GAZA CITY, Gaza Strip (AP) – A shipment of coronavirus vaccines organized by a rival of President Mahmoud Abbas arrived in the Gaza Strip on Sunday, boosting the blocked area’s vaccination efforts and embarrassing the Palestinian leader ahead of to the national elections.
The 20,000 doses of Russia’s Sputnik V, donated by the United Arab Emirates and hosted by Abbas rival Mohammed Dahlan, entered the Palestinian enclave through the border with Egypt. A container truck with a huge banner of Emirati leaders and a thank you message drove through the Rafah border crossing in the southern Gaza Strip.
The delivery came days after the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority, chaired by Abbas, managed to deliver just 2,000 doses of the same vaccine type to Gaza through Israel, which had delayed shipment for a few days. Sunday’s delivery appeared to be in part aimed at making Abbas’s government appear ineffective.
Dahlan, a former senior member of Abbas’s Fatah party, has been living in exile in Abu Dhabi since a falling out with the Palestinian leader in 2011.
Gaza has been ruled by the Islamist militant group Hamas since 2007, when it took control of the territory from Abbas’s forces.
Together, the vaccines are enough for 11,000 people, a small fraction of Gaza’s 2 million people. The Hamas-led Ministry of Health said the vaccination campaign will begin Monday with frontline medical workers and “ honorary dignitaries. ”
It estimated that Gaza needs 2.6 million doses to inoculate people 16 and older.
Dahlan, a former security chief of Abbas’s Fatah party, was forced to flee Gaza during the 2007 Hamas takeover. But in recent years, he has re-established ties with the group thanks to their shared animosity towards Abbas.
The Palestinians plan to hold their first parliamentary elections in 15 years in May. The vaccine deliveries are likely to improve Dahlan and his Fatah splinter group called the Democratic Reform Bloc in the vote.
Abbas has blocked Dahlan from taking part in the polls, but his group members plan to compete and position them as a potential kingmaker in the Hamas-Fatah election.
Gaza’s health authorities have reported more than 54,000 coronavirus infections and 543 deaths.
Israel has received international criticism for largely excluding Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza from its highly successful vaccination campaign.
Rights groups say it has a duty as an occupying force to share its vaccines with the Palestinians. Israel captured East Jerusalem, the West Bank and Gaza in the 1967 war, areas the Palestinians want for their future state.
Israel denies having such an obligation and says its own citizens have priority, as do Palestinians in Israel-annexed East Jerusalem. Under interim peace agreements, the Palestinian Authority is responsible for health care in the areas it manages.
Israel withdrew from Gaza in 2005 but has maintained a blockade with Egypt over the territory in an effort the plan says is to prevent Hamas from arming.