Israel has agreed to transfer 5,000 doses of the coronavirus vaccine to the Palestinians to immunise frontline medical workers, Israeli defence minister Benny Gantz's office said.
It is the first time that Israel has confirmed the transfer of vaccines to the Palestinians, who lag far behind Israel's aggressive vaccination campaign and have not yet received any vaccines.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) has raised concerns about the disparity between Israel and Palestinians living in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip, and international human rights groups and UN experts have said Israel is responsible for the wellbeing of Palestinians in these areas.
Israel says that under interim peace agreements reached in the 1990s, it is not responsible for the Palestinians and in any case has not received requests for help.
Mr Gantz's office said early on Sunday that the transfer had been approved.
It had no further details on when that would happen.
Israel is one of the world's leaders in vaccinating its population after striking procurement deals with international pharmaceutical giants Pfizer and Moderna.
The Health Ministry says nearly one third of Israel's 9.3 million people have received the first dose of the vaccine, while about 1.7 million people have received both doses.
The campaign includes Israel's Arab citizens and Palestinians living in annexed east Jerusalem.
But Palestinians living in the West Bank under the autonomy government of the Palestinian Authority and those living under Hamas rule in Gaza are not included.
The Palestinian Authority has been trying to acquire doses through a WHO programme known as Covax.
But the programme, which aims to procure vaccines for needy countries, has been slow to get off the ground.
The dispute reflects global inequality in access to vaccines, as wealthy countries vacuum up the lion's share of doses, leaving poorer countries even farther behind in combating the public health and economic effects of the pandemic.
It has also emerged as another flashpoint in the decades-old Middle East conflict, even as the virus has wreaked havoc on both sides.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel