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Dear journalists, politicians, media pundits, activists and anyone else who considers this report on #Gaza published yesterday by @CrisisGroup a reliable source, please read this thread and think again. It will require a deep dive into some details and numbers, so bear with me. https://twitter.com/CrisisGroup/status/1245344144962265090
2. The report's main conclusion is that to deal with #COVID in #Gaza Israel should "lift the blockade", Hamas should just carry on what it's doing and the Palestinian Authority... well, there's nothing it's asked to do. How detached this is from reality? Let's start with Israel.
3. Central in the report is the claim that "Israel's blockade" (it acknowledges Egypt also controls access to #Gaza but doesn't place any responsibility on it) has "crippled Gaza's health care sector". This quote of a WHO report is brought as the main proof for that:
4. The footnote for that line exposes how misleading it is. First, the WHO report cited is from 2009, but in 2010 the Israeli policy for restricting goods into Gaza changed dramatically from "nothing but essentials" to "everything but dual-use". That source is long outdated.
5. Maybe aware of the irrelevance of that source, the authors cite a @Beltrew report on a 2018 briefing where, according them, the UN "urged Israel to stop preventing the entry of humanitarian aid and medical supply" to #Gaza. But that UN briefing said something quite different.
6. In that 22 Aug 2018 brief the UN official called on "*all parties* to ensure" that humanitarian supplies reach Gaza. She never said Israel prevents them. Who is? Not long before that briefing Hamas prevented a shipment of such supplies to #Gaza: https://m.jpost.com/arab-israeli-conflict/hamas-turns-away-truckloads-of-israeli-humanitarian-aid-destined-for-gaza-556565/amp
7. Who else prevents medical supplies from Gaza? The @CrisisGroup report has a clear answer: the Palestinian Authority. Why doesn't it accuse the PA & Hamas for "crippling" Gaza's health sector or demand they stop those practices? Ask them. But what do they claim Israel stops?
8. Back to notorious footnote 17, which specifies only one item Israel "prevents": hydrogen peroxide. First, like other dual-use items, Israel doea permit it into Gaza with coordination to ensure it's not put to military use. But that's not the only problem with this example.
9. A quick search discovers that supply of H2O2 requires coordination with Israel also in the West Bank. In other words, it's not part of the "Gaza Blockade" just a monitoring of a dangerous susbstance. BtW, the UK also closely regulates its import even in lower potencies.
10. It gets worse: three weeks before @CrisisGroup released their report Israel sent 20 tons of disinfectants into #Gaza including... H2O2. Can't let facts spoil the argument when it's your only example 4 medical supplies "prevented" from Gaza by israel. https://m.jpost.com/middle-east/israel-delivers-disinfectant-to-west-bank-amid-coronavirus-outbreak-620574
11. Next bogus claim. Due to the "blockade, many medical staff have left" #Gaza. How do they know? Well, they don't. The footnote (see attached) mentions "estimates" of thousands who left, but cites only some @AJEnglish 2-min clip which doesn't mention medical staff at all.
12. Hard to know how many medical staff left Gaza since 2007, but not hard to find official PA stats online showing that in 2017 Gaza had many more doctors and nurses per capita than the West Bank.
Doctors:
WB - 1.4 (p/1000 ppl)
GS - 2.6
Nurses:
WB - 2.7
GS - 4.4
"Thousands"?
Doctors:
WB - 1.4 (p/1000 ppl)
GS - 2.6
Nurses:
WB - 2.7
GS - 4.4
"Thousands"?
13. Also regarding hospital beds, the report says there are only 1.3 beds p/1k ppl in Gaza without mentioning that the ratio in the West Bank is the same, 1.3. Of course more is needed in both, but clearly this shortage has nothing to do with "the blockade".
14. Also on that, the report claims that in "2014 alone Israeli fire destroyed 17 hospitals and clinics". No source given. So I searched for the UN's damage assessment: 1 hospital and 5 clinics destroyed. BUT more important, why not mention the abuse of such facilities by Hamas?
15. In general, Hamas enjoys complete impunity for its actions in this report. For example, it doesn't mention the frequent cases in which Hamas exploited movement of medical patients and goods for its terrorist activities against Israel. https://twitter.com/InqNative/status/1242212331351932930?s=19
16. It's legit to argue Israeli security screening of patients against that threat is excessive or too slow. But saying something about the PA preventing medical treatment from Gazans for purely political reasons? Sorry, not in this @CrisisGroup report. https://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/.premium-pa-keeping-gazans-from-medical-treatment-in-israel-1.5488669
17. Which leads to the last and perhaps most ridiculous point in this report. It calls on *Israel* to assist the construction of a field hospital for Gaza which ia what's it's been doing while the *PA* has been desperately trying to prevent it. https://m.jpost.com/israel-news/pa-opposes-construction-of-new-hospital-in-gaza-603036/amp
18. I could go on, but I think it's enough to show that this is not a serious report but just one of many attempts to use the #COVID crisis to spread falsehoods which invent Israeli blame where none exists and provide blanket impunity to Palestinian authorities for their actions.
19. There ARE shortages in Gaza for dealing with a #COVID outbreak - test kits, ventilators, masks, medicines, PPE - but none of those are blocked by Israel. Diverting attention from the actual blockages at a crucial time like this is not just unprofessional, it's immoral. END
