Israeli officials secretly agreed to fund coronavirus vaccines for Syria in exchange for the release of an Israeli woman arrested for illegally entering Syria, The New York Times reported Sunday.
Under the terms of the deal, Israel will pay Russia, a financier of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, to ship the Russian-produced vaccine to Syria.
In an interview Saturday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu
Benjamin (Bibi) Netanyahu MORE did not directly deny the settlement, merely saying that no Israeli vaccines would be sent to Syria and that he was “glad” that the Israeli citizen had been released.
“I will not add anything more,” Netanyahu said after thanking the Russian president Vladimir Putin
Vladimir Vladimirovich PutinMedia’s gushing promotion of Governor Cuomo looks pretty bad as Putin critic Navalny loses appeal over imprisonment Biden calls for creating ‘rules’ for cyber, technology to combat threats from China and Russia MORE
Syria and Israel have no formal diplomatic relations, and the two countries still dispute the Golan Heights, which Israel conquered in the 1960s. According to the Israeli government’s official announcement, the woman had been released in exchange for two Syrian shepherds captured by Israel, the Times said.
The report is also because Israel has given at least one dose of the vaccine to about half of the population. Only a few thousand doses have now been delivered to the West Bank, which is home to about 2.8 million Palestinians.
The country has argued that it is not responsible for providing healthcare to Palestinians under the terms of the Oslo Accords, while Palestinians have argued that the Fourth Geneva Convention lists healthcare as one of the responsibilities of an occupying force, according to the Times. .
“Israel is willing to provide vaccines to Syrians outside their borders, but at the same time not to provide them to a massive occupied population for which they are legally responsible,” researcher Khaled Elgindy, a former Palestinian leadership adviser, told the newspaper. “That seems to be a signal that they are deliberately trying to avoid their legal responsibility to look after the well-being of that occupied population.
The Hill has contacted the Israeli Foreign Ministry for comment.