Pages

Monday, January 18, 2021

One more reminder of the hypocrisy of @Amnesty, B'Tselem and Physicians for Human Rights - Israel as first Russian vaccines due to reach Palestinian territories (update)


Ma'an quotes Israel's Kan News as saying that the Palestinian Authority will bring five thousand Russian Sputnik COVID-19 vaccines into the territories tomorrow.

Palestinian Authority official Hussein al-Sheikh is visiting Russia now and he will return tomorrow with the vaccine via Jordan, after he obtained approval from Israel to bring the vaccine into the territories. The PA has already approved the Sputnik vaccine for use under emergency regulations. 

Israel is allowing the Russian vaccine - but B'Tselem, Amnesty, Physicians for Human Rights-Israel, Gisha and other NGOs are against this happening.

They do not want the Sputnik vaccine - which only require storage at -20C - ostensibly because they don't think Palestinians should have a vaccine that Israel hasn't approved for Israeli citizens.

The Russian vaccine, although not as well tested as others, is approved for use in a number of countries. 

These supposed human rights organizations don't seem to care about human lives when they can choose to use vaccines as a public relations weapon against Israel.

UPDATE: It looks like the vaccines won't arrive until Friday,  they will come through Israel, and the next batch of 100,000 is due in February.