Palestinians excluded from Israel's vaccination drive, as millions in the occupied territory may wait months

Despite the fact that Israel has conducted a record-setting vaccination drive, having already vaccinated a tenth of the population, Palestinians in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and Gaza have yet to be involved in the process.

Batches of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccines have been dispatched to the West Bank, but they have only been distributed to Jewish settlers - depriving the nearly 2.7 million Palestinians in the territory.

Two weeks into the vaccination campaign, Israel has managed to administer more than 150,000 doses per day, with a million of its 9 million citizens already vaccinated over a short span of time; with people over 60, with pre-existing conditions and healthcare workers being prioritised.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has stated that the country could be the first to emerge from the pandemic, which he credited to the country's well-equipped and advanced healthcare system.

On the other hand, the cash-strapped Palestinian Authority, which maintains limited self-rule across its territories, is struggling to obtain vaccines, with Ali Abed Rabbo, the Director-General of the Palestinian Health Ministry, estimating that the first vaccines could potentially arrive in February.

Those vaccines would be acquired through a World Health Organization-led partnership called Covax, aimed at helping poorer countries, which has pledged to vaccinate 20% of Palestinians. However, vaccines intended for Covax have not yet gained “emergency use” approval by the WHO.

Despite this blatant disparity, the Palestinian authority has yet to officially ask for help from Israel, as coordination between the two sides halted after the Palestinian president cut off security ties for several months last year. However, Rabbo has mentioned that "sessions" with Israel have been held, adding that "Until this moment, there is no agreement, and we cannot say there is anything practical on the ground in this regard".

Israeli officials have suggested that they might provide surplus vaccines to Palestinians.

While Israelis could potentially return to some form of normality within the first three months of this year, Palestinians remain trapped by the virus.