About 20,000 doses of the Russian Sputnik V vaccine against Covid-19 arrived on Sunday, February 21, in the Palestinian enclave of Gaza, officials and witnesses said.

This shipment originated from the United Arab Emirates and was routed via the Rafah border with Egypt.

The vaccines are "intended for medical teams" in the Gaza Strip, said a group led by Palestinian Fatah dissident Mohammed Dahlan, who currently lives in exile in the Emirates.

He claims responsibility for this transfer.

Also special advisor to Crown Prince of Abu Dhabi Mohammed bin Zayed Al-Nahyane (MBZ), Mohammed Dahlan indicated last week that the Emirates would donate these vaccines to the Gaza Strip, a Palestinian territory under Israeli blockade.

The delivery of these vaccines, scheduled for last week, was finally postponed to Sunday.

And the vaccines entered Gaza via Rafah, a border post between this Palestinian territory and Egypt, an AFP team noted.

A first batch of 2,000 vaccine doses had already arrived on February 17 in the Gaza Strip, after the transfer by the Hebrew state was blocked.

The transfer had taken place at the request of the Palestinian Authority and with "the approval of the (Israeli) political level," said Cogat, the Israeli body responsible for civilian operations in the Palestinian Territories.

The Palestinian Authority, which sits in the West Bank, accused Israel of refusing entry of these vaccines into Gaza, an impoverished enclave of two million inhabitants.

Cogat had said, for its part, that the Palestinian request for entry of vaccines was "under examination and awaits a political decision".

The Islamist movement Hamas, in power in the Gaza Strip, had denounced it a "violation" of international law.

Decrease in hospitalizations in Gaza

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In Gaza, around 54,000 infections have been recorded since the start of the pandemic, including more than 500 deaths, but medical sources have reported a decrease in hospitalizations in recent weeks.

The delivery of anti-Covid vaccines from the United Arab Emirates, and under the claimed responsibility of Mohammed Dahlan, comes in a busy political context in the Palestinian Territories with the first legislative elections in 15 years scheduled for next May.

Analysts question the participation in this poll of elements favorable to Mr. Dahlan, who is an opponent of the President of the Palestinian Authority Mahmoud Abbas, originally from the Gaza Strip and who was excluded from the central committee of Fatah ten years ago for "corruption".

With AFP

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