Executive Council of WHO rejects Israeli entity’s attempt to cancel provision on health conditions in the Palestinian territories and the occupied Syrian Golan

The Executive Council of the World Health Organization rejected a proposal made by the Israeli occupation entity to cancel the provision entitled “Health conditions in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, including East Jerusalem and in the occupied Syrian Golan” from the agenda of the next session of the World Health Assembly, as the proposal failed to obtain a majority due to opposition from 15 countries.

In a speech delivered before the vote at the 148th session of the Council, the permanent representative of Syria to the United Nations in Geneva, Ambassador Husam al-Din Aalla, noted  that the Israeli occupation authorities have continued since 1967 to prevent all fact-finding missions established by the United Nations from access to the occupied Syrian Golan to investigate the situation there and make recommendations regarding them.

In this regard, Ambassador Aalla underscored the preconditions and restrictions imposed by the occupying power on the organization’s mission to assess health conditions in the occupied Syrian Golan. The occupation  prevented it in the past from submitting an objective report based on a real assessment of the conditions on the ground. Since then, the occupation authorities have been preventing the organization from unconditional access to the people of the occupied Golan to assess their conditions and meet their humanitarian needs, especially during the Covid-19 pandemic.

Ambassador Aalla emphasized that null political statements, accusations and false allegations to surpass the legal obligations of the occupying power cannot veil the destructive practices of the occupation entity in the region.  Its attempts to hide behind false humanitarian masks will not succeed in concealing its direct logistical support for terrorist groups linked to Al Qaeda inside the Syrian territories under the pretext of humanitarian aid.

Ambassador Aalla described the Israeli proposal as “driven by political considerations that aim at practicing a  misleading policy  and present the case as if it were just a case of internal health emergency and not a health situation in occupied lands”.  But, the occupying power has to comply with specific legal obligations under international humanitarian law and relevant United Nations resolutions, including resolutions of the World Health Assembly and providing unconditional access to the occupied territories to survey the situation there.

For his part, the observer delegate of the State of Palestine, Ambassador Ibrahim Khreishi, called for compelling “Israel”, as the occupying power, to comply with legal obligations under international humanitarian law and the Fourth Geneva Convention, especially with regard to the health conditions of Palestinian prisoners in Israeli jails. He called for forcing Israel to stop its violations and practices, especially with regard to preventing the transfer of patients to hospitals in the West Bank and the demolition of clinics.

Inas Abdulkareem