dr Mai Al-Kaileh said they plan to procure the Covid-19 vaccine by the end of March, but there is no no precise date yet for their arrival. The ministry says it has contracts with four companies producing the vaccine. These vaccines will cover 70% of the Palestinian population and the World Health Organization will provide 20% to the ministry, ”the Palestinian Authority said in a January 9 statement.
At Ramallah Central Public Hospital, doctors are working around the clock to treat coronavirus patients in a dedicated Covid intensive care unit. As in many other hospitals around the world, non-specialist staff have been recruited to help deal with the pandemic. But after a prolonged lockdown, admissions are declining and on the day of CNN’s visits, the intensive care unit is not full.
Dr Wafa Shihadeh, a resident general surgeon, has been working on Covid-19 services for months. He says he has seen several of his colleagues succumb to the infection and pass it on to their families.
“We are starting to feel depressed because we are not getting the vaccines here in the Palestinian territories,” he said. “And across the border, Israel … I think three days ago about 1,600,000 people were vaccinated, and here in Palestine, the number of people vaccinated is zero.”
Abeer Salman contributed to this report.
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